The Grampians
From Kangaroo Island we started the drive to Victoria. We were keen to drive as much as we could after getting off the ferry but with the tent you really have to be pitched by dark. We spent the night in a town called Keith – this struck me as a rather strange name for a town. In the morning we were up bright and breezy, caught up on the chores in Horsham and collected the tourist info and headed for the Grampians.
Mt Stapleton was our first walk. This was another walk without a path- just a series of markers on the rock. Similar to the Flinders Ranges the hillsides (or ridges) are tilted layers of sedimentary rock, so that one side of the hill is a smooth steady slope but the other side has definite ridges. Unlike the Flinders Ranges the rock was grey and the area around it was green with trees and shrubs. It was a steady rock hop to the top with a very bizarre bird shaped rock half way up. The marked path seemed to end just below the summit. The views were good and Phil started to snap away with the camera. I wanted to get to the summit, so I took a rather unorthodox route to the very top but Phil didn’t want to follow – however it meant that I found the proper marked path for Phil to come up (and for us both to go down). The view was pretty special; possibly even worth the climb, looking south to the Grampians and north along the ridge and out to the plains beyond. As 1 walk is clearly not enough for an afternoon we then climbed Hollow Mountain – this was a lower peak on the same range but had some good caves to explore (gaps underneath very large boulders).
The main town in the Grampians is Halls Gap and we stayed in the campsite that night. It was a pretty noisy campsite with flocks of cockatoos; galahs and of course a fair few laughing kookaburras. There was a large mob of kangaroos grazing the grass in the early evening – as soon as we checked in I wanted to go and have a look at them. Phil still can’t believe that I’m not all kangaroo’d out.
The next day we walked from Halls Gap, up a ravine up to an area called ‘Wonderland’. For goodness sake – Wonderland is almost as bad as “Surfer’s Paradise” for silly names! The walk up to the Wonderland car park was pretty uneventful – another unique opportunity to see the Australian bush recovering from fire. The walk around the summit of Wonderland was one of the best walks I’ve done in Oz for a while. You walked up through an area called the ‘Grand Canyon’ – again the name is a little grandiose but the area was pleasing enough (it just wasn’t on as Grand a scale as you’d think from the name). The path cut across open rock to ‘Silent Street’ this was a perfectly straight canyon about 2 stories deep and 2m wide and about 75m long (and out of the sun) which was pretty impressive. All of this was gradually climbing up to “The Pinnacle”. This was the top of the range looking down onto Halls Gap town and out over the flat farmed wheat plains of Victoria. As you looked out in the far distance there was still a mist with the southern Grampians cutting through. In the near distance it was very obvious where the national park ended and the private land began – a definite line of green breaking to the dry yellow of the fields. It’s crazy to think that only 200 years ago the woodlands would have stretched out for as far as the eye could see.
Great Ocean Road
From Halls Gap we cut down to the Great Ocean Road at Portland. The campsite faced the Southern Ocean and we camped under a bush to protect us from the prevailing winds. The next morning we went out to explore Cape Bridgewater. It had some bizarre rock formations that looked like fossilised trees. We then walked out to the Cape and had a look at the seal colony down below us.
We spent a couple of days trundling along the Great Ocean Road taking in some of the sights and towns we’d missed before and revisiting a couple of others. We stopped at the 12 Apostles again, which is the famous view on the Great Ocean Road, and amazingly Phil only took ONE photo – even he conceded that the light was wrong. We were hoping to walk up to some of the waterfalls behind Lorne. We walked up to She-oak falls (600km in 30 minutes according to the sign) and were disappointed to find a dry gully with a dry cliff at the back and a murky pool below. I guess the summer isn’t the season for waterfalls in Victoria!
Melbourne
From the Great Ocean Road we drove to Melbourne to stay with our friends Clare and Michael. Clare really wanted to go to the cricket and we were cajoled into going as it was a cheap and cheerful 20/20 match and it was at the MCG (Melbourne Cricket Ground). It is the Australian sporting mecca and holds about 105,000. We saw Australia vs India. There were 84,041 people in attendance. It was the first time either of us had been to a cricket match and I was unsure of the rules. 20/20 is a little bit more rowdy than a test match with music played between balls and it’s a lot faster than a normal match. I was just getting into it and had just grasped the rules when it was all over. India got annihilated.
We’ve been to visit Clare and Michael a couple of times but we’d always had some particular activity planned, so we had not really had chance to explore Melbourne. On Saturday we borrowed Clare and Michael’s bikes and bike map and headed off by ourselves. Melbourne is a much more bike friendly city than Sydney – there are bicycle lanes; bikes are free on the trains, and most importantly the city of Melbourne is flat! We cycled along the front at Williamstown; got a punt across the river under the Westgate bridge (which dominates the nearby skyline) and then cycled along the front of the bay to St. Kilda. We lunched in St. Kilda and then cycled into the city. We didn’t spend too long in the city; by the time we’d completed our chores it was time to head back to C&Ms. Clare and Michael had collected a visiting pom friend (Sam) from the airport and we joined them for an evening game of beach cricket before heading back home for a BBQ and a birthday cake.
Great Ocean Road – Day trip
Michael tabled a number of itineraries for the Sunday and the winner was the Great Ocean Road again – but a slightly different twist to our visit. We first called in to the golf course at Lorne so Sam could see a kangaroo. He took a photo from the car…and was then amazed at how close you can get. He wanted to see them bounce so Phil and Michael kindly obliged and ran at a couple of them!
We hired kayaks at Anglesea. Rather than tootling round the lagoon we kayaked under the road bridge (watching our heads) and explored the wetlands that were just inland. The bloke we hired them from explained there was an island we could circumnavigate. It was like a mini Kakadu though we had to disturb a few fishermen. It was all going well until we came to a rope swing over the waterway…we couldn’t resist. We are 27 going on 7!! We pulled our kayak up on the far bank and swam across, then took it in turns to swing and jump into the water! It was a bit of a power paddle to get the kayaks back – in fact we were probably about 20 minutes late but luckily they didn’t seem to mind.
We then went to Aireys Inlet and Split Point lighthouse – which IS the “Going Round the Twist” light house (childrens TV program). We did the cliff walk and watched the surfers not doing much surfing – they were waiting for the right wave apparently. Clare had a new camera and became paparazzi Clare for the day. We then did the lighthouse guided tour. This was another lighthouse where the interior was pre-fabricated in Birmingham – bizarre. We got some good photos from the top. The day out was finished off with a big chunk of tasty cake at the lighthouse café, then a bit more beach cricket. For Sunday dinner Clare had offered to cook us anything we wanted. As we’ve been camping for the last 3 months it had to be something in the oven. She prepared a massive lasagne which was easily demolished by 5 of us. I’m a little bit worried what she’ll ask for when I return the favour.
Morwell and Wilsons Promontory National Park
On the Monday we drove out to Morwell, to the East of Melbourne, to say Hi to Phil’s Auntie Anne and Uncle David. From here we did a 2-day trip to Wilsons Prom. The leaflet we were given only had walks up to 6km and we felt like something a little more energetic. The lady at the visitors centre recommended the walk to Sealers Cove. Off we went….it was 10km each way. The first section went over a saddle. It was a 300m descent through forest (with nice fern gullies) and finally a 1.8km boardwalk across to the beach. The beach was lovely – the sky had brightened and the sun was shining. To our left were the remains of a jetty: photogenic remains, just above the waterline rather than scruffy remains. To our right a tannin-stained stream came down to the beach and the area was strewn with boulders. The beach was enclosed by thickly forested granite mountains. It was reminiscent of Freycinet Peninsula (in Tassie) but possibly even prettier. Wilsons Prom is the end of the land bridge that used to join Tasmania to mainland Australia, so it could well have been the same mountain range? We had a picnic lunch at the beach and a paddle and then headed back. The walk back was not so much fun – I hadn’t really noticed the down on the outward trip but I definitely noticed the up. A young echidna brought a little bit of interest to the walk. As did a sudden ‘Eeek’ from Phil – our foot steps had disturbed a snake and he’d darted across the path between Phil’s legs (while Phil was in motion).
I’d promised we’d climb up Mt Oberon if it was still clear when we got back to the car. We’d walked 20km; I was tired and grumpy and Phil still made me go up Mt Oberon. It wasn’t really a climb. The walk was along a well graded management road – it was always up but never steep. By the time we reached the top the sun had gone and the clouds were rolling in again. The bay and the islands below us were still in light and hopefully we should have some rather good photos. It was 7pm by the time we got to camp that night. We were carefully watched by our own flock of seagulls as we prepared; cooked and ate dinner. We did get to see a wombat in the campsite that night, but despite the warning signs I don’t think he seemed particularly aggressive.
It rained through the night and the next morning it was still raining. We checked the forecast at the visitors centre: rain with patches of occasional drizzle. I’d linked together a few shorter walks for a good figure-of-8 hike, but I didn’t really fancy it in the rain (plus I was still tired from our 27km epic the day before). The campsite was located behind Normans Beach, so after breakfast, brollies in hand, we went to have a look at that and the mouth of Tidal River. We then did the Lilly Pilly Gully circular walk (not Silly Billy as Phil wanted to call it) as this was sheltered by the trees. The rain was intermittent so we were able to make a dry dash for Squeaky Beach but unfortunately wet sand doesn’t squeak. We were hoping to go to Picnic Bay for lunch but it was misnamed so we had lunch in the car at a lookout. Picnic Bay was similar to Squeaky beach. They were both nice beaches but rather unappealing in the drizzle. We then headed back to Morwell in time for tea.
We’ve spent the last few days working through our finally leaving Oz/preparing for Africa chore list. I don’t know if we’ve had a lot to do or if we’ve just been particularly inefficient?! We fly out to Cape Town tomorrow and we’re both very excited now. We’re ready for a change of scenery…
