Our tour was meant to depart at 7am from the hostel... at about 7:15am, there was a phonecall to say it had been delayed for "at least 45 minutes"... unfortunately by this point it was too late to spend that time sleeping (:-() so instead I befriended the only two other people crazy enough to be up so early on a Saturday morning... who I correctly presumed were waiting for the same thing as me!!! Therefore, the next few hours were spent playing pool as we waited for the bus...
As we were making up for our late start, our first day was a little mad - basically just alot of driving (or sleeping for the majority of us!), interspersed with the occasional clamber on and off the bus, mainly for the purpose of eating or photography!!! That evening our group 'took over' a hostel in the Grampians, we cooked dinner and then were all pretty anti-social it has to be said, as we collapsed in front of the TV to watch tennis!
However, after a much required decent night's sleep, we woke early to complete a hike in the Grampians. The scenery was pretty awesome, although at the very highest point of our hike, the visability was shocking (so we admittedly had to rely on pictures to describe the exact view at this point!!!) After heading back to the bus (or in Es's case... sliding back to the bus!!) we headed off towards the Great Ocean Road (which is pretty self-descriptive in that it's the road which winds directly along the edge of the coast!). We arrived at the beach hut we were residing in that evening (in a small seaside resort), pretty early and therefore had about 4hours to waste before heading to the Twelve Apostles for sunset... the English contingent of our party were corrupted by the Dutch (although they might say it was the other way round!) and we sat on the veranda overlooking the beach, eating fajitas and having a few 'quiet' drinks before heading off for sunset on a rollercoaster mini-bus ride.
Although sunset was a little disapointing (the sun disappeared behind clouds a few minutes before it would have set!!) it was good to see the Apostles that haven't been beaten into shrapnel by the tide, before heading back to the village and the one existing bar.
Our final day, as we approached Melbourne, we saw some great beaches, lots more rock formations, ventured into the sea (briefly!! Despite my best efforts I couldn't persuade anyone else in my group to have much of a go - admittedly, there probably was risk of frost bite after 10 minutes or so it was sooo cold!!!) and partook in some tasty fish and chips for lunch (it really did seem like a day out at Whitley Bay!!!) At one point a few of us ventured for a short walk through an area of rain forest... short because we ran, and incase the foliage wasn't indicative of a rain forest... the weather was!!! Torrential!!!
As always, no tour would be complete without an end of tour night out, and it was a good excuse to explore Melbourne (by night!), therefore I let Becky and Es do a good job of corrupting me to party through until the early hours in some of Melbourne's er... finest establishments?!?
