The Great Ocean Road

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Just woke up and decided to write a bit seeing as I actually got out of Melbourne for a day yesterday. Me and Jess (a friend I met in Byron Bay) took a tour down the Great Ocean Road. It was brilliant, really scenic. It's amazing how long the drive is and how long we actually took to do it. The tour started at 7:30am and ended at 9:30pm!

We started off at the famous Bells Beach which is where the surf brand 'Ripcurl' was made. This part of the coast is where all the surf competitions are held, which was pretty cool to see, although the waves were intense! Then we hit the Great Ocean Road, not before a photo opportunity in front of the memorial at the start, although whole road is actually a memorial to those who died in World War 1. In fact, it was built by the soldiers who came back from war as a way to re-integrate them back into Australian society. The rest of the day was filled with lots of stops at scenic points, towns, for a rainforest walk, koala spotting and even an ad hoc dolphin spotting for ten minutes or so as our guide happened to see them leaping out of the water quite a way off the coast (although with the twisty twiny route across clifftops I was hoping he was paying more attention to the road than the ocean!) The final stops were the Twelve Apostles and London Bridge - both natural rock formations. The definite highlight for me was a helicopter ride over the Apostles. I'm not sure whether I was more excited about the view or that I was in a helicopter, but it was such a great experience! Constantly flying in planes, it was cool to experience the different sensation of taking off vertically and it's definitely something I'd like to do again. Oh, and the view was spectacular too!

For the drive back to Melboure we were given PSPs to watch a film on. I chose 'Rabbit Proof Fence' as I'd never seen it before and thought it was quite topical seeing as I'm in Australia. It was good, but makes me realise how shameful the English were in the past. There's certainly a lot of history here in Australia and I'm sure I'll learn a lot more about it as I travel in the more remote areas next year.

I've started planning my onward travel from Melbourne with my current thought being to leave in mid-January. I love it here in Melbourne, but there's just so many amazing trips that I want to do that I just can't wait to get going! I think it'll be a good idea to stay put and celebrate Christmas and New Year with friends here and then move on when everyone else settles back into a normal routine.

The apartment I'm staying in here in St Kilda is really interesting. We learned that it used to be some kind of mental respite home or something along those lines. So every two of the apartments are adjoined. I think we're in what would have been a carer's room and our neighbour's would have been the patient. When we viewed the apartment there was a door hidden behind a bureau/desk thing which I tried to open and the landlord quickly told me it was locked and I thought nothing more of it. On moving in, it didn't take long to find out where the door led - into our neighbour's bathroom! There's actually one crazy resident who perhaps was left over from the previous building use! She's this French woman who seems to be in the corridors more than her apartment. She will rant on to anyone and everyone about how she's a mature woman and hates backpackers and thinks they've ruined Australia and how she just wants to meet a mature man to take to Montreal with her. She always catches me just as I'm heading to work and I end up standing there and nodding and agreeing with her backpacker condemnation, even though I know full well she knows I'm a backpacker as she's been in the apartment and seen my backpack! We have a courtyard outside the bedroom window and in the evening there are often people drinking and talking which doesn't bother me as I can sleep through it. Without fail, crazy Frenchy will open her window and shout a tirade of abuse which then wakes everyone up. One night her face appeared at the corner of our window telling us to be quiet at 10pm! She's been saying that she's desperate to leave the three weeks we've been here, but secretly I think she enjoys the attention of too many well-meaning backpackers who just don't have the heart to tell her to piss off! On the positive side, she buys pretty much every magazine going and one day insisted that Jess take all her old ones which gave us enough reading for at least a week!

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Photos

Bell's Beach
The home of surf

The start
of the Great Ocean Road

Jess'
new friend

Look
It's a Koala

Me
as a Koala

Take-off
(vertically)