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Great Ocean Road Travel Blogs

Background: Aboriginal settlers arrived on the continent from Southeast Asia about 40,000 years before the first Europeans began exploration in the 17th century. No formal territorial claims were made until 1770, when Capt. James COOK took possession in the name of Great Britain. Six colonies were created in the late 18th and 19th centuries; they federated and became the Commonwealth of Australia in 1901. The new country took advantage of its natural resources to rapidly develop its agricultural and manufacturing industries and to make a major contribution to the British effort in World Wars I and II. In recent decades, Australia has transformed itself into an internationally competitive, advanced market economy. It boasted one of the OECD's fastest growing economies during the 1990's, a performance due in large part to economic reforms adopted in the 1980's. Long-term concerns include pollution, particularly depletion of the ozone layer, and management and conservation of coastal areas, especially the Great Barrier Reef.




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Camp dinner...
Camp dinner...
...this is just before we found out the camp had all those crazy facilities we mentioned!
The final leg of our time in Oz saw us visiting Kangaroo Island, Adeliade, the Great Ocean road and Melbourne...what a way to wrap it up! On KI we stayed on a farm and did a guided tour of the island, which consisted of seeing lots if wildlife (kangaroos, wallsbys, two different types of seals, echindas, and FINALLY a snake!! Oh and the cutest penguins ever! ). We also did sand surfing on huge sandunes and were the only pair who managed to stay on the 'sandboard' the whole way down! Woo, go team! Back on the mainland, and it was [View Full Entry]

Halpinda - David Halpin & Sarah O'Brien | Read The Full Entry | Subscribe
793 Words | 0 Comment(s) | 83 Photo(s) | 0 Video(s)
Published: February 26th 2009 | 140 Views | [diary=376300]

Sarahs Reaction to 23 Degrees on Kangaroo Isl!!
Must be love...
Last drinks in Oz

Base night club
Base night club
Ross's bday! (Me, Natalie, Louise, Ross)
So, yesterday I decided that I had worked quite hard for four whole days, and deserved the day off to see the Great Ocean Road. Sigh, I love international elective rotations... =) And what a trip it was! Louise, Natalie and I left our home at 6:30 am to start our journey (which was perhaps a bit easier said than done, since we stayed out until 2:00am the night before at a hostel/club called Base to celebrate Ross's birthday... free champagne for ladies or any man who DRESSED like a lady... yes, enough said). In any case, we were picked up [View Full Entry]

ArielP - Ariel Palanca | Read The Full Entry | Subscribe
529 Words | 0 Comment(s) | 8 Photo(s) | 0 Video(s)
Published: February 14th 2009 | 111 Views | [diary=373426]

Bells Beach
Bells Beach
Koala!

Great Ocean Road!
Great Ocean Road!
Renting our car in Melbourne, we had all of our camping gear ready and got on the road!
Jennie, Francisco and I rented a car in Melbourne to tour the Great Ocean Road! We had 5 nights and camped the entire way. It was one of the most beautiful roads we have ever been on and reminded me a lot of New Zealand's scenery. Driving along the coast, we saw so much wildlife - such as koalas, kangaroos, wallabies and kookaburra birds! We drove from one small town to the next and camped in the most beautiful sites. A lot of people can organize tours to do this kind of thing, but we decided to take our time and [View Full Entry]

EmandJennie - Emily and Jennie | Read The Full Entry | Subscribe
111 Words | 0 Comment(s) | 134 Photo(s) | 0 Video(s)
Published: February 12th 2009 | 244 Views | [diary=372825]

Francisco
Beautiful Sights!
Me, Fran and Jen

It seems like such along time ago we did this but i'm gonna try to remember everything we did!! We left Adelaide and first we had to head South to the coast, it looks really close on the map but like everything here its miles!! On route we camoed over night in the national park near Port Fairy. We were the only ones there and it was beautiful overlooking the beach. When we woke up, we were having our usual wash in a bucket from a cold tap when 3 emus ran past along the beach, as we were washing we [View Full Entry]

Steve and Jenny - Jennifer Bocock | Read The Full Entry | Subscribe
441 Words | 0 Comment(s) | 32 Photo(s) | 0 Video(s)
Published: February 5th 2009 | 50 Views | [diary=370548]

Beach where we saw the emus!
The Blue Lake at Mt Gambier
The Blue Lake at Mt Gambier

It is considered one of the top scenic drives in the world and we had heard it compared to the Pacific Highway along the coast of California before we embarked. With all the hype we had high expectations to say the least, but it lived up to them and more as we drove along the southern coast of Australia from Melbourne heading towards Adelaide. We headed out in our mini-van and had a leisurely breakfast on the coast in Torquay and an afternoon swim in Lorne. Keep in mind that as we started this journey the media was calling the weather [View Full Entry]

Matt and Heidi - Matt Harper, Heidi Barnes | Read The Full Entry | Subscribe
485 Words | 0 Comment(s) | 18 Photo(s) | 0 Video(s)
Published: March 16th 2009 | 132 Views | [diary=376917]

Cape Patton
The-geat-ocean- road-mobile
Koala

Es war Sonntagmorgen (21.12), 7Uhr in der Früh als ich wieder einmal anfing mein Hab und Gut in den Taschen zu verstauen und einem weiteren Zimmer des Greenhouse Backpacker den Rücken zuzukehren. Doch anders, wie es zuvor immer der Fall war, ging es nicht in einen anderen “Dorm-room” oder womöglich in ein anderes Hostel dieser Stadt. Nein! Es ging in die Wildnis. Weg von diesem öden Hostel, weg von dieser tristen Stadt, der ich leider Gottes schon viel zu viel Zeit gewidmet habe. Endlich einmal wenigstens für 34 Std. dem Alltagstrott entkommen, denn so lange würde unsere Reise entl [View Full Entry]

the lucky one - Benjamin Schottstedt | Read The Full Entry | Subscribe
2226 Words | 0 Comment(s) | 128 Photo(s) | 0 Video(s)
Published: January 27th 2009 | 73 Views | [diary=367494]

Photo 2
Photo 3
Photo 4

The 12 Apostles are surely the highlight of the entire Great Ocean Road. Well, that's what we thought until we hit the Grotto...which most tourists miss as they return to Melbourne after seeing the 12 Apostles. As we the GOR took us to the 12 Apostles, you could not see them from the road. There were huge parking lots to the right of the road and then a walkway took you to a scenic overlook. The parking lot was packed with buses and cars. What can you really say about the 12 Apostles...they are simply amazing! They are known as one [View Full Entry]

MizDownUnder - Miz | Read The Full Entry | Subscribe
475 Words | 0 Comment(s) | 5 Photo(s) | 0 Video(s)
Published: February 3rd 2009 | 85 Views | [diary=369837]

12 Apostles
Grotto Entrance
Grotto

Surf World
Surf World
world's largest surfing musuem
Our initial stop and where we picked up the Great Ocean Road was in Torquay. Torquay is home to Surf World, the world's largest surf museum. It was worth visiting, and we spent just over an hour there. It is open 9-5 everyday, so our 8:57am arrival was perfect. It was empty and we were able to peruse through the various surfboards and videos at our leisure. At the end of the SurfWorld tour, there is an information stand. The old lady there couldn't wait to give us the run down on what to do on the Great Ocean Road (GOR). [View Full Entry]

MizDownUnder - Miz | Read The Full Entry | Subscribe
434 Words | 0 Comment(s) | 2 Photo(s) | 0 Video(s)
Published: February 3rd 2009 | 46 Views | [diary=369830]

Surfers Bell's Beach

With Christmas 2008 already a mere memory, Carissa and I took to the open road again en-route to our next destination: Adelaide. We actually managed a head start this time as my sister and her husband had done a lot of the hard work for us, leaving the van at Avalon airport having toured the NSW and VIC east coast. First stop was the Geelong botanical gardnens where we walked through a desert garden thriving on very little water, before arriving at Torquay. Torquay is considered the birthplace of surfing in Australia and home to one of the most famous surf [View Full Entry]

jezzball - Jeremy & Carissa O | Read The Full Entry | Subscribe
942 Words | 0 Comment(s) | 10 Photo(s) | 0 Video(s)
Published: January 17th 2009 | 104 Views | [diary=364291]

The Official Start (just outside Torquay)
A sleepy local
One for the pool room

Chris woke up earlier than me today - no surprise there! So he went for a walk along the beach. When he got back we did some washing - joys of joys! But knowing it would dry within an hour as it was sooo hot! By 10am it was too hot to be even in the sun! We then went to the park where the lakes were and sat under a tree with an ice-lolly.... we were waiting to go to the cinema. It was going to be too hot to be outside during 11 - 3 so we thought what [View Full Entry]

Tufty - Emma Loades | Read The Full Entry | Subscribe
398 Words | 0 Comment(s) | 4 Photo(s) | 0 Video(s)
Published: January 29th 2009 | 21 Views | [diary=368221]

The red Coats
Three men singing on the street!
Gold panning