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Published: April 30th 2015
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Phillip Island Day nine - 45km driven: Our first proper day in Phillip Island was pretty torrential rain! But we didn't have enough time to sit around and feel sorry for ourselves so off we went. A stop at the ever helpful info centre made planning our day quite easy. We booked tickets for the Koala Conservation Centre (I'm sure you can guess what we saw here ...) and also tickets for Phillip Island's famed penguin parade. More on this later.
The conservation centre was great, it was home to loads of species not just koala's and we managed to learn a bit more about their natural habitat and mannerisms. We also got up close and personal with our first Wallaby (a less cool Kangaroo in my opinion) which was cool! We spotted another few Koalas although they were all sleeping - they kip for 19 hours every day so it wasn't a massive surprise.
Our next stop was at the very tip of the island at the Nobbies where on a clear day you can see a large colony of fur seals. It wasn't a clear day so the $2 I spent on
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Not what we signed up for! the binoculars wasn't exactly well spent. We did see a pretty spectacular blow hole on our coastal walk due to the wind and crashing waves.
The most eagerly anticipated part of the day was the penguin parade (it makes Edinburgh Zoo's look less than amateur). The smallest species of penguins in the world naturally come in every night from the sea and make their way to land. It's amazing! These tiny penguins come crashing in with the waves, waddle ashore and typically get spooked so sprint back to the sea a few times. Eventually they walk along the beach and straight past the fence we were standing at. We saw hundreds of penguins all going right in front of us, definitely worth the cash and highly recommended by the 4 of us.
Day ten - 225km driven:
We packed up the van and headed off to Wilsons Promontory (Wilsons Prom) with a quick detour to our campsite for the night. Our first stop was 'Squeaky Beach' - no prizes for guessing what this sand does! It was pretty impressive and definitely an upgrade on your usual sand.
Kerry
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Wilsons Prom was our resident walk chooser and she absolutely nailed it in Wilsons Prom. It was called Mount Oberon and was roughly 3.4km all uphill for about an hour. It was incredible. We had 360 degree views of the whole national park on the top of a mountain - as far as views go this was pretty impressive.
Day eleven - 276km: Another early rise and a drive to Bairnsdale was on the cards for us and we stopped at an old famous church. The guy volunteering and telling us about the place was an Italian immigrant Bruno. He was great, telling us all about his boat trip 60 years before to get to Australia with his family.
Again the info centre was amazing and recommended we go to Raymond Island to see some Koala's. This was an inspired shout by Alan - we managed to see over 15 koalas. And some of them weren't even sleeping!
Lakes Entrance was our stop for the night and we risked it a bit and parked in a carpark for the night. It had recently been trialled for free camping and we
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Wilsons prom - Oberon Mountain view! thought it would come naturally to play dumb should anything happen. It ended up being Novo and I's favourite campsite with some incredible sunset views and millions of stars.
Day twelve - 249km driven:
Our first stop was a chocolate shop at 9am - as you do. It was amazing to be fair and according to the owner was pretty healthy (gluten free and everything!). Our night stop was a small town in Eden - where Novo bought a fishing rod and tried to catch us dinner. He managed to catch a seaweed stick but no fish.
Day thirteen - 109km driven:
This was a bit of a whistle stop day driving through Merimbula and stopping at the beach, going through a few towns and walking around. Our stop for the night was Bermagui, which had a lake at the campsite for Novo to fish for dinner. This time he did catch something but fishing etiquette dictates throwing your first catch back. He should have kept it. No more bites for the night.
Day fourteen - 176km driven:
Fishing round
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Batemans bay cathedral three. Novo managed to catch 3 fishes and that was dinner sorted. Another day of driving around small beach towns and visiting some landmarks like natural ocean swimming pools. Our campsite for the night was in Ulladulla, which had its own beach and some famous fish and chip places. We had our treat meal for the trip which was a good old chippy. No chippy sauce, hake instead of boring old cod and it was cracking!
Day fifteen - 138km driven:
One last day fishing for Novo saw him breaking his rod. You buy cheap you buy twice and all that...
A quick trip to Mollymook to stop at a great beach (and next to Nick Nairn's fish restaurant)! Our campsite for the night was pretty crap but we had managed to get to day 15 with no complaints. We drove up the craziest, windiest road ever built to see another amazing view on top of Camberwarra mountain.
Novo and Kerry tried very hard to get a fire going and to be fair did a stellar job but unfortunately the wet wood and leaves made it tricky. After
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Sam and Kerry the Koalas - Raymond island a good bash at a fire and with it slowly dwindling a group of people next to us asked us over to join them. It was a crazy mix of people including a 40 year old irish guy, a few americans, some brits and a spaniard. We sat round the fire, drank beer and sang some songs. After a few too many, I stepped into the lake with my shoes still on and decided that meant bed time. The guys stayed out and kept drinking into the small hours.
Day sixteen - 87 very hungover km driven: Drinking is not clever. A very hungover 4 travellers got up early and went to Maccas (McDonald's in Oz). This helped a lot. Luckily it was my turn to drive (yay). Today we headed to Hyams beach - the whitest sand in the world - which was a pretty big highlight. Another quick stop in Huskisson for a coffee and a wander before we got to our free campsite for the night.
I had found this place online and thought it was too good to be true - a free campsite on
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A real live Koala - Raymond island sealed roads and on the right route. It was brilliant, they had flushing toilets (luxury right?), security and wombats wandering around everywhere.
Day seventeen - 120km driven:
We were close to the end now and to be honest were ready to not be sleeping in the van! We drove to Wollongong (apparently the Dundee of Australia ...). This was our last night and had very little plans. We visited a Buddhist temple which was beautiful and unlike anything either of us had seen before (not being Buddhists and all) and a nice thing to do for a quiet chill.
A few beers and an early bed for our last night.
Day eighteen - 109km driven:
LAST DAY - we made it. A quick drive to Sydney and drop the girls off in Bondi. Novo and I had the pleasure of getting the van washed, filling it with petrol and handing it back. The girls lay on Bondi beach in 30 degree sun.
We had a few issues in the hostel but made it in one piece and were ready to
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View from our car park campsite at lakes entrance see what Sydney had to offer.
So that was that. 18 days, 1 van, 3 states, 4 pals (still all pals!) and 3,713km later. #roadtrippin'
Until next time xxxxxxxxxxx
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