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Day 64 - 71
On flying to Melbourne we both got ‘randomly’ selected to have our clothes and bags swabbed for drugs. Of course, both were clear so we were sent on our merry way.
Unfortunately our flight was delayed so in order to try and make up the time the pilot didn’t climb as high as usual so we could fly low and fast, which meant more turbulence and a very unpleasant flight.
Arriving in Melbourne the city was absolutely heaving with people. In our few days in the city we:
visited the Shrine of Remembrance and were amazed by the heartfelt tribute to those that had fallen
strolled in the Botanical gardens, (got to visit one in every city!)
satisfied our cravings for jacket potatoes
used free internet at the library
marvelled at the random mix of modern and historic architecture
visited a huge casino where Jake managed to win $235 from a $5 bet after a lucky gamble on a wheel of fortune type game
chilled out on the southbank, watching buskers and magicians
Then we picked up a hire car, a little Hyundai Getz and tried to find our way out of the city
without paying a toll. Unfortunately map reading, hire cars and Websters don’t really mix and there were a few strong words, some shouting and stoney silences before we were finally on the right road!
The next few days were spent driving the Great Ocean road and beyond to Adelaide. Along the way we:
Stopped at many, many view points
Stopped in the town of Lorne, which was very pretty and the sun came out for us to have a walk on the beach
Saw Erksine falls, but these were nothing compared to the falls we had seen in NZ
Saw a snake when we were walking along the road to Teddy’s lookout, but luckily it was dead
Stayed over night in a small cabin in Apollo Bay where we enjoyed fish and chips and it rained so hard at night that the noise on the cabin roof kept us awake
Visited Cape Otway lighthouse when it was really really windy and nearly got blown off the top. This lighthouse was built to reduce the number of ships that were wrecked whilst trying to navigate between Oz and Tasmania and was one of the first things that people arriving
in Oz would see after 100 days at sea.
Saw some wild koalas in the trees lining the road to the lighthouse
Saw the infamous 12 Apostles rock formations, although there aren’t 12 anymore
Did some short walks to see Lock Ard Gorge, a blowhole, The Arch and London Bridge. These are all rock formations similar in style but different shapes and were good to see but started getting a bit repetitive!
Ate some scones and cream in Port Campbell
Saw more rocks at the Bay of Martyrs
Drove round and round Port Fairy trying to find somewhere reasonably priced to stay and ended up getting a bargain at the YHA
Saw some wild wallabies on Griffiths Island
Did a really long walk to see a seal colony at Cape Bridgewater
Saw some ‘petrified trees’ that weren’t really trees, but were in fact rocks formed by various minerals, salt, water, wind and rain that supposedly looked like trees
Stayed in a cabin in Hall’s Gap in the Grampians that had a log fire, so Jake could put his manly fire skills to good use, although he actually put too many logs on, as it soon got way too hot and
we had to open the door!
Did a few walks around the Grampians to see the various rock formations and viewpoints, we even saw a couple get married overlooking the rocky mountains.
Amy had a few too many glasses of wine and dropped her wine bottle on the floor in one YHA, but luckily it didn’t smash!
We got sucked into watching Australia’s Got Talent which was fairly amusing
Arriving in Adelaide we struggled to find cheap accommodation and ended up staying one night in a Bavarian cabin in the German esque village of Hahndorf, just outside of Adelaide city. We only had one day in Adelaide, most of which was spent on the internet in the public library trying to sort out other bits of our trip and we also went to the Thai consulate to talk about visas, but they needed more than one day to sort them out, so we would have to leave that until a later date to organise.
As is customary we visited the Botanical gardens, which were very nice but we wished we had longer to explore the city as a whole.
One funny thing that happened was that we didn’t
realise that when we crossed from one state into another there was a time difference of half an hour. We even thought Amy’s watch had stopped working, as it had a different time to that on the library clock!
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