Great Ocean Road Trip - Part 2

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Our lovely journey along the Great Ocean Road continued on to Port Fairy. It was once a busy trading port which reached its peak during the 1850s and exported items such as bales of wool, gold and bushels of wheat. Today the port is still active but the main trade is quite different, being crayfish, shark and abalone and also a small fleet of leisure craft. Just off the mainland is Griffiths Island, accessible over a small bridge which was named after John Griffiths who established Port Fairy’s whaling industry, which, thank goodness, doesn’t exist today. The island is mainly known for its large colony of Mutton Birds which arrive in late September from the Aleutian Islands (near Alaska) for a bit of warmth - sounds sensible to me. After laying and incubating their eggs in January they leave again in April.

On arrival at the hostel the owner informed us that if we walked over to Griffiths Island at dusk, around 9.30 pm, we would see the Mutton Birds coming back to their burrows for the evening. So we duly set off not really knowing what to expect, but were absolutely astounded when, at just after the due time, literally thousands of birds came from nowhere to settle in for the night. They manage to locate their burrow, which contains a chick, and then they circle it for a few times before coming in to land. What was weird was how quiet it all was, we at least expected to hear the squawking of the chicks announcing to their parents where they were, but it was absolutely still save the sound of frantically beating wings disturbing the air around us. Absolutely stunning thing to see and to top it all off there were also Wallabies just walking around the island totally oblivious to us gawping spectators. A totally mind-blowing evening and we were grateful that we witnessed it. The only down side is the high mortality rate amongst the birds from various predators and this we also witnessed the following day when we decided to take a walk on the island before the heat got too fierce. Scattered around were the bodies of adult birds and chicks alike: all part of nature’s great plan but very sad.

With only two days left on the road trip the next destination would be the small town of Robe, with a brief stop at Bridgewater and Portland. The latter because we felt we just had to in order to see whether it compared favourably to the original. Portland, Australia, is an industrial town and much larger than the one we are used to seeing. It also had another major difference; the weather was hitting 44 degrees! The drive today was a long one and so there was no real time to stop and look around for too long, so we left Portland Mk 2 (or 10) and continued on our way. Unlike the Great Ocean Road, with beautiful waterfront scenery, this drive was significantly different with views of flat, brown grass interspersed every now and again with some slight rolling countryside - a bit boring and only made somewhat more interesting when the Garmin tried to send us down unmade dirt tracks which it was convinced were major roads - maybe they were.

The overnight stop was in Robe, whose history included the exporting of wool, tallow and sheepskins to Europe and horses to the Indian Army. It was also adventurous in its marketing (as they say here, but could be described as downright fibbing) as their canning factory used to can swans which they marketed as Robe Geese and Parrots which were marketed as Robe Snipe and Rabbits - yum! As Robe declined due to poor agricultural seasons, falling wool prices and railway construction it became what it is today a quiet little country village. We felt we had to mention here the YHA we were staying in, Lakeside Manor YHA, which is simply the best one we have stayed in so far on our travels. This is due mainly because it is in a building which dates back to the 1880s and has high ceilings, huge rooms and original Italian marble fireplaces and other original pieces. It was built by an Englishman, Sir George Danby, who was disowned by his family and sent to Australia because he was a gambler and a drunk (not really that unusual for a Yorkshire man). When his family died he inherited the whole estate and, after living back in England for a while, decided that he missed Aus so much that he promptly dismantled everything from the family home and transported it here. A great place, accommodating and friendly owners and if anyone is in the vicinity and needing somewhere to stay we would certainly recommend it.

A hot and sticky evening awaited us, but there was some relief in sight as, after the hot muggy weather, came the rain. The following day we left Robe for the last part of the road trip to Adelaide. It was over a 400 km drive and all of it was in the rain and a dramatic drop in temperature, from 44 the day before to about 19 degrees today. Once again the scenery was fairly bland, consisting of more flat, brown prairies, but you could just imagine that grass lapping up the rain and we wondered how much it would take to transform it into lush pastures.

Although more than 40,000 years ago, the Kaurna Aboriginal people settled the Adelaide Plains, calling it Tandanya, which means ‘place of the red kangaroo’, the City of Adelaide was founded in 1836, being named after King William’s popular wife. A fact, which I am sure the Adelaide citizens are proud of, is that their ancestors were not taken from the many convicts originally sent by Britain to Australia, but were free settlers. We arrived at the Adelaide YHA early afternoon and made straight for China Town and some lunch. Lots of cheap places to eat and we settled for an all you can get on your plate for $6 and boy could we get a lot on the plates. Very nice and it fortified us for a brief walk around the main part of the city in order to get a feel for the place. We walked to the main shopping area which was quite impressive and then on through the Botanical Gardens, which opened its gates on North Terrace Boulevard in 1857, and along by the Universities of Adelaide (which was the first in Australia to open its doors to women in 1880) and South Australia - bit of competition going on. Adelaide centre is basically a big square, surrounded by terraces on each side, and it’s got a similar feel to Southampton. It is a really nice small city and there’s probably enough to keep you busy for weeks, especially if you start to tour SA’s fab wine regions nearby. But as our time was limited we had to concentrate on the centre only. It was on North Terrace that some of the loveliest buildings we’ve seen in Australia are located. The Museums, Art Galleries, Parliament Buildings and Government House are testament to a city dedicated to preserving its history while also allowing some very impressive modern structures (like the water board building) to shine. The older buildings had been beautifully preserved and the modern architecture, often consisting of vast amounts of glass, was seamlessly slotted in-between creating an interesting fusion of old and new. Rundle Mall is a nice large pedestrianised mall that is quite city generic but fringed on both ends by small cafes, bars and niche shops. The fact that the city can put all its headline stores in a few blocks tells you all you need to know about the size of Adelaide but don’t let size put you off. It has a pleasant, relaxed feel to it, difficult for a successful city to achieve. The streets were wide and clean and the buildings were an interesting conglomeration of old and new. Later in the evening Chris enjoyed a few drinks with the aforementioned Rodger, a friend from work in the UK and part-time travel advisor who had upped sticks and moved to Aus a few years ago, while Lisa, feeling the effects of the large lunch, decided to chill instead.

The following day the weather was back to being warm, although not the mid 40’s of earlier, and, after much debate, we decided to go the Adelaide Zoo as they had a new addition of two Giant Pandas, Wang Wang and Funi. Firstly, let me apologise to those of you reading the blog who hate zoos, I was hoping that it would be modern, educational and generous with its space for the animals. Well, it is trying but some of the enclosures, namely those for the big cats, looked inadequate and left us with the feeling that maybe we shouldn’t have come. However, I don’t remember having seen Giant Pandas before and they were beautiful, cuddly (!) and obviously didn’t give two hoots about being stared at. The only thing which could better it would be to see them living free in their natural habitat. The evening was topped off with us meeting another two of Chris’ ex-work colleagues, Bill and John - seems like a bit of a QinetiQ migration - for a great dinner, drinks, reminiscing and a bitching session. However we couldn’t stay out too long as our flight to Perth the following morning was at an unbelievably early time, which meant an early bus trip for us. Perth, and our holiday within a holiday, here we come.

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Photos

Griffiths Island
And all good Islands have a lighthouse

Fraggle Rock
Bigger than the original and the sheep have got tails ....

University of South Australia
or it could be Adelaide Uni.. impressive anyway.

History Protected
Adelaide seems rightly proud of its heritage

Feeding Station
Taking street art to the limit

Compare the Market
No, Compare the Meerkat ... simples eh

Giant Panda
They look so cute, but you wouldn't want to play.

Dinner Time
Surely Bamboo gets a bit boring.

Reunion
Would any of these 3 rather be back at Winfrith???

Big Beast
And they call this a pygmy!

Watch out Road Runner
Here's the real Tasmanian Devil (mad!)

Lurking
Or just soaking up the sun.

Comments

[Anna Q]

Nice muscle vest:)