Continuing along the Great Ocean Road, the coast changes from the surf-battered wild scenery to coves and beaches with more rideable waves. The road hugs the coast coast more here, so the only way both of us can enjoy the scenery is to stop and walk along the cliff tops and beaches.
Lorne has a lovely wide sweeping beach with gentle waves that were just perfect for my level of surfing!
We’ve started along the Great Ocean Road, stopping frequently to view the stunning limestone formations, including Bay of Islands, London Bridge and Loch Ard Gorge. We camped at Princetown and walked back along coast to the Twelve Apostles; this gave us tremendous views of the coast, which you cannot see from the road.
One of the outcrops is a breeding ground for mutton birds (short-tailed shearwaters). They breed here but fly 15,000 km to Alaska during the Australian winter. Many don’t make it as we saw on many of the Pacific coast beaches with many washed ashore in a ragged heap.
With much of the northern Grampians closed off because of the recent bush fires, we explored the less-visited southern area. Most tourists zoom past this area but we discovered they are seriously missing out. We climbed the aptly named Mount Abrupt which opened up the best views in the Grampians national park.
We did a quick tour round some of the main look-outs in the northern part of the Grampians. Unfortunately most of the northern section is closed off because of the recent bush fires, so we couldn’t get to some of the famous beauty spots.
After travelling many thousands of miles and having the Great Dividing Range for company along the first part of our route until we headed into the outback, we’ve finally arrived where the range starts in Victoria.
We based ourselves in Halls Gap where we found a hot-rod rally in full swing. There were many beautifully restored old vehicles to admire with huge V8 engines stuffed under their bonnets.
In the afternoon we climbed the peak that looms above the camp site which gave us some amazing views across the mountains in the evening sunlight.
Back on the mainland, we’re following the coastline through Coorong National Park. We camped at an idyllic spot close to where the Murray river enters the sea. Along this part of the coast there is a long sand bar separating the Southern Ocean from the strip of inland water.
Today we travelled along the south coast of the island. The highlight was a colony of Australian sea lions. They spend up to 3 days in the ocean feeding and then come ashore to this particular beach to rest. Their behaviour is fascinating – some completely zonked out and others, mainly pups, playing around on the beach and going surfing.
We bumped down an unsealed, corrugated road deep into the national park to camp in the wilderness and spend a day hiking down to a couple of remote, surf-battered coves.
Cape du Couedic is at the south western end of the island. First we went to see the Remarkable Rocks, which have been weathered into, um, remarkable shapes.
Then onto Admirals Arch, but the star of the show here is the colony of New Zealand fur seals, basking in the sun and playing in the rock pools.
Kangaroo Island is a short (but expensive) hop from the coast south of Adelaide, famed for its wildlife and beautiful scenery.
So, the evening we arrived we went down to the beach where there is a Little Penguin colony. It turns out that they take their holidays in February, so no luck there.
We explored some beaches and coves along the north coast and camped at one where the beach is accessed through a secret passage through the rocks. Once there, you find a natural pool to bathe in that protects you from the dangerous rips.
Back at the campsite, we spotted our first sighting of koalas in the eucalyptus trees – so more luck with those!
Adelaide is a small city, but to get to it you have to drive along a road with mile-upon-mile of ugly low-rise chain outlets. All Australian cities have been like this, but Adelaide seemed to be particularly afflicted.
We visited Adelaide on the hottest day we’ve encountered anywhere so far, so all we were able to do was stagger between a couple of air-conditioned museums. The South Australia museum had an impressive exhibition of Aboriginal artefacts and the Immigration museum told what it was like for all those people who emigrated to South Australia.
Adelaide has some elegant colonial stone-built architecture, but heat-induced lethargy and lack of inspirations means there aren’t any photos to show you.
Travelling south towards Adelaide, we passed through several wine regions, so it was an ideal opportunity to replenish our stock, having run dry in the desert.
The most famous region is the Barossa valley, but we’d been tipped off about the Clare valley. We loved the Clare valley as it is very picturesque, the wineries are small and there are no tourist buses. The Riesling is particularly good – nothing like the sweetish German stuff we tend to get in the UK.
We did stop in the Barossa valley and sampled the Shiraz for which it is famed. The Shiraz you get here is much more varied and less heavy and sweet than the stuff you pick up in UK supermarkets. We even stopped off at Jacob’s Creek and challenged them to give us something better than they export to the UK. In fact they have some excellent wines; the export stuff wasn’t available for tasting! Clearly, they keep the best wine for themselves.
We finally completed our long journey through the outback, arriving at Port Augusta and finding normal civilisation a bit strange. So we headed straight back into the outback to visit the Flinders Ranges. This is a striking range of mountains, particularly after the days of flat desert.
An interesting feature at the end of the range is Wilpena pound, a large area enclosed by the mountains with only one way in, accessed on foot along a dry creek with red river gums along its length.
Back onto the Stuart Highway and another long drive through a mainly featureless desert. After several hundred km, the first town you come to, heading south, is Coober Pedy. However, all you can see is a landscape of spoil mounds and notices about taking care not to fall backwards into deep holes. There’s a lot of junk around and no people about; that’s because Coober Pedy to the indigenous people means ‘white man in a hole’.
Coober Pedy is where 85% of the world’s opal is mined. The residents live in homes dug into the hillsides so they can cope with the extreme heat (commonly 50C in the summer).
We went on a tour of an old mine and learnt how it all started and how the mining techniques have changed over the years. We also went into a typical underground home. I have to say, it looked very cosy and at a constant 25C was much better than being outside!
