The Great Ocean Road

Well I wish I had good news to report about the Collingwood v. Carlton game on Friday night, but unfortunately Collingwood DOMINATED the game. Some die-hard Carlton fans were telling me that it was the worst they had ever seen the Blues play. Oh well, maybe next year. The game was pretty fun still, although the one last week was much more exciting.



Yesterday(Saturday) we went to the Great Ocean Road. I didn't really know what to expect other than seeing the Ocean, but we were told it was an all-day trip so I figured it had to be good. Looking back, the day was incredible. We left at 7 in the morning and got to the beginning of the actual road at about 9:30 or so. We stopped at the ocean and through a footy ball around for awhile while the girls took pictures and tried to make pyramids of each other. After that we drove a little further and got into an area with beautiful rolling green hills to our right, and wide open ocean to the left. We turned up a little gravel road and found ourselves going into a forest type area. Up ahead there were some people standing on the side of the road with a bucket of bird seed and they were COVERED with the red and blue and green birds. I haven't ever seen such exotic birds just sitting around and so common. They were pretty awesome and I thought that was the attraction, but we just kept driving. Soon we pulled up to some cars that were on the side of the road and lots of people standing around looking up toward the trees. I quickly realized that we were in a Eucalyptus forest, and the attraction was KOALAS! They were just sitting sleeping on the branches all around us. As they would say here in Australia...there were heaps of koalas on all sides. We drove up a little further away from the crowds and found some that were awake and almost looked as though they were posing for us. We were maybe 5-10 feet away and I got some really cool pictures. Sometime after that, we stopped for some good ole fish & chips for lunch around the ocean and headed on.



Next we came to a coast line that had tons of people pulled over on the side, and I looked out into the ocean and saw there was a whale a couple hundred feet into the water. I had never seen one so close to shore(in the wild, not counting Sea World). We got out and got some decent pictures. I'm pretty sure it was hump back which are apparently hard to see even on whaling tours, so that was pretty exciting.



Our next stop was bizarre. We pulled off the main road and drove for a few minutes and arrive at a parking lot with some hiking trails. As we started hiking, I realized we were in a rain forest type area. Who would have thought Australia had rain forests? After about 15-20 minutes of hiking, we came to a huge waterfall with tons of trees and shrubs all around it. It was a beautiful site and totally unexpected.



After that we kept driving(I know, I'm getting tired just trying to recall all of this, and all in one day!). and came to one of the main attractions of the Great Ocean Road. It is called the Twelve Apostles. Basically it is these huge rock formations in the ocean that just jut way up in the air. There used to be 12 of them(hence the name), but over time they fall over and erode away, so now there's like 7 or 8 left. The sun was starting to get low at this point, so the pictures were amazing, and the expanse of shoreline that you can see from the lookout point was just incredible.



But that wasn't even the end!



We drove a few more miles down the road and came to the Loch Ard Gorge, an area where two pieces of land create a bottleneck type entry into a gorge that has a nice little beach and is surrounded by cliffs. It's so hard to describe and I wish I had pictures, but it looks like something out of a movie with a small opening out in the water and then a wide contained beach. Toward the back where you walk down, there are cave-type areas with stalagtites and cool formations. It was discovered when a ship wrecked years ago and has been a big attraction ever since.



The next part was a few miles down the road called the Blowhole and Thunder Cave. Basically the blow hole is this big open area that you can look down and the waves come through a tunnel in the ground into the area and then wash out. Again, very difficult to describe, but really unique and interesting. The Thunder Cave is the other side of the entrance where the waves come in, and if you're down at the water level(which unfortunately the steps were under construction), the waves sound like thunder coming in. I realize that probably none of this is making any sense, but I'll definitely post pictures when I get home. From there we got to see the sun set across the horizon while all shades of orange, yellow, purple and blue.



One of the cool parts about the trip is that after you drive through, you can just hop on the interstate and get back in a fraction of the time it took you to go the whole way down the road. The actual road has lots of curves and things to look at, so it definitely was a full day affair. We stopped at McDonald's on the way home and pulled up to the hostel about 9:30 at night. It was full day but absolutely worth it. I'd say this is my favorite touristy thing we've done so far. I really got to see all that is unique to Australia and take in the sites of what untouched natural environments look like. If you ever come to Australia, you have GOT to do the Great Ocean Road.



Tonight is church back at the docklands(it was really good last week), and then preparing for my team's outreach at RMIT City tomorrow. I'm really hoping we get a good response and are able to get alot of contacts. It's hard to believe I am heading home in less than 2 weeks. On one end it seems like I just got here, but on the other it seems like I have been here forever. As always, I hope things are going good back home and am looking forward to catching up with everyone!