The Great Ocean Road

The Great Ocean Road is a tourist mecca and a local’s nightmare. Although it is spectacular it didn’t have the WOW Factor for Murray and I. The coast road around NZ’s coast is just as spectacular and a safer trip than the Victorian version. Road signs are everywhere reminding the motorist that Australians drive on the left-there are even arrows indicating this.

Also the road doesn’t follow the ocean all the way, it veers away into the hills and we are given a taste of Victorian rolling hills – very green and a fresh look, after the brown of SA and WA.

We started the road from Naringal and turned off at Lorne- A total of 150kms of windy, narrow, crowded beaches and towns. Camping grounds command a fee of $50 per nite for an unpowered site and they were chocker!

The 12 Apostles just out of Port Campbell are very well organised. Parking is provided for all types of vehicles-although the day we visited the caravan parks were taken up by Hino tourist buses carrying most of Asia. We didn’t see many Australians or Kiwis that day. To view the towering rock formations an underpass is provided and fenced walkways. Despite the crowds and being too short in places to see – I did manage to get some photos. Leaving the Apostles we headed to our first free campsite at Johanna Beach – a popular surf beach, 3 paddocks full of campers.

 Big Hill – Otway National Park- we were the first to arrive at 11am and by 9pm there were 19 campers in a space that at Mambry Creek would accommodate 8 campers. From 9pm, 5 more campers arrived and they had to park on the side of the road.

The towns of Lorne and Apollo Bay are extremely picturesque and so postcard perfect with colours of ocean blues, but packed with people ambling across the road-no provision for caravans to park-so $$$ from caravanners are missed. I would imagine the income from the holiday makers is sufficient to keep the towns ticking over for the year.

Currently we are camped on a farm at Beremboke-Murrays friend Charlie and his 3 dogs and a cat live here. We look out through gums to Port Philip – in the distance. The kookaburras, crimson rosellas, sulphur crested cockatoos keep us entertained.

Beremboke is 1 hr from Melbourne and 20minutes from the train line-Melton. There are no shops here.

This will be our base for a few weeks while we explore Ballarat, Geelong, Melbourne and the northern goldfields, have a check-up with the doctor etc.