Year 2010 Summary Part One - Melbourne to Adelaide

I haven't done a very good job of blogging this year. I like to think I was too busy enjoying myself to worry about telling everyone about it. So now that the year and my time in Aus is coming to an end, I thought it would be a good idea to fill in that big gap from March til now.

On 2nd March I went down to Port Melbourne and met up with Lou and Jen, the Canadian who was coming along with us on the first part of our road trip - Melbourne to Adelaide. As this could become quite an essay I'll just give you the highlights:

·Much fun (and education!) in information centres('i's), all started by visiting the one in Lorne to ask Wendy, who was 'Totally wild' our stupid question - Which is the Great part, the Ocean or the Road?

·Seeing lots of 'specks of nature' along the way, including rainforest walks at Mait's Rest, Triplet Falls and Erskine Falls, where we got ourselves a cheeky lift up the really steep hill with the park ranger guys.

·Reaching the Twelve Apostles and Loch Ard Gorge on Day 2, and trekking 100 km (or maybe just 1.00 km) to Sherbrooke River. There we met Simon and Junior, two locals who'd just finished fishing and taught us that in WA the sun 'falls out of the sky like it's been shot'. Something to look forward to.

·Seeing the sunset, the moon rise and the sun rise again at the Twelve Apostles. It was here that Jen discovered panoramic mode on her camera and we camped in a car park.

·Having brilliant sunny weather for all the highlights of the Great Ocean Road and Lou accidentally swearing at a man on a bike cos her window was open.

·Taking awesome running and jumping shots on the beach at the Bay of Martyrs, and having a gorgeous beach all to ourselves at Childers Cove thanks to Deano in the Port Campbell i.

·Crashing a tour at Cheeseworld in Warnambool and getting free cheese samples.

·The weather taking a turn for the worse as we took our tent down at the Saw Pit campground, leaving us with a rainy day in Portland. We still managed to visit Cape Nelson Lighthouse, spot seals at the blowholes, despite our seal tour being cancelled, and make our long awaited visit to the Petrified Forest, which turned out not to be a petrified forest after all.

·Seeing a waterfall that wasn't a waterfall at Wannon Falls campground and meeting Patrick the wallaby.

·Going through Hamilton, with its Big Wool Bales, on the way to the Grampians, and Mackenzie falls, where Lou got herself stuck on a rock cos she was scared to take big steps to get to the next one.

·Doing the hike up to the Pinnacle for my second time and getting about the same view as the first time cos the weather was still overcast.

·Putting our tent up in pouring rain, only for it to stop pretty much as soon as we finished.

·Seeing a statue of a 'Dog on a Sheep' in Casterton - the home of the kelpie.

·Crossing the border into SA, where they thanked us for visiting Victoria, but didn't welcome us to South Australia - how rude!

·Mount Gambier with its Umpherston sinkhole, ridiculously steep walk up to the Centenary tower and Blue Lake, which really is blue.

·Camping next to Mount Schank, an extinct volcano, and watching one of the most beautiful sunsets I've ever seen.

·A cloudy, rainy drive to Adelaide via Woakwine cutting (a big ditch), Larry the Big Lobster in Kingston and the ferry at Mannum where we camped before heading into the city the next day.

·Amococo at the Adelaide festival - a big inflatable network of tunnels which was all different colours and meant to be art, but felt more like a kids fairground attraction. I'm sure I've been in something very similar when I was a kid.

·Learning to play lawn bowls with Laura, Richard and 'Big Skip' our teacher.

·Lou's birthday celebrated with a visit to the cinema and the Elephant, a British pub.

And so we were in Adelaide, where Lou and I said goodbye to Jen and set off towards Perth with just ourselves, Harry the Powagon and our new addition Barry, the chicken that I bought Lou for her Birthday…