Today we began the Great Ocean Road, a 250km coastal drive with stunning scenery mixed in with a bit of mountaneous rainforest. We were looking forward to it.

To begin the day we went to whale watching station in Warrnambool before we left. They'd had 3 whale sightings in the past week so we thought we might get lucky and catch a glimpse of one. Unfortunately we didn't see any, but we did see two surfers riding some bloody big waves which was pretty cool. Also, it was the first time Kirsty had seen people surf in real life. She was pretty excited. As we left Warrnambool through some farm land we could see the coast coming closer and just like that the Great Ocean Road began.

We were then pulling off the road every 2km or so to go to a lookout. The lookouts consisted of various different rock formations and mini islands that were quite stunning. All the different formations had different names like London Bridge (no longer a bridge now as the rocks collapsed a few years ago) and the Grotto. As well as the beautiful scenery the drive was excellent. Winding clifftop roads, the sun shining and for once the van was running pretty smoothly.

We stopped for lunch at a really nice (and expensive) town called Port Campbell, and watched some kid chase seagulls while we ate our cheese & salad cream sandwiches in the van. And then we were off again.

The next stop we pulled over for was for the famous Twelve Apostles (although there only 6 now). They are basically large roack stacks emerging from the sea and from the viewing platform they look quite impressive. Despite the hundreds of tourists that get off the coaches to take their pictures and jump back on again, it is still an amazing thing to see. Apparantly there would have been four times the amount of tourists had we'd been doing the trip in the summer, so thankfully we weren't.

After this coastal drive we followed the road headed inland through the Otway Ranges and deep into the rainforest. The change from coast to rainforest was dramatic. After a little persuasion, I managed to get Kirsty to do a 3km walk through the rainforest to see the beautiful Triplet Waterfalls. I think she was glad we did it afterwards.

We ended the days driving at another scenic little seaside town called Apollo Bay, with its hills looming over a long stretch of surf beach. We checked into a caravan park, then went in search of some fish n' chips. There was plenty of places to choose from, but the decision wasn't hard when we found one playing '100 Best Arsenal Goals in the F.A. Cup' on the TV. Quite random, but it put the cherry on top of a really good day!