Last Oz blog!

I'd spent the 30th and 31st of Jan in Melbourne on my way back from Tassie to make sure I could have a decent webcam chat with Ciara on her birthday. On the 1st Feb I caught a train to Geelong about an hours journey out of Southern Cross station. At Geelong I swapped to a coach and travelled another 2 hours ish along the Great Ocean Road up to Apollo Bay. They dont call it the Great Ocean Road for nothing. The scenery along the way is stunning. The road is pretty much parallel to the coast for most of the way from Geelong to Apollo Bay. I kept trying to get perfect shots on my camera to demonstrate how the road curls round the sides of the cliffs with the ocean next to it but most of them didnt come out as well as they would have done if I were able to stop at lookout points along the way. (Tip: if you're going to travel up the Great Ocean Road, make sure you have your own wheels!)

On arriving in Apollo Bay, I took a walk and found my hostel. 5 mins walk from the beachfront in a quiet little residential street with the widest road i've ever seen in a neighbourhood! It was like a dual carriageway. You could walk in the gutter with loads of room and still have cars travel in either direction! On arriving at the hostel I noticed it wasnt the same as a lot of hostels I've stayed at in Oz,the hostel in Wollongong being the only exception. It was basically a normal house layout with dorm rooms out the back as well as some caravans in the backyard. I did my usual thing, dumped my bags and took a wander down the seafront to check the place out. I was feeling lazy from the travel of the day so couldnt be bothered with cooking brekky so opted for a nice big piece of flake (shark) and chips from one of the many seafood restaurants along the seafront. Is it wrong to have fish and chips for breakfast? I dont think so..

Luckily the new copy of Empire came out that day so I sat on a bench down by the beach, caught some sun and read for a bit. I needed some shade after a bit so went food shopping (how exciting, I know), stocked up on supplies as well as a 4 litre box of red goon and went back to the hostel. Almost straight away I got chatting to some folks, Luke a lively Aussie from Melbourne and Rebecca from Scotland who is working at the hostel whilst travelling. That evening we went down to the beach along with some others, Roman from Germany who is full of laughter about pretty much anything, Ona from Belgium who was good fun, Neil from Newcastle, England who should work for the Apollo Bay tourist board, and another German girl whose name I forgot. We sat about, chatted, drank plenty of goon and listened to Luke jam on his guitar. Later we were joined by Sven, another backpacker from Germany who was living in a house nearby. After an hour or two on the beach we headed up to Svens and sat in his garden til gone 2am drinking more goon and generally getting wasted! I stumbled back at this point as I was knackered from travelling earlier in the day.

Next day, I felt as ropy as you'd expect from caning lots of cheap box wine. At $14 for 4 litres it's not gonna be top notch plonk eh? After some fruit juice and a hearty brekky I felt revived enough to contemplate doing something for the day. Myself, Ona, Neil, Rebecca and Luke headed up to Cape Otway lighthouse in Bruno, Lukes car, a brown 1983 Nissan Pintara. You've never known the love that a man can have for his motor until you've seen Luke and Bruno in action. I reckon if marriage between a motor vehicle and a human was allowed then they'd be hitched for sure, ha ha. We made it to Cape Otway and found out that they charge to go up to the lighthouse - $16 too! It was too late by the time we arrived to go up to the lighthouse anyway so we just headed down to Blanket Bay nearby and had a wander around the rocks before heading back to the hostel. Saw some Koalas in some trees on the roadside on the way back, luckily they didnt move fast as they arent that energetic so I got a couple of nice pics of them in their natural habitat. In the evening we sat around, watched some TV before turning in. The TV at the hostel was ancient, you have to turn the dial to tune it in to the UHF signal, proper retro!

Next morning on the 3rd, myself, Ona, Roman, Luke and Rebecca went for an early morning swim in the sea. I was feeling half asleep before but not after! Some of the waves were massive and one was so big I couldnt jump the height of it and it bowled me right over and took me under. I came up spluttering! The current was dead strong too, you can see why so many people get caught in rips and end up in trouble. Afterwards we headed back to the hostel and chilled out for a while. The place has a really homely feel to it so it was easy to relax there and do nothing. A lot of places I've stayed in are simply too big so you dont always end up getting to know people as easily.

I was keen to see the 12 Apostles in my last week in Oz. They are 12 stone pillars that stand along the coastline although they are now really the 8.5 Apostles as some have crumbled into the sea. They are another 100kms drive up the Great Ocean Road from Apollo Bay. We decided to go for a drive up there and set off pretty late at 4.30pm. Luke to his credit, only wanted $10 petrol money from each of us so he saved us a fortune. Cheers bro! Luke, myself, Ona and Roman set off with tunes blaring before stopping along the way at a few lookouts each with their own awesome views. We took a walk down onto the beach at one point and stood with some massive cliffs behind us. Next we stopped at the blowhole and the thunder cave where we saw the surge of the ocean come in and crash up the cliff walls. The power of the swell was amazing to see. Another bit of a drive and we arrived at the 12 Apostles. After parking up we walked along the underpass that goes under the main road and came out onto the lookout walkway. Its a fairly big walkway with lots of choice to get different shots. I've never seen such an amazing epic piece of coastline. Luckily we got there as the sun was going down so the sunlight was just right on the water and the pictures turned out a treat. Afterward we made it a short distance up the road to Loch Ard Gorge where we got got some more good pictures just before the sun disappeared for the day. Afterward we headed to Port Campbell nearby for fish and chips at a nice restaurant before grabbing some Boags from the bottleshop. Luke decided he was going to have a late night swim in the harbour, I opted out as it didnt look at all warm! I just sat and sunk a beer instead.

The drive home didnt take us long, about an hour. The Great Ocean Road dips inland at one point and leads you through these windy forest roads which looked completely different by night. On arriving back at the hostel we found that we'd been expected back a bit earlier and Rebecca had stayed up getting a bit worried for us. It was 12.30am by then so we could see why! A final beer and I got my head down for the night.

The next day it just rained so no-one really did anything. I headed out in the morning to grab some more grub and than just sat on the porch with the cats reading and watching the rain, chilled.. I'd initially set out to just stay 3 nights but decided to stay another 3 as we had a good crowd together. Plus I wanted to relax for my last week in Oz and not be changing hostels and moving around every other day. After the 12 Apostles I felt content with all I had seen so I wasnt bothered about cramming in any more. In the afternoon we had a legendary meal thanks to Rebecca who had been given some fresh fish fillets as well as a large lobster from a friend of hers. The lobster was missing a leg or two so couldnt be sold so it got given to Rebecca instead. We all chipped in bought a truckload of salad and fruit juice as well as garlic bread and pesto and tucked into what has to be one of the best feeds that I've had in Oz. Who says backpackers subsist on noodles?

As the day wore on the goon came out and we all sat around in the evening along with some new German backpackers and had a drink. We watched some documentary on the TV about stadium rock which made me feel sick as they covered too much about U2 and Bonos stupid face but managed to offset it with some decent stuff too ha ha.. Reg, the guy that owns the hostel has a massive pile of vintage classic rock vinyl albums so we sifted through them and just sat around playing old records and getting pissed til the wee hours. We were joined that evening by Hamish from Scotland who had stayed at the hostel a week or so earlier and had pretty much walked it back from Port Campbell doing it in portions at a time. Bit of a trek! Neil was on overload about how great Apollo Bay is, he's been there 3 weeks and cant get enough of it!

The next morning on the 6th, we said farewell to Luke who headed back to Melbourne in Bruno to see his folks. Later I went for a walk along the beach with Riley from the US who had arrived that morning. I didnt feel like doing much else after the previous nights goon binge so we hung out in the evening and watched 12 Monkeys on Rileys laptop. It was a bit tricky as we had to crowd loads of us round it and could barely hear it. I fell asleep near the end anyway. More goon didnt help.

Yesterday, it was another lazy day. Myself, Roman and Rebecca took a walk down the seafront, bumped into Neil and ended up renting District 9 on DVD which was really enjoyable. I'd been wanting to see it for ages and had bought a copy which i've posted home so I was chuffed that I didnt have to wait til July to see it. I didnt really do much else last night apart from get my washing done and packed and organised ready for the off today. Actually, tell a lie, I had more goon. It'd be rude not to..

So this morning after saying goodbye to a few people the previous night, myself , Ona and Hamish caught the bus out of Apollo Bay at 7am. Roman came to see us off and also bought us all a bar of choc for the journey, good on him. It was a shame to leave as I've had a top time with some great people in the last week. Dead glad that I decided to head that way.

Now I'm back in Melbourne (again) just killing time before I fly to NZ tomorrow.

So that wraps up Oz! It's been loads of fun and has gone too quick but the next leg awaits!!!