The Great Ocean Road – 1/12/13
Jan 14th, 2013 by admin
It’s a beautiful, almost calm morning in Torqauy. I take a walk on the Surf Walk which is a cliff top path that overlooks the beach and headlands. The path is maintained for bicycles and goes on for some kilometers all the way to Bells Beach, the surfers mecca. The walking is very easy and the sunrise is beautiful.
We’re heading for The Great Ocean Road that starts a ways east of Torquay. Break camp, look for gate code so that we can get out of campground, find said code, open gate, turn left and finally start moving. Some days start easier than others.
We stop at a couple of coves and eventually we stop at Bells for some pictures. There are quite a few surfers sitting on their boards waiting through the small waves that are all that’s disturbing the placid ocean. They came to Bells and they’re going to get a wave, dammit!
The Great Ocean Road is the original road from Melbourne to Adelaide. It’s been replaced by a more direct motorway that misses the small towns and beaches that dot the coast. It also misses the road carved out of the cliffside with walls soaring to the blue sky on one side and sheer drops to the ocean on the other side.
And the views: to die for, as they say. After seeing the signs that state in explicit terms that they drive on the left side in Australia, apparently dying on the Great Ocean Road is a serious fact. With some degree of regularity, tourists in rental cars from countries that drive on the right side of the road stop for a view or snapshot and then pull into oncoming traffic on the wrong side of the road. That never seems to end well.
The Great Ocean Road is a very long road, almost 300 kilometers (175 miles in old money) and it seems that there is another spectacular view around every corner. Occasionally, the road dips down to sea level at some ridiculously beautiful cove only to climb back up to its normal perch a hundred or two hundred feet up the cliffside.
We pass through a village every 10 or 20 kilometers where the already slow traffic slows to a crawl. After a while the villages become routinely quaint and beautiful. Of course, this being the highest part of the high season (comparable to July on the US), every hotel is booked and all the caravan parks are packed. (See previous post on Torquay.)
The sky has been periodically overcast but with occasional sunny breaks. We stop at the first view point for the 12 Apostles, rock pillars that have been separated from the main cliff face by tidal erosion. There are actually only 7 Apostles left standing, the others reclaimed by the tidal erosion. On cue, the sun comes out for the postcard perfect photos.
We climb down to the sand on the beach which is occasionally impossible when the wave action and the tides conspires to bring the crashing surf right to the base of the cliff face. Today, the surf is rough but not high enough to cover the beach. It’s rough enough so that there is no desire to jump in for a quick dip. The entire coast is know for its rocks and rip tides and no Aussie life-saving stations that are always featured in the travelogues about Oz. Then back up the stairs to the car and on the road again.
We stop again farther down the coast at an even more spectacular outlook. This one, however teats us to another of Australia’s hot summer treats: march flies. As we walk the 300 meters or so from the car park to the beginning of the boardwalk that leads to the lookout, we’re attacked by the flies. The area is sheltered from the wind so it’s warm and the warmth brings out the flies with a vengeance. People are walking past us with mosquito netting over their heads to protect them from the flies. Once back out in the wind, the flies disappear, the air is cold and the wind is strong. They’ll get another shot at us on the way back.
Out at the lookout, the views are even more spectacular than the first stop. And nearly everyone has to have their picture taken with the rock sentinels as a backdrop. I can’t imagine that the Iphone pictures really give the beauty of the view but the Iphones are a blazing nonetheless. Facebook, Twitter, Picasa, et al lookout for the onslaught.
We leave and finally get to Portland which is the end of the road for us tonight. We pull into the sleepy town and find the town’s nearly deserted caravan. It’s not quite empty but is off the end of the Great Ocean Road and there’s not much to Portland anyways. It’s a terminal for the bulk hauling freighters that car minerals, grain and wood chips to foreign countries as part of Australia vibrant extractive economy.
We get a site for AUD27 for any of a 100 open tent sites vs AUD 67 for last night’s cramped tent site in Torquay. What is that they say? Location, location, location. Even here in Oz.
We pick a site down a ways from a young family with two young boys. They’re tent camping and the father of the older boy is teaching how to ride his two wheeler without training wheels. He’s six and in just a few minutes he gets the hang of it. A few high speed runs, a crash and then more sensible riding. He’s so proud to say nothing of his father.
The mom seems to be letting the dad/son bonding run it’s course unfettered. Soon the younger boy is riding along on his bike (still with training wheels) with his older brother. Things will never be the same. A six year-old’s rite of passage.
We head down to the town center in what’s become a very cold wind looking for a quick supper but nothing appeals to us. Back to the tents for wine, cheese, crackers and sausage. That is turning into the standard fall back dinner for us. It’s dark and getting late. To the warmth of the sleeping bags.
Obi-wan