Great Ocean Road Part 2

Grand Pacific Hotel

  While we were at Lake Colac we decide to use it as base to see some of the Great Ocean Road.  So we set off one morning early and went through  Birregurra and continued down a back road till we came over the Otways and into the back of Lorne. We had lovely weather and it was warm enough that many of the locals were going for a swim.  Of course it was too cold for us to go swimming.We just enjoyed the sunshine and had morning tea in a nice seaside park. We then drove up past the Grand Pacific Hotel and checked out an historic jetty. We noted the prices in the local Fish co-op of $ 75/ kg for cray fish which was way too much for us.

 Great Ocean Road Scenic Drive

 As we wandered down the road through the small  seaside places in lovely little nooks we both reminiced about  a previous trip we did over 25 years ago and how the roads had improved and the places were so much bigger and busier.

 Cape Otway Lighthouse as seen from Point Franklin

 After lunching on fish and chips at the harbour at Apollo Bay we continued on to Cape Otway with a view to seeing the Lighthouse. On the way we passed a board that said there was a fee to tour the Lighthouse but we were very dissappointed that there was no way of seeing the lighthouse unless we paid $ 16.50 ea . Instead we found a track that took s to a beach which allowed us a distant view after an easy walk for about 10 minutes.

 From here  we returned to Lake Colac via Laver's hill and Johanna beach which we checked out as we planned to move to here the next day ,so we could continue our Great Ocean saga.  part of the Camping area at Johanna Beach

 After packing up at Lake Colac we moved here and again had another lovely day and met lots of nice people who invited us to have a drink wiht them. We were a large group of about 12 people from different states etc.

 On our way to Johanna Beach we stopped for morning tea at Gellibrand where there was lovely park and it had an interesting  cutout shape of the Otways and surrounding area. 

Park at Gellibrand with cutout of Otways

 From Johanna Beach we ontinued up and over the Otways at Lavers Hill and then on to the better known features of the Great Ocean Road.

 Our first stop on this section was to see the Twelve Apostles . This involved aprking  at the Information centre ans walking under the mani road. The walk was very pleasant with diiferent information and lots of nice boardwalks that provided access to everyone. There was also plenty of lookouts to view the Apostles.Lynn at the Apostles lookout

Our main problem was getting into some of the carparks as with the big van if there was already a number of cars and motorhomes there was no room for us to park or turn .

 From the Twelve Apostles we visited  Loch Ard  Gorge which had several interesting walks with different views of there area.

 The most outstanding feature is the layers of sandstone and  the erosion from the waves. Nearly all the rock stacks and other formations had these features, just some were clearer than others.Loch Ard Gorge   Typical Sandstone formation showing layers and erosion from the waves

 The Bay of  Martyrs was another interesting stop with lots of stacks in a big bay. Here some of the cliffs were a lovely shade of red wiht iron oxide or similar in the soil.Childers Cove

When we were looking for a lunch stop I noted this cove on the map and we were very pleasantly surprised to find at the cove next door that there was a huge grassed area wiht picnic tables and toilets. It was on the walk to Childers cove that I saw a snake making a beeline for the scrub as he could obviously here me coming on the path.

 This was the end of our wanderings along the Great Ocean Road as that night we stopped at Warrnambool . We had made arrangements to have the computer part of the washing machine changed over here in the hope that it would fix the problem of not pumping out the water after washing.