4/26/09 (clayton)
Annie LinClayton – Melbourne – Apollo Bay
There have been two things that keep following us around. One has to do with the weather. Jon has coined our adventure as “the year of no summer”. In every country we have been so far, which has only been Fiji, New Zealand, and Australia, the summer is just about ending and the fall is beginning. The first few days we are in a new area it will be relatively sunny and warm and towards the end it will start getting cold. It happened when we were in the south island of New Zealand, Katoomba and also in Clayton. Our first few days in Clayton were sunny and then it sprinkled off and on for the last three days. The other thing that keeps following us or we are following it is the holiday season. During our last week in New Zealand it was the start of the Easter holiday, which lasts for two weeks, and when we arrived in Sydney it was still their Easter holiday so families were out and about. When we arrived in Melbourne we learned of Anzac Day much like our Memorial Day, which meant a three-day weekend. We were planning on driving the Great Ocean Road (GOR) in Victoria this past weekend but we were advised to wait till the weekend was over since lots of people go away on holiday and many of the hotels require two night stays.
We waited till today to rent a car to do the drive. We said our farewells to our friends in Clayton and headed into the city to pick up our car. This time we decided to rent a compact automatic and stay in motels since we would only be on the road for four days. I have coined our car the Little Zipster because of its small size and how fast it zips along the windy road along the ocean. Jon is really enjoying being in compact car so much that he’s even considering getting one when we go back to the states. But it does feels weird not being in a camper and makes me miss the camper life a bit since camping is very popular along the ocean road.
The road is 285 km along Victoria’s southwestern coast, which is supposed to mirror the California’s Pacific Coast Highway. It was built in the 1920’s to commemorate the fallen soldiers in WWI as well as provide work for the soldiers who returned from war. The road is carved out in the middle of the Great Otway National Park and against some pretty rugged coastline so I can only imagine what a tough job it was for the soldiers.
We made a pit stop in Geelong for some lunch before starting the GOR. Jon snoozed for a bit while I drove and I guess I must have missed the signs to Torquay, which is the official start, because before we realized it we were in Lorne already and missed the first three towns on the ocean road. We decided to backtrack and head back to Aireys Inlet to check out the Split Point Lighthouse. The lighthouse had a bright red top and made for a great time-lapse backdrop.
It was nice to be on the road again and the coastline scenery was pretty spectacular. It does remind me a bit of PCH. It is pretty interesting to note the subtle color differences in ocean around the world. The water around the glaciers and Tasman Sea in New Zealand were a soft teal but the water in the South Ocean is more of a turquoise blue color.
We ended the day in Apollo Bay and crashed at a motel.
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P.S. I am still waiting to see Stanley :)