Great ocean road is a coastal drive located in Victoria state, where you travel admiring nice views of the pacific ocean. During the drive you find lots of lookouts and the idea behind this tour is to take advantage of everything there is to see, no hurry, take your time to make pictures and explore as much as you can.
We rented a car to do this tour, left from Melbourne around 8a.m. drove about 100 km (62mi) until Torquay, first city we stopped to visit. We visited the main beach and the famous Bells beach where annually happens the Rip Curl Pro, world surf league. For coincidence and also a little luck the championship was happening this period, but this day the activities were cancelled because of bad ocean conditions. We visited the beach and decided to come back the next day to watch one of the rounds.
We followed travelling until the next lookout which was the Split Point Lighthouse, where you have a great view from the ocean and enjoy the cenarium to make good pictures, but this was only the beginning. Our next destination was Lorne, where we visited the Erskine falls. The structure to explore the falls is minimal, respecting the natural aspect of the attraction, the road to get there is wooded and narrow, there is no shoreline, there are not many parking spots and the structure to visit uses mainly what is already available in the region, uses the rocks as a pathway and puts handrails and when necessary a small wood stair to keep the safety of tourists. There is no employees and not even trash cans along the way, but even then the place remains clean and well conserved.
Leaving the place we stopped the car by the city center and walked around the charming place looking for a restaurant for lunch. We stopped in one by the beach called Mapple three, their main course was seafood, but they had other options for the ones who like me don’t enjoy it. We talked to the owner who was italian, it was a pleasant time.
We followed ahead, but now a little more in a hurry, because we wanted to get to the famous tourist spot twelve apostles before sunset and still see the Lord Arch beach before we return. The road alone is an attraction, the view is amazing and we were lucky to choose a beautiful day, even though it was cold outside, since the wind is really strong through all the state. We finally arrived at the 12 apostles right after the sunset, could still see the cenarium before it got dark, but the pictures were a little prejudicate. The attraction has this name because of the 12 sandrocks formed in the ocean. The name has been capt, even though time action made some of the rocks fall, today there are eight left to be seen, which are still worth the visit, for sure.
Unfortunately we didn’t have time to see the Lord Arch beach. I’ll definitely have to go back and do the entire trip again, to see what I have missed. Since we wanted to watch the surf league the next day we returned to Torquay, but now using a faster road. We slept there and the next day, when we arrived to Bells beach to watch the league was already 9am and Medina (the most famous brazilian surfer) had already surfed and won his heat, we watched part of the heat of the John John Florence and after that the competition changed place and I had to watch from the top hill. I was happy to know that there were many other brazilians competing, in total was 9 males and 2 females. We watched the next heat which was between the french Joan Duru and the brazilians Adriano de Souza and Caio Ibelli, the winner for this heat was Adriano. Caio won second place for the whole competition, very proud of these brazilians athletes doing their best on the other side of the world.
Around noon we left, because we need to be back in Melbourne on time to pick up our suitcases and go to the airport where we embarked to Gold Coast at night. I will tell you about this trip next post. Hope you enjoyed this one. See you.
TIPS:
-If you are not comfortable and don’t feel safe drive on left side, this is probably not the best time to try since the road is single track and curvy. My brother is leaving in Australia for over a year so he was the driver.
-In Melbourne is possible to buy the Great Ocean Road tour in travel agencies.
-Plan to do this tour with at least two entire days, this way you will be able to enjoy everything on the way.
-No matter when you go always take a warm coat with you, the wind is really cold.
-Wear tennis, in most of the stops you will have to walk to get to the lookouts.
-If it’s summer you may want to take a swimsuit, because you might feel tempted to swim on some of the wonderful places you will visit.
-If you are travelling by car and wants to save money, it’s possible to sleep in the car in some of the cities along the way.
-If you want to experience the Rip Curl Pro, it happens every year in April and lasts two weeks, see the programming and plan your trip to this period.