After visiting the Grampians we drove until late night towards the Great Ocean Road (which was apparently quite exciting because of all the night active animals in the park). When we finally found a good spot to park, it was close to midnight why we all fell asleep immediately. The next morning was waiting with a big surprise. We didn’t realize that we parked directly at the top of a cliff of the Great Ocean Road, why we could enjoy a stunning view during breakfast surrounded by cows 🙂
Since we drove the Great Ocean Road in the reversed direction, all the big highlights were at the beginning and not at the end as it is supposed to be. This part of the coast consists of quite fragile sandstone. The water was able to wash out spectacular bays and some bizarre stone formation. The Twelve Apostles (there are apparently only eight of them left, one was destroyed only 5 years ago) and the London Bridge (which lost one of its bows around 1990) are the most famous ones. The Twelve Apostles are breathtakingly awesome, but are really touristy. Definitely a small minus point that every 10 minutes a further bus full of Asians arrived (where do they come from???). We pointed out the others on the pictures (Murnanes Bay, Childers Cove, Bay of Islands, Bay of Martyrs, The Arch, The Grotto, Loch Ard Gorge, Gibsons Steps).
The road was built after the first world war in order to generate jobs for the soldiers coming home from Europe (very creative the Australians J ). Therefore it’s maybe the hugest war memorial world-wide. With the beginning of the tourism it became a magnet for tourists all over the world and generates constant income for the people living in this area.
Besides the very spectacular first part of the coast, the remaining part we did the second (unfortunately rainy) day may seem a bit tiring but has some impressive highlights. Apparently the part with the sandstone measures only 30km of the track. On the remaining part, the road follows along the coast (with some amazing lookouts) and through the rainforest (yes there is rainforest in this part of the world…). We walked to short tracks through the rainforest (Maits Rest, Erskine Falls) and we were surprised that it was almost exactly as one may imagine a rainforest. Tropical smells, ferns, huge trees, tiny streams, stunning waterfalls and (sit down!!!) WILD KOALAS. There is a quite hidden street through the forest but after a few km there are koalas everywhere! One of them even moved his head and was only 3m away from us!!! (For those of you who are not so familiar with the study of koalas, they are the laziest animal in the world. They sleep around 22 hours per day! Of course they have nothing else to do rather than eating in the rest of the time…)
Vera and Kerstin almost made the trip unforgettable. During a lunch break they were both sure that the other one has the key for the car. So Vera closed the already locked door leaving the key inside the van. After a bit of panic – we didn’t even have a phone to call someone – we recognized that one of the windows of the rooftop was not closed why we just had to destroy the fly screen and Vera could climb into the car. After that we agreed to let the rooftop window open.