Wednesday 24 December 2014

The Great Ocean Road

The Great Ocean Road is iconic in South Australia. The deeply scalloped headlands, lone rock stacks and arches have been carved by long fetch waves for thousands of years. The scenery was stunning. Cruising along this windy road was a real highlight of our journey. The driving was great (and was just what I imagined touring around the curves of Italy's coast would be like). The open vistas were enthralling. It was a beautiful place and we were very happy to be able to enjoy it. There were so many picture-postcard scenes it's been a hard job to choose just a few for the blog. Here's some of our favourites

Stacks stand in the Bay of Islands

 Sirrus clouds above the London Bridge Arch, which has fallen down

Bay of martyrs 


The Twelve Apostles, our memory only stretched to naming eight though....

On the landward side heavily wooded plantations and natural forest made a striking buffer. There was a sweet smelling breeze. The Great Ocean Road crossed over many steep ravines. Once it went up the side of a wide valley with a flat dry bottom. The buttercups here were grazed by cows and sheep and an abandoned old wooden cart rested on the valley floor whilst white butterflies danced in helixes above the hedgerows.

After one glorious photo seascape stop we continued along a side road and were luckily enough to see Miss Tigglewinkles long lost cousin scurry up a bank. It was an echidna. The spikes were thick and long, and surrounded by course think hair. It's long nose snuffled around in the dirt for ants. They have a backwards facing pouch and lay eggs, just like the duck-billed platypus.



Later as we drove into Lorne we stopped when we noticed a man feeding two kookaburras with slices of steak from the balcony of his house. Loarne was definitely more affluent then further east. We watched the sun go down over the Loarne beach and were joined by a flock of very brave sulphur crested cockatoos.

Little Corellas playing in the park


 Sulphur Crested Cockatoos argue over breadcrumbs


Have you ever, ever felt like this? Strange things happening, are you going round the Twist? - remember this lighthouse anyone?

Who lives here?

Feels a bit like home?

4 comments:

  1. Yes, I remember the lighthouse! I can recall the theme tune better than the actual programme. I remember the episode with the shape-changing mushrooms though...

    ReplyDelete
  2. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Lush pic of you guys!! Lots of love Xxxx

    ReplyDelete
  4. Hope your having a great Crimbo! Gary, mummy and I are off to Venice today! Will send you some pics! eek!Xxx

    ReplyDelete