Day One – Friday August 30, 2019

Road video and map – Torquay to Port Campbell

Today I drove the eastern part of the Great Ocean Road that follows the southern Victoria coast. I was hoping that this may be the day that produced a scenic road video but that proved not to be the case as you need to walk to viewpoints to see most of the coastal scenery. Nevertheless, it was a pleasant drive and the stops I made were all worthwhile.

My first stop was at Bells Beach just along the coast from Torquay. This area is a surfing Mecca with two of the leading surfboard manufacturers being headquartered in Torquay and Bells Beach being the location of the world’s oldest annual professional surfing competition.

Next I took a little detour from the Great Ocean Road for a walk to  the bottom of Erskine Falls north of Lorne, VIC. You can get an idea of the height from the person visible early in the video.

According to one of my guidebooks I was almost guaranteed to see wild koala bears at Kennett River. Of course, the same guide said there would be kangaroos at Hanging Rock but I couldn’t find any. Luckily there was a koala about 40 feet up in this tree, where the trunk divides.

Also, luckily, I have a good zoom on my camera so I was able to capture this somewhat better view.

Kennett River is also home to plenty of birds, including the green and red King Parrot, which are very friendly. One landed on my head but flew away before I could take a selfie.
Cape Otway Lighthouse, built in 1848, is the oldest surviving lighthouse on mainland Australia and sits 90 metres (295 feet) above the ocean, protecting shipping in one of the most dangerous sections of the Australian coast.
The lighthouse and grounds are open to visitors and this is a view from just below the light.
The 12 Apostles are the scenic highlight of the coast. Although there are only seven significant stacks, smaller eroded stacks said to make up the rest. This is looking east from the lookout.
and to the west.
You get a better feel of the experience from this video.

My final stop of the day was at Loch Ard Gorge. The gorge is named after the clipper ship Loch Ard, which ran aground nearby on 1 June 1878. Looking west are two stacks named Tom and Eva after the only two survivors of the wreck.To the east is a huge stack call Razorback

Day Two – Saturday August 31, 2019

Road video and map – Port Campbell, VIC to Penola, SA

I continued west from Port Campbell as far as Bridgewater and then turned away from the coast to finish in Penola. I had no Internet connectivity in Port Campbell and the only way I could prepare for today’s journey was based on notes I had made about possible stops two months before leaving. Again, there were hardly any views of the ocean from the road.

Just west of Port Campbell is The Arch which was my first stop.
Another few miles brings you to London Arch. The current arch was previously joined to the mainland with another arch and, at that time, the formation was called London Bridge. However, in 1990 the left arch collapsed, leaving two tourists stranded on the section that is visible today.A better sense of the whole view can be seen in this video.

Another few miles on is the Bay of Islands. Click for a larger version.
My last coastal stop was in Bridgewater with its magnificent bay as shown in this panorama. Click for a larger version.
This is called the Petrified Forest as it was originally thought these rocks were formed from trees. They are, in fact, limestone “solution tubes” formed when acidic rainwater dissolved out the middle.