Great Ocean Road

This 1000 km long route between the capitals of Victoria and South Australia belongs for us to the most delightful landscapes of Australia . Hilly back countries, nice holiday places at the sea, historically interesting places and above all the bizarre steep coast make this distance to an absolute Highlight.
 

To drive on the left-hand side is really no problem, because there is not so much traffic as on European touristic routs and with a tidy car including air conditioning and automatic system, you can enjoy this trip very well. We wanted to make ourselves no stress and selected our daily driving distances round 200 and 300 km.

Our first stop after Melbourne was Geelong , the second largest Town in Victoria with its National Wool Centre.

Here everything turns around the wool, from sheep shearing up to the processing in the textile industry, everything you can see here in the best way. The age-old mechanical machines were most fascinating, like the enormous loom with 1200 punch cards.
 

  
Following the street to the Great Ocean Road over Torquay, Apollo Bay to Port Campbell along the beautiful coastline and the fantastic back country with its great landscape. It reminded us with its width of the South of Spain, full-green hills, giant-large herds of cattle and isolated farms in the midst of big golden wheat fields. This is freedom pure.

Approaching the Port Campbell national park the coastal scenery becomes much dramatically. In a spectacularly kind the Australian continent falls directly into the sea. To the probably largest nature phenomena belong the Twelve Apostles, strange, isolated cliff sculptures in the rough sea. Singularly, grandiose! Of course we climbed down on the famous Gibson Stepps and could admire so this phantastic nature from a very unusual perspective. All times whether in the morning or to the sunset it always offered an unforgettable and incomparable panorama.
 

Nearby Port Campbell you can see the parts of London Bridge , which was originally connected to the steep cliffs on the bank.  Some years ago it broke down in a spectacular way.

On our tour it was no problem to find a good overnight accommodation. Everywhere you can find Motels or Bed and Breakfast. One of our most beautiful accommodations was the Sea View Lodge in Cape Bridgewater . Dennis and Jackie were very hearty and extreme friendly hosts. Unfortunately we did not have enough time to spend more days in this beautiful home stay.

A 1 hour walkway over the highest cliffs of Victoria across the Bridgewater Bay bring you to a seals colony, where you can see often hundreds seals playing in the sea. We had unfortunately not very much luck because we saw not so much seal families lying on the rocks as usual. Instead of it hundreds of flies accompanied us on our Trip, a typically Australian phenomenon.

Also you can reach the Petrified Forest comfortably by foot. In the midst of a moon landscape nature stand the plastics of petrified trees. In thousands of years these singular petrified trunks resulted from the interaction of sand, water and wind.

Early in the morning the scenery is very fascinating and mystic. In addition of the near steep cliffs and the noises of the big waves breaking on the cliffs is the visit really unforgettable.