Goodness gracious great ocean road

Trip Start Oct 22, 2007

103

Trip End Mar 01, 2008

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Flag of Australia Mount Gambier, Australia
Friday, December 28, 2007

Wendy and tony have hired a car for themselves peter harry and Julia to travel in together - we will try and follow them in maz.the hire car turns out to be a bit smaller than expected - and it's a bit of a squeeze for five! We set off for Sorrento and the car ferry to take us across the bay instead of driving through Melbourne. It takes about an hour of very busy roads but we all manage to get on the same boat at 11am. The crossing takes about an hour and it's a beautiful start to our journey - the sun is just perfect and as we sail across the bay a big yacht race gets underway - there are about 60 boats all heading for the ocean. We pass the homes of the rich and famous that overlook the sea and this leg of the journey is over far too quickly but theres a long way to go yet...at lorne we all stop for a late lunch in a restaurant by the jetty . the route has already taken us past some spectacular coastal scenery but the twists and turns and countless hills are taking their toll. Tony and co will be staying overnight at camperdown, a little inland, and we are heading for warnambool, a bit further down the coast so we go our separate ways with plans to meet up for breakfast in the morning

Nattie "BuzZ"

. Warnambool is packed with holiday makers but we manage to get a pitch at the surfside caravan park for our first nights kip in maz for what seems like ages!

Fri 28 dec
As planned, we all meet up in a restaurant in the main street in warnambool for brekkie and compare notes on how our overnight accommodation measured up! The breakfast here is great but nattie feels a bit under the weather today and harry didn't get any sleep last night because Julia was poorly . Oh dear - lets hope its not catching! todays drive is a bit shorter than yesterday, we are aiming for mount gambier, but the heat is rising and maz's air con isn't working. It looks like we will all feel a bit uncomfortable for the next few hours...
By early afternoon we reach the beautiful city of mount gambier - full of natural wonders and we all meet up once again at the sunken garden called the sinkhole - full of tree ferns and agapanthus flowers (wendy says these are classed as weeds in some states - there are so many of them everywhere!) then its on to see the most famous of the sights here - the blue lake - in a volcanic crater above the city. The blue water is dazzling - no photo will do this justice but we try anyhow! Our home for the night is just across the road - big 4 blue lake holiday park - tony and co are staying at a hotel in town so, once again , we arrange to meet up in the morning. Its very hot here too so tonights kip in maz will have to be with the doors open ! lets hope its very dark for the other campers sakes!

Sat 29 dec
The rendezvous at macco's in town is at 8am - today is our longest leg of this journey - auntie shirl is expecting us at teatime - she isn't expecting harry and Julia tho - them being here will be a big surprise for her later and that's the reason why we didn't visit her when we were in Adelaide 2 weeks ago - we thought we might let the cat out of the bag if we went to visit first time around

Blue Lake

! So we all hope to turn up at auntie shirls house together later. We decide to take the slightly shorter inland route which, at keith, will take us back the way we left Adelaide before. But its not long before we realise maz cant keep up the pace with tony's hire car, the temperature is in the high thirties and we have to slow down to avoid maz's engine overheating. We manage to meet up again in keith though and have lunch together once more. Tony and co press on while we wait for maz to cool down a bit - don't think we'll catch them up now but we'll give it our best shot!
We stop for an icecream at a servo (service station) - the assistant tells us its 41 degrees...now we wish we'd stuck to the cooler coast road! Not far to go now we decide to cross country and just miss getting flattened by a falling tree! We also missed the big surprise - but only by about an hour - auntie shirl had just got over the shock of harry and Julia being there when we arrived at her house! Very hot ,very tired we get introduced to all the family - its great to get such a friendly welcome and its hard to leave for the Christies beach campsite a few miles down the road. We'll be back tomorrow for sure...