So I'm currently in Glenelg, and have been for a week. Glenelg is just on the outskirts of Adelaide. Beautiful city I must say! I leave tomorrow for Launceston Tasmania where I start work on Tuesday. I'm definitely not looking forward to it, but I think once I get settled and started, it won't be that bad.
Anyways, here is how day two of the great ocean road went:
We had an early morning start - departed at 7:30am.....and you all know how much of a morning person I am .....*insert sarcasm here*. But I was excited for the day so it wasn't that bad :)
We headed out to Loch Ard Gorge, famous for its shipwrecks due to heavy fog and its many hidden reefs. The reefs stretch 120 km's and more then 80 vessels crashed in just 40 years. Of course there is one famous wreck in 1878 in which 55 people where aboard and only 2 survived. One girl was washed into the 'gorge' and an other guy rescued her - they waited in a cave until they where rescued. I like to add that they had a little hanky panky while they waited - and so did the press, but story has it that nothing happened and the girl returned to ireland and they never saw each other. I know, boring.....but now you know! The next stop was london bridge, and guess what? the bridge has fallen down!! It used to be a double arch platform linked to the mainland, however one of the arches collapsed in 1990, and sadly soon the other arch will collapse, and it will look like one of the apostles! I could have taken a helicopter tour the apostles, the gorge and the arch and the rest of the coast line, but it was like $70 for 5 minutes. No thanks! The cool thing about taking a guided tour - apart from waking up earlier then I would want and being on a strict time line - is that you get to see things that you couldn't find in the lonely planet - such as the Bay of Martyr's, or Bay of Massacre's. It happened ages ago when the Europeans came over and massacred all the aboriginals, driving the men off the cliffs, and killing the women and children in a nearby swamp. Not a great story - but some history for ya! It was a beautiful long beach - about a kilometer long, nice white sand, and more apostle like things in the water!! I will add a link at the end so you can see the pictures. After some nice relaxing beach time, we headed up Grampians National Park. A beautiful park with lots of bush walking opportunities and waterfalls! So we headed up to a spot where we hiked to the 'pinnacle'. And as Collette describes it, the death hike. We happened to be doing this walk/hike/climb whatever you want to call it, on one of the hottest days. I'd say it was about 38 degrees, freakin hot anyways. Brian said a fit person could hike it in 35 minutes, with the average person reaching the summit in an hour. It was a fairly steep hike, lots of rocks to hike over, a bunch of stairs to climb, and a lot of open areas which allows the heat to reflect off and make us even more tired/hot/thirsty ect.!! I of course brought my camera, and took tons of photos, probably taking closer to an hour and half to reach the top. I also started chatting with Blake, the guy who slept in the first day and missed the bus, who was also and avid photographer, so we took our time exploring and enjoying the view. The pinnacle was pretty spectacular, beautiful views of the Grampians and steep cliffs. We where also the last ones to leave, of course, and caught up with the other 'stragglers', taking about an hour to reach the bottom. After an exhausting hike, running out of water on the way down, I was not feeling so great. Dehydration kicked it, I had a headache when I reached the bus. Drank a bunch of water, had an orange, but my headache stuck around for a few hours. Our hostel that night was close just at the base of the Grampian 'mountains' - if you can call them that, so we started supper right away. Our chef cooked us supper - chicken, lamb, hamburgers, sausage, salad - all yummy foods! The kangaroos came out from hiding from the extreme heat and Blake and I took some more photos. The came right out into a field across from the hostel and loved being in the wilderness with these cool animals! I could watch them for hours hoping around! The sun was going down when they came out and none of our pictures came out great, so we decided to get up at 6 the next morning to get some more photos before taking off for our last day.
Anyways, here is how day two of the great ocean road went:
We had an early morning start - departed at 7:30am.....and you all know how much of a morning person I am .....*insert sarcasm here*. But I was excited for the day so it wasn't that bad :)
We headed out to Loch Ard Gorge, famous for its shipwrecks due to heavy fog and its many hidden reefs. The reefs stretch 120 km's and more then 80 vessels crashed in just 40 years. Of course there is one famous wreck in 1878 in which 55 people where aboard and only 2 survived. One girl was washed into the 'gorge' and an other guy rescued her - they waited in a cave until they where rescued. I like to add that they had a little hanky panky while they waited - and so did the press, but story has it that nothing happened and the girl returned to ireland and they never saw each other. I know, boring.....but now you know! The next stop was london bridge, and guess what? the bridge has fallen down!! It used to be a double arch platform linked to the mainland, however one of the arches collapsed in 1990, and sadly soon the other arch will collapse, and it will look like one of the apostles! I could have taken a helicopter tour the apostles, the gorge and the arch and the rest of the coast line, but it was like $70 for 5 minutes. No thanks! The cool thing about taking a guided tour - apart from waking up earlier then I would want and being on a strict time line - is that you get to see things that you couldn't find in the lonely planet - such as the Bay of Martyr's, or Bay of Massacre's. It happened ages ago when the Europeans came over and massacred all the aboriginals, driving the men off the cliffs, and killing the women and children in a nearby swamp. Not a great story - but some history for ya! It was a beautiful long beach - about a kilometer long, nice white sand, and more apostle like things in the water!! I will add a link at the end so you can see the pictures. After some nice relaxing beach time, we headed up Grampians National Park. A beautiful park with lots of bush walking opportunities and waterfalls! So we headed up to a spot where we hiked to the 'pinnacle'. And as Collette describes it, the death hike. We happened to be doing this walk/hike/climb whatever you want to call it, on one of the hottest days. I'd say it was about 38 degrees, freakin hot anyways. Brian said a fit person could hike it in 35 minutes, with the average person reaching the summit in an hour. It was a fairly steep hike, lots of rocks to hike over, a bunch of stairs to climb, and a lot of open areas which allows the heat to reflect off and make us even more tired/hot/thirsty ect.!! I of course brought my camera, and took tons of photos, probably taking closer to an hour and half to reach the top. I also started chatting with Blake, the guy who slept in the first day and missed the bus, who was also and avid photographer, so we took our time exploring and enjoying the view. The pinnacle was pretty spectacular, beautiful views of the Grampians and steep cliffs. We where also the last ones to leave, of course, and caught up with the other 'stragglers', taking about an hour to reach the bottom. After an exhausting hike, running out of water on the way down, I was not feeling so great. Dehydration kicked it, I had a headache when I reached the bus. Drank a bunch of water, had an orange, but my headache stuck around for a few hours. Our hostel that night was close just at the base of the Grampian 'mountains' - if you can call them that, so we started supper right away. Our chef cooked us supper - chicken, lamb, hamburgers, sausage, salad - all yummy foods! The kangaroos came out from hiding from the extreme heat and Blake and I took some more photos. The came right out into a field across from the hostel and loved being in the wilderness with these cool animals! I could watch them for hours hoping around! The sun was going down when they came out and none of our pictures came out great, so we decided to get up at 6 the next morning to get some more photos before taking off for our last day.
1 comment:
Sounds awesome Amanda! I cannot wait to see all of the pictures to go along with the stories.
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