The Great Ocean Road : Torquay to Apollo Bay

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The Great Ocean Road starts at Torquay and ends at Allansford.  There is so much to see and so we are moving along the road every couple of days.  Each move I will do another post to save them getting too long.  We will be visiting most of the points of interest along the route so will try to name them all.  There will be a lot of pictures of the ocean - hopefully you will love the scenery as much as we do.

Torquay

We arrived in Torquay by 3.00pm and what a lovely place.  Just as picturesque as its UK namesake.  We sat on their equivalent of a promenade and watched the swimmers and surfers for a couple of hours.  We were actually waiting for the fish restaurant to reopen at 5pm but it was a good use of our time!!  

We were staying above the town in a chalet a couple had just finished converting in Jan Juc.  It was lovely and we were very sorry to only be staying the 1 night.  


We left Torquay on a dismal rainy morning but were determined it wouldn't stop us doing anything.

Anglesea


Airey's Inlet

A stunningly beautiful place.  We were delighted with the number of birds we saw on the walk up to the lighthouse.  David's video of a cockatoo is quite amusing as I was quite oblivious - he would say as always!





Great Ocean Road Memorial Arch

It is quite interesting that the Memorial Arch is not at the start of the road but rather where the first toll booth was for the road.   The arch was built to honour the 3000 servicemen that worked on and built the road from 1919 to 1932.  


Many of you know I don't do sand unless I have to, so whilst I fought with the huge coachloads of people trying to get pictures of the Arch, David went down to the beach to see what it was like.


One thing we have found is some lookouts are in what we consider dodgy places to stop and also the actual overlooks are a little overgrown.  This was the case with Cinema Point and Big Hill so I have put their plaque with some photos I took on the way to Lorne.


Lorne

Lorne visitors centre holds the Great Ocean Road Story which I personally found really interesting.  If you think that the actual road is considered one of the top 10 drives in the world it definitely should be better signposted.  We knew it was in Lorne but didn't know it was within the visitor's centre but we found it.  It really is a phenomenal story.  I was very moved by the fact that these amazing men did it all by hand and that the lead benefactor for the project sadly died just 3 months before its completion.  His chauffeur drove his car with an empty passenger seat during the opening ceremony.


We then went and walked Teddy's track and the Pier.


Our next stops were at Wye River, Kennett River, Skenes Creek and the lookout points.  Unfortunately the weather was very unreliable, one moment raining the next sunny so several of the photos are from the car.  We saw more koalas when we went back on corrugated roads along with parrots and parakeets. 



We arrived safely in Apollo Bay and went straight to our chalet.  Our home for the next two nights.





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