Great Ocean road tour
Unfortunately it was pouring this morning - very nice when you have a 20 min walk to your pick up point.
We got on the bus and Jude our guide told us a bit about the two days we are going to spent together. Then we had an 2 hour drive through inland and stopped at Bilmore for morning tea and biscuits. Another hour during we saw the volcano Elephant and drove through Mortlake, a village where the road is seemed with trees everyone reminding of one fallen soldier, we stopped for lunch in Lismore. Later we stopped briefly at a beach where in winter you can see the southern whale.
After we went to the Tower hill reserve. Also an reminding volcano where we saw koalas, wallabies and kangaroos. There were quite near and as always so cute! :-)
We then went to the bay of island and the bay of marles. Two very nice spots with a great view over some rock formations.
The next stop then was The grotto - also very nice to look at and a great shot opportunity.
After that Jude drove us to our hostel in Port Campbell. We had a delicious barbeque there and then headed to the 12 apostels to watch the sunset (unfortunately because of that we were a bit rushed through the BBQ).
The weather wasn't that good, so we couldn't see the sun setting, but it was still an amazing view!
After watching the penguins walking on the beach (unfortunately they came in quite late so you could only see black dots, but it was still cute) we went back to the hostel and "faded out" the night.

Tuesday, 25th of January

Because we wanted to leave the hostel at 7.30 we got up quite early for breakfast.
After checking out we then went to the London bridge. There Jude told us about the day when the bridge fall down. Two people couldn't make it to the mainland when the bridge fall down, got stuck on the other side and had to be rescued with a helicopter.
Unfortunately the rescue helicopter took his time and so the news travelled to Melbourne and actually the news helicopter was on the London bridge before the rescue helicopter.
Once the people realised it wasn't the helicopter which ll rescue them they bent down and tried to hide their faces. The helicopter circled the bridge and tried to get shots from the "survivers" but in the end couldn't get one and flew off with just the "hiding pictures". This then got on the news and everyone was wondering why the people acted to strangely. A week later the secret was discovered. The couple was married - but not to each other :-)), they had a little day off together and surely tried to keep their affair secret! :-)) What a story! :-)
Later we stopped at the loch ard gorge where we had a bit time to wander around the beautiful site.
Then we visited the 12 apostels again - to have a look at daylight too.
Before we reached the Mait's rest rainforest we visited the gibson steps. There you can walk down to sea level and have a little walk along the beach.
At the rainforest Jude took us on a walk and explained some things about this rainforest there - the "Oekosystem" and mainly the big trees and who there steps in live are. The trees are so big that 20 ll fit into the "Stamm". Crazy!
For lunch we went to Apollo bay and everyone who had bought a container ate the leftover from the tasty salad from yesterdays BBQ. mmmhhh.
Then the journey followed the coast line and we had a gorgeous view. On our way we also saw heaps of koalas sitting in the trees just near the road. Amazing!
We had a few stops for "view - pictures" and kangaroo- and koala-sighs before we reached the war memorial near ________________. There we took a group picture - 24 cameras that meant smiling a lot :-)))
The last stop was then Bells beach were we had afternoon tea and watch the surfers trying to catch some waves. It was the perfect ending of a really nice tour.
I was quite happy that I chose this one!