PART 2 THE GREAT OCEAN ROAD

 

BEAUTIFUL PORT FAIRY 

 

TOWER HILL



THE GROTTO



THE 12 APOSTLES



THE BAY OF ISLANDS



LOCH ARD GORGE



PORT FAIRY HARBOUR



PORT FAIRY TO 12 APOSTLES

Tuesday 21st February   We left Anglesea at 8am.  Our next destination was Port Fairy Gardens Caravan Park, another 3 hours drive along The Great Ocean Road.  We had to call into Warrnambool to get a wheel alignment on the caravan wheels, which took longer than anticipated.  Whilst we were waiting for the wheel alignment we spent a few hours looking around the town.   We had lunch by the ocean and drove along the coastline coming to the Tourist Information Centre at Flagstaff Hill where the Maritime Village is located.   By the time we picked the caravan up again, hooked on and got to Port Fairy we were pretty tired as it had been a long drive having to wait around in Warrnambool.  The caravan park was located along the Moyne River and had a garden beside the footbridge into town.  It’s quite a large park but much of it is closed off now that it’s not peak period.  We set up, had some dinner then went over the footbridge into town.

PORT FAIRY   We instantly liked the little port town and thought it was just so pretty, with boats on either side of the harbour.  It’s an historic port town that has been kept pretty much intact.  It was originally known as Belfast but was renamed Port Fairy in 1887 by Captain James Wishart when his cutter named Fairy was caught there in a bad storm.  In the early 1800’s it was an attractive place for sealers and whalers.  A whaling station was established on the island.  Whaling was so successful that by 1840 there were no whales left to capture, so the whaling station closed.  It had very rich soil and was populated by famers and many Irish immigrants.

Wednesday 22^nd February  We drove back towards Warrnambool to explore Killarney and Killarney Beach and admire the little stone walls along the road that you find in Ireland.  Many of the roads have Irish names.  There was a large Irish community of potato farmers living there when the town was first settled.  Behind Killarney Beach there is a cheap camp where you can stay for $17 per night (unpowered) and $22 for a powered site.  It’s run by Jamie O’Brien.  It’s very popular there and was quite crowded with vans and motor homes.  We’ll definitely stay there if we’re back in the area.

 Further on is the historic Irish town of Koroit that holds a big Irish Festival every April. William Rutledge an important Irish landowner took up 5,120 acres of land in the 1840’s and imported fellow Irish labourers to work the land.  These poor fellows were suffering during the potato famine in Ireland and were eager to look for opportunities abroad.  Many Scots and Yorkshire folk also lived there, but the Irish dominated and set the lay of the land.  Koroit soon became known as a major potato producer.

Later that night we came back to Warrnambool for the Shipwrecked laser light show at the Maritime Village.  They hold this show nightly.  It’s so popular that they had to have a second show that night, starting at 9.50pm – a bit late but we really wanted to see it.  Entrance was $26 per adult.  We had a guided walk through the village by lantern and were taken to an auditorium set out like the inside of a ship.  We sat down and saw a re-enactment of people telling their story of how they were on the Loch Ard ship that sank in 1878 in Victoria.  One was the captain of the ship, one was Tom Pierce an 18 year old ship’s apprentice and the other 18 year old passenger Eva Carmichael.  The Loch Ard set sail from Greenwich in England on 1^st March 1878 with 81 passengers, 51 crew and valuable cargo.  During the 13 week voyage they did the great circle route through hot temperatures to the freezing cold arctic temperatures.  They had days of bad weather and fog and couldn’t plot their course accurately.  Consequently, they hit a reef off of Loch Ard Gorge and sank in 15 minutes because of the cargo of heavy lead they were carrying.  There were only 2 survivors – Tom Pierce and Eva Carmichael.  The captain who was only 6 weeks married perished with his ship.  The most famous piece salvaged was “The Peacock” which was going to an exhibition in Melbourne.  It’s current value is $4 million, but was purchased by the town of  Warrnambool for $4,000 at a salvage auction.  It is now proudly displayed in The Maritime Village for everyone to admire.  It was a fantastic show well worth looking at.  It gave us a great insight into the cramped conditions aboard the ship and the hopes and expectations of the immigrants wanting to start a new life or visit relatives already settled in Australia.  The laser show was projected over the water in the harbour and our seats rocked with the motion of the boat and we could really imagine what it felt like to be shipwrecked.  Afterwards, we walked up the cobblestone roads and hills to the top of the village and couldn’t help thinking about what we had just seen.

Thursday 23^rd February   We set off at 9am eager to see the rest of The Great Ocean Road.  It took us over an hour to get to the first stop The Bay of Islands.  It was just breathtaking and we were in awe of what we were looking at.  Every lookout we stopped at was magnificent with deep turquoise clear water and changing colours of  the cliff faces.  We stopped at The Bay of Martyrs, The Grotto, Port Campbell and many more along the way. Loch Ard Gorge was quite a poignant stop, having just learnt its history first hand the previous night.  We saw the actual cave where Eva and Tom sheltered on that fateful night. It was almost impossible to imagine how Tom had clambered up the cliffs barefoot to get help.  We had lots of steps to help us up and down the steep cliffs.  Each lookout just got better and better as we went up and down steps and pathways to the viewing platforms.  There were lots of 15 minute helicopter rides over the area from different starting points.  The 12 Apostles was the biggest stop with a visitor’s centre, helicopter rides, huge car park and café.   The views were superb and magnificent and it was hard to absorb just how phenomenal it all was.  I would say it should be a must on everyone’s bucket list of things to do.  It would probably rate as our number one destination so far in our travels.

To cap it off we stopped at Cheeseworld at Allensford on the way back.  They have free tastings every hour and a café famous for its milkshakes and ploughman’s lunches.  Entry is free and the museum there was full of interesting artifacts from the past, machinery, woodworking tools, china and photographs.  We really enjoyed the cheeses that were made in the factory across the road.  We had a yummy Devonshire tea and bought some of our favourite cheeses for future happy hours.

Friday 24^th February   We went on a half hour Bay Cruise that left from the harbour at 10.30, costing $10.  We were greeted by “Captain Jane” and her border collie Molly (a 5 year old rescue dog).   Captain Jane was a fascinating local character who had been sailing in various boats for many years (she had previously been on cray fishing boats).  She has been operating the tour boat for the past 17 years and informed us we were on her 10,897^th trip over that period. We knew her trip was going to be different to what we had expected when she informed us she had to “fill up with fuel” if no-one objected or was in a hurry.  Well that turned out to be quite an episode of bowsers not working, cards not being valid to operate the bowser and a longstanding battle with port officials being unhelpful towards her.  Just as we were heading off up the river, without having refueled, there was a miraculous recovery with the bowser operating. We had to back around into position again and got 2 tanks filled with diesel (thankfully).  We learnt as much of Captain Jane’s history as we did of our surrounds and our 30 minute trip stretched out to 1 hour and 10 minutes.  She was having fun and was enjoying our company as much as we were enjoying listening to her tales.  We thought it was the best $10 of entertainment we’d spent.  Molly balanced on the gunnels through the waves and was steady as a rock the whole time.  She’s never once yet fallen off the boat.  She was as entertaining as her owner, running up and down and barking when she saw fit.

After lunch and a good laugh talking about our boat trip, we drove to Tower Hill an inactive volcano with a crater lake.  It is part of the State Park system and was used for pasture for stock, crop growing fields, a stone quarry and an unofficial motorcycle racing venue.  The area has been reforested with over 300,000 native trees.  Koalas, kangaroos magpies, geese, echidnas, possums and waterbirds can be found there.  Small quantities of gold were found from time to time and it soon developed into a town and tourist destination.

There are lots of walks you can do of varying lengths.  It’s a very quiet, restful place where you feel so peaceful.  We saw wild emus walking past.

That night we went to “Wishart’s” fish restaurant by the harbour and had “Catch of The Day” blue grenadier.  It was a huge serve of 2 pieces of fish, chips and salad for $25 each.  We were going to have an entrée until we saw the size of the serves coming out to other customers.  It was very nice and we had a window seat alongside the harbour, despite the fact that I asked for grilled fish but got fried, the waiter ignored my request for extra lemon and when I ordered a bottle of wine he brought me a glass – he later came back with a bottle and said I may as well have the extra glass as he’d poured it out and couldn’t do anything with it!!!

The rest of our stay at Port Fairy was very enjoyable.  There’s a beautiful beach 5 minutes walk from the caravan park with really soft sand and we walked there every day.

Next Week:  We’ll be going to Portland (an hour from Port Fairy) for a few days as we both want to do a boat trip out to the seal colonies.  We’ll then be heading to Mount Gambier to see The Blue Lakes.

Don't forget to log on the blog for another exciting episode.  Thanks for your company so far.  Take care Love Marian, Richard and Sally.