Melbourne 2016 Day 2: Great Ocean Road

DAY 2: 1 DEC 2016

Twelve Apostles

We got up really early this morning because we were going on a Great Ocean Road tour.

Prior to this trip, we pre-booked this tour with Sightseeing Tours Australia.

I paid S$96 per pax which was one of the cheapest GOR tours online.

My colleague recommended extragreen holidays which offered really cheap Mandarin speaking

day tours.

But I decided to go with Sightseeing Tours as they offered a smaller group and

it's English speaking!

Our tour started with a pick up at 7.30am and off we went to our first quick destination,

Urquhart Bluff.

Urquhart Bluff

Next, we moved on to the famous Memorial Arch which symbolises the start of

the Great Ocean Road.

Memorial Arch

 

The drive along the coast was really stunning despite the gloomy weather.

I must say Australia definitely has one of the nicest beaches I have seen.

The waters were so clear and the sand was white and fine.

We stopped at the Kennett River for morning tea, and we were greeted by

tons of native rosella, lorikeets, cockatoos and koalas!

I wasn't a fan of the rosellas because they were a little too friendly with humans

and they love to get on top of tourists' heads.

I guess because tourists often feed them and they know we all love a photo shot with them.

Wild Koala up on a tree

Wild Rosella

There were many koalas up in the trees when we were there.

It was a really great experience spotting them in their natural environment,

although tourists were often seen here.

After morning tea, we drove off to Apollo Bay for lunch at Iluka restaurant.

We only had 40 minutes there and lunch took up the entire 40 minutes.

I wished we had more time to explore the area though.

We headed to the Maits Rest rainforest for a nice little stroll.

It was really nice to be surrounded by nature once in a while as we all live in the city.

Finally, the main attraction is next: Twelve Apostles!

We were driven to the Twelve Apostles boardwalk and we were given 45 minutes to explore.

 

The sight of the twelve apostles surrounded by the blue clear waters was absolutely breathtaking.

I would have stayed longer if I could!

Next, we drove to the Loch Ard Gorge for more rock formations and beautiful beach.

We were given 45 minutes at this site even though there were 3 different but 

amazing walks to go for.

We walked down to the beach first and we were greeted by this picturesque view!

 

 

We spent too much time here which made us rush through the other two walks.

Go for the island arc and razorback walk if you are constrained with time.

 

 

 

Last item on the list was the Gibson Steps, which are an area of cliffs on the south coast

of Australia.

20 minutes of exploration was just nice to take in the view right in front of our eyes.

 

 The journey back to the city took three hours and we had a quick stopover at a town

for some dinner.

We were dropped off at Exford hotel in Chinatown and we decided to check out Chinatown.

There was so much to offer, from Chinese to Vietnamese to Indonesian, and they were

all so familiar.

Taro ball dessert

We passed by a dessert shop called The Dessert Story and we decided to give it a try!

It was good, but we tried better ones back home.

But this place is really popular, so you can pop by if you are in the vicinity.

And that marks the end of our second day in Melbourne!