From Otway we headed on to the east this morning to cover the last of the Ocean Road. We headed through Apollo Bay and then stopped for a short walk up to Carisbrook Falls. As with everywhere else, the volume of water was not very significant, but nevertheless a beautiful stop.
From there we drove on along a beautiful stretch of road, closely hugging the coast with some fantastic views, though with constant bends, a close eye on the road was essential as well! Our next stop for a coffee and crepes (how very Australian) was in Lorne – the start of the surfing coast. The paying customers of the cafes seemed to be outnumbered by the non-paying customers – sulphur crested cockatoos. They lined themselves up on the backs of the chairs just watching for anything to fall. If it did, they pounced. In fact they occasionally pounced while stuff was still on people’s plates!
We drove on with the coast gradually changing in character and our last stop before Torquay was at Airey’s Inlet. Here we walked up to Split Point lighthouse. This was one of the last lighthouses to be built in 1891, but was a helpful markers for ships navigating the treacherous Bass Strait. The lighthouse even apparently appeared in the film Mad Max, though somewhat in the background. The foreground was apparently a beach shack in Fairhaven with the lighthouse in the background. That same beach shack went on the market in 2021 for around $11m, though it had been somewhat extended and improved since Mad Max’s day!
Our next stop was for lunch in Torquay – the surfing capital of the area and the host to the famous Bells Beach surfing championship. Surf was apparently not up the day we were there though there were various people wing-foiling and kitesurfing in the surf.
Our route to lunch took us past an intriguing carved tree. Close by there apparently used to be a figurehead. This was from a barque called the Inverlochy which met the same fate as many other ships along this coast when she was wrecked in 1902 at Anglesea. The figurehead was retieved and mounted on the front at Torquay, until it mysteriously disappeared in the 1950s. So, in 2001/2 the sculptor Mark Trinham carved a dead cypress tree trunk to match the figurehead in its abstract underwater surrounds.
We then had a very nice long lunch with friends from the UK who were there visiting their son. A long lunch which we unfortunately had to curtail a little to ensure getting to our campsite in Geelong before they shut up shop for the evening. The site is right on the Barwon River and reasonably accessible for getting into South Geelong and Melbourne ….