Great Ocean Road - Apollo Bay to Port Fairy

The plan for day two on the road was to drive from Apollo Bay to Port Fairy.

I started the day with breakfast in Apollo Bay.  The town was pretty cute with basically one main street which was the Great Ocean Road.  On one side were shops and restaurants, then on the other side some park space and the ocean.

Apollo Bay

Apollo Bay

My next stop was a 30 minute rainforest walk called Maits Rest.  I hadn't really realized how big the rainforest was right along the ocean.

I took some time to become one with nature, lucky for you I photographed it.

Up next are the stops within or near Port Campbell National Park.  Get ready for lots of selfies with rocks.  These are the stops that I think most people would associate with the Great Ocean Road.  There were all about 5-10 minutes apart by car.  The first stop was the Gibson Steps.  I presume they are named as such because of the steps in the stone to get down to the beach.  I'm sure there was a placard that explained it somewhere!  The views of the rock formations in and along the ocean were pretty striking.

The actual Gibson steps

I actually noticed some drones the day before at Bells Beach, kindof creepy to see them hovering overhead, but here, I noticed these signs noting no drones were allowed.  Not sure if its because there were lots of low flying sight seeing helicopters or if people just generally find them annoying.

The next stop is arguably the most well known of them all and it was certainly the most popular, The Twelve Apostles.  There was at one point a stone for each of the twelve apostles, hence the name, however I believe now only 8 remain.  This stop was pretty crowded and I finally had some company as a selfie stick toting tourist.

View of the other direction

The next stop was Loch and Gorge.  Two large rock formations almost formed a triangle with the beach with a little opening at the top of the triangle.  This made for some pretty intense waves crashing through towards the beach.

Up next, the Arch.

Then, the London Bridge.  As you can see, the rock to the right forms the shape of a bridge!  

Also keep in mind as you picture this, in between each of these stops I tried to get into the passenger side of the car more than half the time.  Even though I was by myself, I eventually just started laughing out loud at myself.  

Then it was on to the Grotto!  The rocks basically formed a little cave along the beach with a little peak through out to a calm part of water that was protected by another series of rocks.  

The Grotto was my last stop of the day.  Then it was back on the road towards Port Fairy. 

I lucked out again with a great view.  The second photo below is after a short walk from the patio towards the beach.

 

The town of Port Fairy itself was pretty sleepy so I took it easy for the rest of the night.  Up next, the drive back to Melbourne with a stop to see some Aussie animals first!