Wednesday 23 September 2015

Great Ocean Road


One thing that was on my top-things-to-do-in-Australia list was the Great Ocean Road. The fact that we are in Melbourne and our hosts have a spare car made it pretty obvious that the time has come, so we got up at 5.30 am today and took the highway to Port Campbell. By 9 am we finally got there and our first stop was Lord Arch Gorge, which is located in the Twelve Apostels Marine National Park. I saw this spot so many times on photos before, but actually standing there on the beach is pretty impressive and I would dare to say that it is the most amazing place I have ever been to so far. Spending some time at the beach there made us totally forget on how horrible it was to get up that early and I immediately got so excited about the fact that I finally made it to the Great Ocean Road. We got on the car again and drove some minutes until the next stop: The Twelve Apostles. This view of the coast can't be beaten. Walking the path close to the cliffs and hearing the massive waves breaking feels like being on the edge of the world. The first two stops of our roadtrip were definitely the highlights of our roadtrip, but everything else that followed on the Great Ocean Road up to Torquay was also simply amazing. The most enjoyable part in terms of driving is the part between Apollo Bay and Lorne and we were really surprised how often the landscape changed from stunning to very stunning ;-) 

By looking at these photos you will get an idea of the Great Ocean Road, but no photos can ever capture the beauty we saw today. (I know it sounds so cheesy, but it's the truth!) So to all of you reading this - put the Great Ocean Road on your bucket list, you won't regret it!


Loch Ard Gorge






12 Apostles






Can you spot the koala? So lucky we saw one!



too lazy to get out of the car ;-)



somewhere between Apollo Bay and Lorne





Bells Beach



back in Melbs after driving about 650km

Sunday 20 September 2015

Sunday Funday


I don't know whether you can tell the difference of the quality of the photos or not - but these photos are a collection of pics taken with Paul's smartphone, my smartphone and the reflex cam, before it decided to pass away, leaving me alone with my goddamn bad iPhone camera. I don't know how that could happen, but it just broke down while taking photos and I personally hate having low quality photos of beautiful places. I hope I will find a store somewhere in Melbourne tomorrow, where they can fix my camera again, because the Spring Break Trip has just started!! Thank god we still have the GoPro... Anyways we had a really nice Sunday today, starting with a lovely breakfast in a cafe close to the place where we are staying. Then we headed to St Kilda to hang out on the beach, before we took the tram to the CBD to enjoy lunch in a cafe in Degraves Street. The afternoon was spent at Brighton Beach - the beach itself is definitely not the best, but the little bathing boxes are just so picturesque. In the evening we had a really delicious dinner together with our hosts to celebrate Tom's 16th Birthday and afterwards we played two rounds of pool with the boys at home - what a lovely Sunday!


yummy breakfast - Vienna is definitely a good place to be in terms of coffee, but I have to admit that Melbourne is probably even better ;-)


finally found the perfect heart shaped sunglasses <3



St Kilda Beach



Luna Park


Lunch


Flinders Street Station


Melbourne Skyline




Brighton Beach










Friday 18 September 2015

First day in Melbourne


The first stop of our Spring Break Trip is Melbourne. We got up today at 6am and flew to Melbs, where we got picked up at the airport by Chris, who is a friend of my father. Paul and I are staying at their place in Melbourne for the next 6 days and what can I say? Their house is one of the most charming and classiest homes I have ever seen. It is so nice to finally live in a real home again, even if it is just for a few days and it was really good to finally see Chris' family again (we spent a skiing holiday together last year in Austria), not to mention that they are the friendliest hosts ever.

In the afternoon we headed to the city centre to explore a bit of Melbourne and just stroll around, because Paul and I were both a bit tired. I really enjoy being in a big city again after such a long time and the view from the 88th floor of the Eureka Tower was stunning! Unfortunately the weather is even worse than in Adelaide and it doesn't seem that it will get much better until we fly to Cairns next Thursday and we really wanted to a daytrip to the Great Ocean Road - but for now we just have to wait and see. However, Chris will take us to a horserace tomorrow afternoon and on Sunday we will celebrate Tom's Birthday - I am really looking forward to this weekend!

For now I will just leave you with my first impressions of Melbourne - Enjoy!