Road trip, Part 3

We set off from Mount Gambier on Tuesday morning and forgot to go have a look at the volcanic lake that makes MG famous. We headed south into a hilly landscape known as the Lower Glenelg National Park. We had occasional glimpses of the sea after the road curved into a south-easterly heading but this was not Great Ocean road proper – it began at Portland, according to our map. The Glenelg is a big man made forest for logging, or so it appears from the road. Large swathes of field were empty of everything except for mangled roots or the odd horizontal tree trunk. Other fields had exact lines of small pines stretching into the distance. Not what I thought it would be after looking at the map, but at least we saw a group of emus (a flock?).

We sped onto the GOR with little fanfare and hurtled past an area good for whale watching. It was now that I would realise Stephen’s failed ambition to be a rally driver didn’t prevent him trying to emulate his heroes on picturesque tourist routes. And so the few days we spent driving on the GOR ended up being quite tortuous, despite the immaculate beauty of the place.

But I can’t complain about it because I could have told him to slow down. He would have listened, I’m sure, but then there would have been an understanding lingering in the air that I had somehow deprived him of something precious. I said to him in the Grampians, “God, Stephen are you in a hurry?” and he looked at me, almost hurt, and said “just having some fun”. I’m sure he was having fun but it’s fucking irritating for the passenger.

So anyway the upside to various levels of G being inflicted on you is less road time and more golf. We travelled the 170km from MG to Port Fairy in no time at all and then played at a fantastic links course. The best I’ve played in my life, I’ll hazard.

2nd, I think. Some chips would bend in the wind

Beautiful par 5 on the back nine

Played very well, but not throughout the whole 18, and this seems to be my problem. Inconsistency and lack of concentration seem to prevent me from shooting the odd 75. Of course, practice could probably solve at least one of those problems.

It was probably late afternoon when we carried on our trip along the GOR, this time on route to Port Campbell. This is the part of the journey most famous for its natural beauty.

Some place I forget the name of...

I think this beach was next to London Bridge

London Bridge. The arch on the left broke in about 1990

Port Campbell is a miniscule place which survives purely on tourism. You would probably call it the gateway to the Twelve Apostles, if you were some kind of travel agent. So apart from these “apostles” (of which there are only eight remaining) PC is rather dry: a pub, a few restaurants, a couple of hostels and a campsite.

We decided that we would both quite like some seafood that evening so we went to a seafood restaurant but they didn’t have any fish so we went down the road to a normal restaurant and got a seafood basket each. We had a few glasses of wine and then went down to the pub and played pool for a few hours. Ho hum. A few locals were saying how quiet it was.

The bar closed and we went back to the eerily quiet hostel, both wanting another drink. We were despondently wondering towards the dorm when a Scottish man came down the passage way and said to us “are yous after a drink?” It turned out he was completely bored out of his tree and had been waiting around for someone / anyone to come in and join him for a couple of beers. Ahh, Port Campbell.