The Galant Versus the Great Ocean Road and Kangaroo Island, Part 1: Hobart to Robe, South Australia

ooo OOO ooo

The Galant, ready to board the SPoT (visible in the background). 

I’m a huge fan of the self-driven road trip.  Buses, trains and planes are all well and good if you’re happy to surrender your freedom to set schedules and and inflexible routes, but there’s only one way to be the captain of your own ship - by which I mean car - and that’s to take your own.   If it’s a 47 year old Japanese classic, even better!

41,905k, ex Hobart. 

It has been a while - a mere 31 years - since the Galant last saw mainland Australia.  However, the old girl has proven to be a great little tourer over the past three decades, having regularly been road-tripped up, down, through, across and around the island state of Tasmania, clocking up many thousands of kilometres of reliable service.  

The Great Ocean Road, Victoria, has always been an attractive  route and a destination in its own right.  South Australia’s Kangaroo Island, accessible via the Southern Ocean Drive (effectively a cross-border extension of the GOR), has held a similar appeal, despite the devastating bushfires that occurred there in 2019.   

And so it was that in June, 2022, Team UMPH finally embarked on our long-planned Tour De Grande Île.  Three hours from Hobart on the recently upgraded goat track that is the Midlands Highway saw us board the Spirit of Tasmania at Devonport, ready for an overnight crossing of Bass Strait.  A right, a left and another left off the ferry the following morning had us pointing in more or less the right direction, over the Westgate Bridge and towards our destination. 

Docking on the big island:  Melbourne’s skyline as dawn breaks.  

Our first proper stop of the day was seaside Torquay, some 100 kilometres and one hour, twenty minutes’ drive from Melbourne on the Princes Freeway (M1), Anglesea Road and the neither dirty nor dirt cheap Mt Dundeed Road (C134 /  https://youtu.be/9v8pAxWL6C4?si=5XGUiIRnSC8TObdj / 🤣), then onto the Surf Coast Highway (B100).  It’s a pretty town, marred somewhat by the mega McMansions that now line the coastline - on the inland side of the adjacent road and foreshore reserve, fortunately - that also serves as the official start of the Great Ocean Road.

We breakfasted at the excellent and aptly named Salty Dog Cafe where seemingly all the locals - and their canine companions, fresh from having frolicked in the ocean - gather for coffee and snacks after their morning exercise or a quick surf.  We could get used to that sort of lifestyle very easily!

Now on the Great Ocean Road proper (B100), we enjoyed a scenic 50 kilometre, 50 minute drive to Lorne, stopping along the way to visit the Split Point lighthouse at Aireys Inlet.  Some readers may remember the light as the setting for the kids’ programme, Round The Twist, that ran on ABC television between 1990 and 2001.  It certainly is quite spectacular and has views to match!  Even the interior is beautiful, featuring an ornately decorated spiral staircase.

Less ornately decorated.

Locals and tourists alike had taken up very nearly every available outdoor dining seat along Lorne’s Mountjoy Parade (really just the town’s own segment of the GOR), despite it technically being mid-winter.  And it wasn’t just humans who had flocked to the the very attractive town’s outdoor eateries; there were more squawking, swooping, pooping white cockatoos than I’ve ever witnessed in one place!  One little, ummm … , “flocker” expressed his admiration for the Galant with a white deposit of the variety that makes one thankful that dogs can’t fly! 

After a tasty lunch of burgers and chips, we resumed our drive westwards, passing through several towns and drinking in the scenery, before arriving at our first-night stopover in Apollo Bay (https://visitapollobay.com/).  For us, the town's highlight was the excellent Great Ocean Road Brewhouse with its log fire, hearty meals and vast selection of craft beers.  The Brewhouse is a sister venture to the widely acclaimed Otway Brewing Company's Prickly Moses line of locally made ales and stout.  They're also responsible for the very best example of inclusive signage that I've yet seen anywhere. 

Apollo Bay also boasts some magnificent scenery being, effectively, the doorway to the Otway National Park.  There's Mait's Rest Rainforest Walk, 17 kilometres from the town itself, as well as two shorebird trails, each being part of the Great Ocean Walk network.  Whale-watchers are catered for, too; during the migration season, there are plenty of lookouts that provide ample opportunities to see our cetacean friends making their way along the coastline.   

Above and below:  the Mait's Rest waterfall.

The following day's section of the Great Ocean Road - from Apollo Bay to Port Fairy - is where the majority of the post card views occur, especially of the spectacular Twelve Apostles, Gibson's Steps, the surrounding cliffs and Southern Ocean, as well as London Bridge and the Loch Ard Gorge.  There are several car parks and viewing platforms along the way.  However, it's still very much worth stopping at the Twelve Apostles Marine National Park visitor centre to get a fuller appreciation of the area and its geological and historical features.

What a way to see the GOR!  This spacious Kombi can be hired from @retrovgreatoceanroad.

The Grotto.

We overnighted in fabulous Port Fairy, our last night of the trip in Victoria.  It's a beautiful seaside town with a proud Irish and Celtic history.  The main local pub - the Caledonian, aka "The Stump" (www.caledonianinn.com.au) - lays claim to being Victoria's longest licensed hotel to be operating in its original building, having been trading since 1844.

The Stump currently boasts an excellent Sri Lankan chef whose Aussie meals are bang-on and who also does a sublime fish curry from his homeland!  Fiendishly hot, admittedly, but a delight nonetheless!  It's not the only dish that he's brought from the country of his birth, either; the menu has several options guaranteed to satisfy any fan of South Asian cuisine. 

From Port Fairy we set out towards the South Australian border, taking in Cape Bridgewater, its seal colony, blowholes, brittle limestone formations and petrified forest, as well as the imposing but almost silent wind turbines that dot the barren coastline.  And like Billy Connolly, the cape - which was once a volcanic island - is both windswept and interesting, featuring shipwrecks, stone ruins dating from the mid-1800s, the Victorian coast's highest clifftop at 130 metres above sea-level - Stony Hill - and seemingly infinite coastal views.

The rocky coast gives way to sand dunes and pine plantations closer to the South Australian border, where the GOR becomes the Southern Ocean Drive, taking a northwards turn towards Mount Gambier.  The route’s not unpleasant, though; the road itself is winds gently, the rural views are pretty and - in July, at least - there was very little traffic to hamper progress. 

Lining up to cross the Murray River on a cable ferry.

Whilst we didn't overnight in Mt Gambier, it is a pleasant stop with a few interesting sights to see.  First, there's the Blue Lake - a massive natural crater serving as the town's main water supply - that provides and excellent vantage point to take in the surrounding views.  Then there's the Umpherton Sink Hole, a natural limestone grotto that's been turned into a charming garden and amphitheatre.  Both are easily accessible and close to the town's CBD.

Our first night in SA was in the lovely seaside village of Robe, approximately 315 k or three and a half hours' drive from Port Fairy.  It, too, has a long and continuing Celtic history and also boasted its own Caledonian Hotel (https://caledonianinnrobe.com.au/), which, like its Victorian namesake, also served magnificent meals, plus local beers and wines in a charming building dating back to the 1800s.  It's also very central; there's no need to take your car as it's an easy stroll from most of the area's accommodation. 

Next:  Part 2, during which we drive from Robe to Victor Harbour, before catching a ferry from nearby Cape Jervis and on to Kangaroo Island itself.

U M P H

(uppermiddlepetrolhead.blogspot.com.au.)

iPhone images.