Erwin and Dorits' Endless Summer

Phillip Island

Enough city, time for nature, beach and waves! From Melbourne our van drove us to Phillip Island. Well known for its circuit, where every year motorbikes race for the grand prix. Some part of the island is ‚National Park” where pinguins come on land after sunset to their homes. Their bellys full of fish, they gather into groups to walk across the beach to the sand dunes. Sometimes their belly’s are that full that they have trouble walking up the beach falling forward all the time. Hilarious! You are not allowed to take any photos of these litlle funny pinguins, because the flashes will scare them.

.. wrong home

Two days later after the wind ruined the waves at Wallamai Beach where we had surfed and sleept the last two days we went to see the sea lions, but on our way we saw people surfing little clean waves. We got in our wetsuit and in the water. After our surfsession, Dorit had some company at the ladies toilet (see photo). We took the photo of course without flash, but he was scared anyway. We called the Ranger who just said: “Oh, don’t worry, they do that al the time, they think it is their home.”

swamp wallaby

Melbourne city

After weeks of small beachtowns, surfing and campsites in the bush, we were going to Melbourne. Our first goal was to find the campsite where Bruce and Sharon stayed in a place called Dandenong. As Dorit thought that  we did not have a map of Melbourne in our Road atlas, we tried it with Bruce giving us directions. The easiest way would be using a highway which you had to pay for. Paying wasn’t like in France where you actually pay at a counter, we had to call and give all your details to a computer who does not understand people with a foreign accent like us. Very frustrating.

We arrived at the campsite and Sharon found that we actually had a map of Melbourne, the one we thought wasn’t there;-) We had a nice evening with Bruce and Sharon. And for the next couple of days we could use the campsite showers and laundry whitout costs, what a luxuary.Exploring Melbourne took us a few days. We cruised around in the free tourist trams and busses. We visited several city parts, often dominated by a certain country as in China, Italy, Spain or Greece.

Dorit & Lisa: happy faces!!

Monday we were invited to have lunch at Lisa’s (Dorit’s friend from high school) We actually ended up having our first Aussie BBQ. Erwin loved it. Thanks Lisa…;o)

Sweeeet Sugarlumps

After some more sightseeing the next day we met up with Jess, Tim’s girlfriend who we met in Dunbury in West Australia earlier on our trip. She moved to Melbourne after we get to know her. We went to a cafe/bar/club with a realy nice atmosphere, played some life-on-stage-travia (not knowing the answer to one single question…:o/ ), tried the local beer and had a good time.

After five days we left Melbourn. Enough of the city, time for the beach again!

14 apostles

Where the previous story ends, the “Great Ocean Road” begins. It’s the famous road along the Southern Ocean from Warrnambool to Torquay with some amazing natural wonders on its way. On the first 200 km on our journey we saw al lot of high steep eroded cliffs from the ocean. The most popular formation is known as “The Twelve Apostles”. Well, at the moment we counted 7, the other 5 must have gone on vacation.

At the most southern point we took a dead end road to a lighthouse, Cape Otway. This road is leading through a national park with a lot of eucalyptus trees. As this are the kind of trees where the koala hang out we spottet about 10 on our way.

koala @ Cape Otway

From then on the Great Ocean Road, as it leads  through the Great Otway National Park is much greener.  This coast line is called “the Surf Coast”, with nice little surf towns along the way. The first town we headed to was Apollo Bay. After we checked out this nice beachtown we did find a free camping site on our map of the National Park. It was named after the  waterfalls in walking distance: “Steavensons Falls”. We drove 30 km land inwards, away from the coast, partly unsealed road, which is always a adventure for it self. When we arrived at the nice peaceful grassy campsite in the forest, no one else was there. We enjoyed the beautiful nature and walked to the waterfalls the next morning as there weren’t any waves anyway.

Apollo Bay

campground, in the middle of ..

After that we got back on the road and the weather turned. The semi-good weather from the day before was getting worse.

Steavenson Falls

We had a two rainy days and drove to the next little town: Lorne. It had a nice beach to run and swim and again some free campsites nearby. We stayed here for 4 days, checking out the different campsites, only sharing them with kangeroos or some other travllers. Checking out the beaches along the coast, we noticed some surfers in the water. We went in the water and had a few waves in this place called “Fairhaven” a fews days in a row.

Almost on the end of the Great Ocean Road – were we still are, on the day of writing this blog – we were having a look at a notorius beach witch is a must-see and must-surf for every surfer passing by. Located near the very surf-minded town Torquay is Bells Beach. As we knew there would be more swell coming on monday we were on our way. Getting out was not a problem, but once in the line up big sets of waves were coming in. We survived it and very important, we surfed. Newspapers and internet were promising sunny weather and 4 to 5 feet swell. (1,5m). This is the hight of the back of the wave, witch means that the front of the wave (were you actualyly surf) can get to 3m+. After three days hanging around we are impressed of the power of the wave and will head further to Melbourne.

We also are very familiar with the quickly changing weather conditions at the South Coast, as we are, after three sunny days sitting in the rain again…

Our view over Bells Beach, camped there for a few days.

After spending some more time at Scarborough and Trigg beach and got familiar with our new boards we headed south to Bunbury. One of Dorit’s former neigbours form the Gold Coast had a concert with his punk rock band called “Silver Lizard”. The next day we were invited for lunch and got some information of Tim & Jazz over the Margaret River Area, we were heading to that evening.

We drove to Yillingup, a village of 810 people with a beautiful reef on the shore. Most surfers seemd to be 65+. We went to a beach a little bit further called Smith beach also with a little reef. We had a couple of nice waves and could get familiar with surfing a reef, which we hadn’t done before. Just as we were looking at the ocean we saw whales jumping out of the water.

whales jumping out of the water

The next morning 7am somebody was knocking on our van. The Ranger of the National Park made us pay 100$ for illigal camping…:o( From now on we were much more careful when picking our sleeping spot.

forest dirt tracks

Margaret River is actually a very scenic destination with beautiful forests and a lot of wineries. Unfortuantly for us most beaches were only acessable with 4 wheel drive. As our van does not have this luxuary we ended up south pretty quick.

The south coast did not have much to offer for us, so we prepared ourselfs for the big journey across the Nullarbor (latin for “no trees”). We crosses the West / South Australien border after driving for 700 km (including 147 km straight). But there was more to come. Still 900 km to Adelaide. And guess what, we are still driving…..

After hours in the desert you would think, why wouldn’t they go for a swim or surfing? Do you know “Nicolle”? We read that this area of south australia is an important breeding ground for whales, sea lions and great white sharks. The scariest scenes in the film Jaws were shot here. We are happy to keep on driving even though it must be one of this hot days (38 degrees) in the outback. We are looking forward to see Adelaide (and some civilisation) and to find some surfable beaches for the “not so brave”.

After more than a week in Perth we found our favorite beach:

waxing up

Trigg beach, got our morning routine going, wake up 7am, check the waves, surf, coffee….

With all the reminders of home it doesn’t feel away that far. Well, the birds here look pretty unusual for Aachen though.

We will head down south this weekend, stop over in Bunbury and will enjoy the fine beaches of Margaret River’s area next week.

the beach of "Burn"

Aachen Cresent

Local bird

airport düsseldorf

4 days ago we arrived tired, exhausted and “jet leged” in Perth, Australia. In only 4 days we managed to have less money (not that difficult…;o), a car and 2 surfborads. After wandering in the streets of Perth we checked the internet for cars. 2 hours later we were proud owners of a 18 year old Mazda E2000. Yesterday we road around Perth to find the cheapest camping stuff available and Erwin found out that driving on the left hand side isn’t all that easy.

Mazda E2000

One day later we finally had time to ride to the ocean and a couple of hours later we were proud owners of two brand new surfboards. An old surfdude told us where to get our boards, he also told us about those 2 big white sharks (probably Nicolle and her friend) spotted in Perth’s ocean near the city beach. Erwin is now also afraid of bees. The guy also told him that there are more people dying in Australia from bee stings than from shark attacks…;o)

Now that we live in our van, we will travel up north, check out different beaches and try out our new boards. We’ll keep you up to date, if we do not meet Nicolle!!!!!!

Front Yard