The Grampians, going inland

And when we arrived to Port Fairy, at the end of the Great Ocean Road, the sea was yet again calm and flat, pretty but for us a disheartening sight. No surfing for us at one of the world's most famous spots. We'll have to hope that at least Sydney will be more merciful.

Too peaceful

It was time to abandon the ocean and to head inland, to the Grampians National Park. We drove through flat land, burnt and dry due to unusually hot and long summer, and the Grampian mountains rose abruptly before us.

Mt. Sturgeon and Mt. Abrupt

When we started making our way through the park, I decided I didn't want to drive anymore. We had seen plenty dead wildlife along the road before, but this road in particular was crazy! Every 2 km or so there was a dead kangaroo on the side, and frankly, I didn't want to be the one who'd destroy our rental car. D drove us safely to our next CS destination, just below the mountains - a farm, but this time a sheep farm! We stayed with Rosie and Lynden who have just recently moved there from Melbourne to help out Lynden's dad and to gradually transform the place into a more self sufficient and sustainable place.

One of them is Miss Porky and she will be in my sandwich

We went together for a short hike in the afternoon and had our first dinner out here in Australia, our wallet bled but survived. It was lot of fun and talking... The ride back to the farm through the darkness was very scary, we were expecting the entire army of kangaroos to jump at us. In the end we almost hit one but no harm done. And then we talked some more and more and I really wished we could stay more time here because we felt so much at home.

Boroka Lookout

Kangaroo invasion at a local football field (Australian rules, of course)

Rosie, Lynden and Joel, feels like home

But our trip to Australia is a short one and so in the morning we packed our bags again, said our good byes to everybody, including the piglets, and drove off. We did another rather short hike by ourselves (they all seemed to be pretty short there) and after lunch started driving in the direction of Melbourne.

The Pinnacle

As the internet in Australia is very scarce, we stopped on our way at a public library of one small town and spent there good part of the afternoon using their free wifi. That's why we arrived quite late to Ballarat, our stopover before getting to Melbourne the next day (we also got lost several times because I suck as a copilot). Quite a shame, because we had no time to explore this pretty city, except for the lake Wendouree, the venue of the 1956 Melbourne Olympics. It is right by the lovely house of our hosts for the night, Jan and Don.

Black swans at Lake Wendouree

Taking Dolly for a walk

The place was great, we had the entire floor of the house all for ourselves! Jan and Don were both not only generous but very entertaining and although we could only spend a short evening together, we swapped many travel and life stories, I even got some serious pep talk about my future, something to think about. And their dog Dolly was irresistible... Our couchsurfing around Victoria turned out great, we couldn't have been more lucky!

We shared a table with politicians!

And the next day was our last in the state of Victoria. We spent it mostly driving around, first to a mall to buy a new camera battery (which I had previously lost, how outrageous) and then all the way to the end of Port Phillip Bay to visit my colleague's uncle and pick up some things D's parents sent for us to his home.

Short visit in Tootgarook

And on the way back to the airport to return the rental car, as we were passing through Melbourne, we felt a little sorry that we skipped the city altogether and saw none of it. Hopefully next time!

Another night at the airport was ahead of us and although Melbourne airport has nothing to do with the luxury of Singapore, we still managed to find a decent spot and slept until 4am, when we got up to check in for the flight to ... Tasmania!