A belated update on The Prom

Hmmm it has been a wee while since I updated on here - guess that is a good sign that we have been busy!!!  Anyway, thought it was about time I wrote about our trip to Wilsons Promontory (or "The Prom" to Melbourne folk) in November.  This is somewhere Chris and I had wanted to go for a wee while....  However, there is not a lot of accommodation down there so we had to camp...  We did not bring a lot of our camping kit with us due to AQIS regulations so we had to wait until we had bought a bit of stuff...  So equipped with our 30 buck tent from Rays' Outdoors, our BBQ and Eski in the boot we set off for The Prom on a sunny November Saturday morning.  We had decided not to go down on the Friday night as we decided trying to put the tent up for the first time in the dark would be a recipe for an argument!!!!!!
It took us 3 hours to drive to the campsite in the Prom from our house in Melbourne.  The drive down was really chilled out and good fun - completely different from trying to drive 3 h out of the SE of England!!!!  We arrived about 11 am and pitched our tent...  We quickly had tent envy as we saw all the trailer tents etc which were already pitched there - our little dome tent looked tiny in comparison...  Some of the other tents were bigger than my 1 bed house in Stevenage and had better cooking facilities!!!!!!  We got excited about seeing parrots etc wandering across our pitch and quickly realised how much stuff we had forgotten to buy/bring....  chairs, picnic rug etc....  oh well lucky there was a big log at the edge of our site - shame about the 1 inch long ants which were walking up and down it!!!!

We got the free shuttle bus from Tidal River Campsite to the bottom of Mount Oberon and walked up it - this gave us amazing views over the Prom.  This walk was pretty steep and it was kinda warm but the views were definately a fab reward!!!!

We then headed back to the campsite and walked around the boardwalk which took us to the beach closest to the campsite...  On the walk we passed some huge rocks and a few parts of the river which are really good for swimming in. After a cool down and a paddle in the sea we built sandcastles and relaxed on the beach....

Then it was back to the campsite for dinner - to be cooked on our new BBQ.  Our Eski had kept our food nice and cool and we really enjoyed our dinner and some beers..  It was then essential to clear up any left over food from our tent as we had been warned the wombats would rip the tents to get to it!  After that we headed down to the beach to see the sunset with a few beers - awesome!

Then it was back to the tent and some more beers.....  When I went to the toilet block I came face to face with a wombat - very glad we did not have one of them trying to get in our tent in the middle of the night looking for left over food as they are huge!!!!!

After a surprisingly good night's sleep, we decided to walk down the beach to Squeaky Beach (so called because it squeaks when you walk on it!).  This beach is lovely - really white sands...  On the way we went to Pillar Point and got some good views of the area.

We walked along Squeaky Beach and headed onto Picnic Bay...  Again another really lovely beach.

We then headed back to the campsite and after lunch decided to head home.  We were worried about leaving at dusk as we had seen a lot of dead animals on the road on the way in and did not know how the Focus would fare against some of the Australian marsupials but we thought we would probably come off worse!

Is life here one big holiday???

A few folk have commented to me via email that life here seems to be one big holiday ;-)  I have been reflecting on this over the last few days....  In the week we still have to go to work full time Monday - Friday, commute to and from work (but it is better than either the Hertford - Harlow or Stevenage - South Kensington commute), do the washing, cleaning, shopping etc and life was pretty much like it was at home but a bit warmer normally... But overall I would say that yes at the weekends it does feel like we are on holiday!!!  Especially now the weather is starting to warm up and the sun is shining!!!!!   And unlike in the UK where we seemed to spend most of our life doing the house up, now we are renting and don't really have a garden we don't have to worry about that.  I thought I might write about what we have been up to over the last few weekends....

A few weekends ago, Chris and I went on a bike ride and a picnic round the coast...  This is one of our favourite local things to do on a sunny day....  We head off straight to the beach, turn left down the bike path and then ride down the coastal cycle trail passed Brighton, Hampton, Sandringham and on towards Black Rock....  It is really lovely to do and can be a bit cooler than heading inland. 

On the Sunday of the same weekend, the wind had really picked up and so we decided to go for a walk on Brighton Beach.  This beach has lots of lovely beach huts on it and also on this day there were lots of people kite surfing which looks awesome!!!

Last weekend, we decided to head to Richmond on the train and take our bikes with us.  From there we joined the Yarra cycle path and cycled the 12 km up to Dights Falls passing the Abbotsford Covent and Collingwood Children's Farm on the way.  This was a nice cycle ride but it was 32 C and there was no breeze there like the coast......

On the Sunday we drove down the Mornington Peninsula.  We had lunch in Mornington and then headed off to Dromana.  This was nice but was really a fact finding trip for the next weekend!!!

The next weekend, we set off early from Gardenvale and drove down the Nepean Highway  and then the Mornington Peninsula to Dromana where we turned off to Arthur's Seat hill.  This was a very steep hill and I was glad that we were not cycling it like some crazy people!!!  From the top and the look outs we got some fab views of the Peninsula.... 

We then headed on to Sorrento stopping on the way to look at a couple of the pretty beaches.  In Sorrento  we had lunch and did a spot of shoe shopping!  Some really nice shops down there!!!!!

We then headed off to Point Nepean - our main reason for our day out.  It is a popular tourist destination renowned for its historic features, outstanding coastal scenery and panoramic views of Bass Strait, the Rip and Port Phillip Bay.  As the transporter had just left and was not due to leave for another 1.5 h we decided to walk it...  On the way we saw beautiful beaches....

We then headed up to a couple of loop walks to Happy Valley (old armed forces barrack ruins) and Cheviot Hill...  From the hill we got saw amazing views of old military remnants and the coast.....

From there we continued heading up to the old fort at the end of Point Nepean where we explored underground tunnels and gun remnants etc...  Again we got some amazing views down the coast and onto the Northern Beaches which have waves as they are not in the Port Phillip Bay like most of the places we go to!  We could also see over to Queenscliff and Lorne etc....

After a long, hot (now up to about 32 C) walk to the car we headed off to a place called London Bridge and saw an interesting rock and great waves....

We then headed off to Cape Schanck and the lighthouse.  Unfortunately, by the time we arrived the lighthouse was shut but we did the Cape boardwalk and again saw some cool coastal scenery.

It was then time to head back to Melbourne to have a bbq for dinner (getting quite into that at the weekends and it means the house keeps cooler if we are not cooking in it!!!!!).

On the Sunday, it was another scorching day so we headed out to Healesville and the Australian animal sanctuary there....  This is in the Yarra Valley so we had to drive passed a number of wineries to get there but amazingly we did not stop in any!!!!  We were surprised too!!!!  It was about 1 h 15 mins drive from our house which was not as far as we had anticipated....  We got up there for about 10.30 am and became "friends of the zoo" which means we can visit Melbourne Zoo, Healesville Animal Sanctuary and Werribee whenever we want...

We were pleasantly surprised to find it was pretty cool up there and the walk round it was lovely...  It was in dappled shade which was fab...  we saw heaps of really cool Australian animals (apart from the dingos whose enclosure was being renovated :-( )