FriendBurst Blog

Day 6 – Tuesday – September 21, 2010

Weather:  Rainy & Cold

Destination:  Phillip Island, Victoria, Australia

Odometer Reading:  96832

Total Distance Traveled:  1489 kilometers (925 miles)

Price of Fuel:  Foster – $1.30.9 liter, 58.60 liters, $76.71

Route Taken:  Foster to Wilson Promontory to Leongatha to Inverloch to Wonthaggi to Newhaven to Cowes on Phillip Island

Highlights:  We’re up early again and it’s gray, rainy and cold today.  There were some huge snails crawling around on the planter boxes and I tried to get a picture of them, but again the camera is giving me problems.  I don’t think it likes the cold and wet too much.

Since we’re so close to Phillip Island and the penguins don’t come in until sunset we decided to take the drive down to Wilson Promontory National Park.  This detour from our original plan was so worth it.  By the time we got to the entrance of The Prom, as it is called, the sun was shining every so often, and the weather had turned really nice.  We were first greeted by a large flock of emus crossing the road.  As they crossed, we tried counting how many there were and the best number we could come up with between the two of us was 32.

We drove to the Visitors Center at Tidal River to pay the $25.00 per person entry fee and to see what we could get to in the motorhome.  There are cabins and camping spots at Tidal River, but The Prom overall is a pretty wild (in the literal sense) place with lots of hiking trails.  I was able to snap a few pictures of the birds that were hanging around the Visitors Center.

The Prom is surrounded on three sides by water and the views that we were able to see were spectacular.  We decided to try the hike to the Mt. Oberon Summit and drove the motorhome up the winding road to the Telegraph Saddle Carpark.  The road was so narrow in some spots, that it was a good thing we didn’t run into anybody on their way down.  We made it up to the carpark without any problem, but there were so many people already parked up there that we couldn’t find a spot to wedge ourselves into.  After making a 42-point turn to get turned around and head back down, we are now affectionately referring to the motorhome as “The Beast”.

We drove over to the Squeaky Beach parking area and took the stroll down to the beach.  Squeaky Beach has its name because when you walk on the sand it squeaks.   The sound was similar to a really quiet squeaky toy.  The park ranger at the Visitor Center told us that the beach squeaks because all the grains of sand are the same size and it’s like walking on tiny round marbles.  As we were walking along the beach we wondered, first, who would take the time to measure the grains of sand and, then, exactly how did they do that?

On the way back out of The Prom we stopped at a few more lookouts and took a few more pictures.

We made it to Phillip Island in the mid-afternoon and found our spot for the night in Cowes.  The Man couldn’t wait to get over to the Penguin Parade.  For all his anticipation, we really shouldn’t have bothered.  It was $20.00 per person to get in and you couldn’t take pictures or video of any kind.  You end up sitting on metal bleachers way above the beach and it was freaking cold after the sun went down.  From the bleachers, unless you have binoculars, you really can’t see the penguins coming out of the water in the dark since they are so small and they straggle out of the ocean in tight little groups.  So, rather than freeze our butts off on the bleachers, since we did bring the high powered binoculars, we decided to stand behind the empty top row of bleacher seats and watch them come in.  We got lucky because we were standing on the walkway right in front of a nest with two chicks.  As it got closer to the time that the adults would come back to shore, the chicks would waddle out from time to time and call for them.  When the adult made it back, we got to see the reunion for a bit before we were swarmed with all the other people that were there.  The penguins were cute, it was somewhat interesting and now we can say we did it, but all in all we could have skipped the Penguin Parade.

Stops:  We stopped everywhere we could while traveling through Wilson Promontory National Park, but The Beast made us very aware of our limitations.  We also made a stop in Inverloch for lunch and a quick stop at the Visitors Center before driving to Phillip Island.

Where We Stayed:  We stayed at the Anchor Belle Holiday Park in Cowes on Phillip Island.  The rate was $34.20 a night with our discount and it wasn’t too far from the Penguin Parade.  This was an older park with narrow one way drives, big trees and small spaces.  It was pretty full and getting The Beast in and out of there was an adventure in itself.

Where We Ate:  We had lunch at Inlet Fish & Chips in Inverloch.  We shared our orders of barramundi and whiting with nice big steak fries.  Yummy.  We had so much to eat for lunch, that we skipped dinner altogether.  The penguins were calling after all.