Alan & Lyn's Huge Adventure: 31/1- 2/2/17 Melbourne & beyond

31/1/17

Back again , down the road a bit further , this time it’s Melbourne . We are visiting some friends , getting some new tyres , and getting our tow hitch serviced .

Catching up with Brian and Marian has been great , we haven’t seem them in person for about 5 years , but we just took off where we left off . Managing to squeeze the van into their front yard was fun , but we got there .

After checking tyre prices at a few dealers , we decided to ring the local Bridgestone dealer at Vermont ( just up the road from where we are staying ) , they gave me a price of $200 per tyre - if we purchased 4 tyres - there was a $100 rebate that brought the price down to that . After checking our previous purchase , we found we saved over $300 from when we bought the last 4 tyres in Darwin and 4 in Geraldton !!! We were pretty happy with that !!

Tyres done , it was time to find our way to Laverton North - on the western side of the city - we were on the east side !! The drive took us through the cross city tunnel and over Westgate Bridge and into an industrial area - a very busy one . There were semi trailers , B doubles , trucks of all descriptions and plenty of cars as well . Arriving near lunch time , we had to wait for the workers to finish theirs before they could take a look at the hitch - they removed it from the ute and did some maintenance and adjustments on a work bench , before reinstalling it on the ute . Job done , no charge , it was back to the east side of Melbourne .

After watching a near miss , or more appropriately , a near hit on a roundabout , we concluded that idiots are driving everywhere !!

Back on the Westgate Bridge again , I thought to take a couple of photo’s . The bridge has 5 lanes both directions and is shaped like a reversed S , it is a spectacular piece of engineering and is also fairly high as well , which gives you good views of the city and Port Phillip Bay .

Back into the tunnel , was fun also , plenty of traffic - 3 lanes each way !

1/2/17

Today we moved south , down the Mornington Peninsular , leaving Melbourne behind . Deciding to go over to Western Port instead of Port Phillip Bay side was a good choice - the bay side is very busy even though school is back .

We checked out our friends place at McCrae , then did some shopping before heading down to Cape Schanck . We went past possibly the biggest market garden we’ve ever seen , it was bordered by cypress pine hedges , that are trimmed to shape - they border the farm . It appeared to go on for a long way - I’m only guessing , but it would have to be more than 300 acres - that’s a lot of vegetables !!

Driving along we passed a few golf clubs - The National , RACV Cape Schanck - we drove in for a look . There’s accomodation units , there’s homes beside the course , a fairly large clubhouse is being turned into an enormous one - there are 4 cranes working on the new building . Fairways have been carved out of the natural bush .

Arriving at Bushranger Bay in the Mornington Peninsular National Park , we headed out to a lookout over the bay . The walk took us through the native coastal shrubbery - the small trees are called Moomba bush , and most are out in flower at the moment .

The lookout wasn’t far away , and revealed a long stretch of coastal cliffs and any beaches were all rock , if there were any beaches at all !

There was another little flower on plants beside the track closer to the ground .

Back to the lighthouse carpark , there’s another walk that loops back around to the carpark and also takes you down the cliffs to Pebbly Beach and the Pulpit . There were many steps and a timber boardwalk to get you down there .

The soil down here is strange , it’s grey & orange , with some sections with cream coloured veins and it’s all very fragile , breaking away . There is a layer of basalt rock here as well , apparently it was lava flow from volcanoes and was over 300m thick .

Back up the steps and to the carpark , we headed off to Flinders , a small town on the way back up the eastern side of the peninsular . There’s some beautiful gum trees lining the road into Flinders , they’re out in blossom now - vivid orange & pink .

We headed out to West Head , a surfing beach beside the local golf club and a naval firing range .

There are some enormous houses here , this one has 4 columns and a large portico on each side of the house , it has views out into Bass Strait .

2/2/17

Today we headed to Arthurs Seat , a curious name for a mountain that’s 314m above sea level , but it has great views over Port Phillip Bay . There’s a gondola ride that goes up & down the mountain , very popular . It was also popular with an artists group , they were perched here & there painting the views of the bay , the gum trees , and anything else that took their fancy !!

After catching the views , King Falls was the next stop . Not expecting much after some of our recent waterfalls , we took to the 1klm walk up & down to the falls & back . The trail took us through Black Sheoaks , down to fern lined water courses and occasional grass trees . The falls were as we suspected , just a dribble of water on the rocks .

A green breasted little bird ( like the technical name ) appeared on one of the bridges before hopping down onto the mossy rock - didn’t seem to be bothered by us at all .

Time for some lunch down beside the bay , it’s a bit windy today , not overly hot - only 24 degrees .

Next we drove down to Portsea and went over to the beach side - very breezy and cool - didn’t stay long there .

We decided to go to Point Nepean - the eastern side of the entrance into Port Phillip Bay . You can drive to the gunners cottage , and you then have to walk or ride or catch a bus to visit the point . This was a strategic point during WW2 , gun turrets and observation points , training areas , bombing and shooting ranges .

This is the largest area of the coastal moomba bush in Victoria .

Cheviot Hill is the highest hill here , and was the main observation point and has a couple of gun positions . One gun turret we looked at is made of steel - looks a little like a mask for a koala !!

The turret overlooks Cheviot Beach - yes , the same one that Harold Holt went missing at all those years ago . I’m a bit amused as to why anyone would decide to swim at this beach , there’s rock shelves , not much sand and lot’s of rips !! It would have been different then most probably - he would have had to swim a long way out to get in the russian sub hahaha .