East Coast Travels - Noosa

12th - 14th May

We left Brisbane at around 2 and arrived in Noosa at 17.00. The drive was really nice, but definitely didn’t need to take 3 hours. We went a bit back and forth, but it means we got to see a whole bunch more. The first stop was Sunshine Coast, which looked really nice, but we decided not to stop there and the other major stop was the Australia Zoo!! We had a special greyhound bus that had Australia Zoo written all over it, was yellow instead of red and had animal characters on the chairs inside. It was pretty exciting.

When we arrived in Noosa we just saw the end of a beautiful sunset (no where near as beautiful as in Byron Bay, but I can’t compare every sunset to that!) and checked into our hotel. We’re staying at the Noosa Heads Motel on Noosa Drive. It’s was a really easy 5 minute walk from the bus station, through Noosaheads town to get to the motel. We managed to get a room upgrade for only $14 to a King room, and we literally had the biggest bed I’ve ever seen! We also have a large balcony with a great view of the sunset. There wasn’t too much to do after 5 since everything was shut, so we had a delicious meal at a little restaurant down the street from the hotel, where you could create your own noodles just the way you want it. We also had a quick stroll through the town and bought some breakfast from Coles.

The following morning we decided to do the 3 hour walk from our motel to sunshine beach. The weather started off a bit up and down, it looked sunny one minute, and the next it was pouring it down with rain. For about 3 seconds. And then it was completely dry and sunny again. We decided to go do the walk anyway, we don’t mind it raining every now and then as along as it’ll be sunny most of the way. We first walked to Main Beach, about 10 minutes away from our motel. It was a really nice beach, but unfortunately the sand was wet from the rain and wasn’t as white as it would be. The water was amazing. It was that crispy clean cold feeling but starts to feel warmer the longer you’re in the water. It soon started to rain, but by the time we got off the beach is was dry again. 

We walked along Main beach and then up beside a road for a little bit before reaching Little Cove. From here it was a great walk with the beach on your left and the forest on your right. This was Noosa National Park. 

As we walked through the trees we saw a wild Koala! It was way up high in a tree so I couldn’t get a great photo, but it was so amazing to see! We’d seen tons of wild Koalas along the Great Ocean Road, but it was just as cool!

The walk was MUCH steeper than I thought it would be... it was exhausting! And after all the hills in Brisbane we were really hoping we could chill out in Noosa. That wasn’t the case at all. We continued the walk all the way up to Dolphin point where it started to get a bit grey. It was a really nice look-out but unfortunately no dolphins. As we continued our walk it just got darker and darker.... 

When we reached Alexandria Bay it started to drizzle a little. No big deal! Alexandria Bay was really beautiful, but with the weather conditions I couldn’t do it justice in photos. We walked all the way along the beach - which is much longer than I thought it would be - back up in the hills along Lion Rock and Devils Kitchen. This is where it started to rain. It was pouring down, not just a little rain that would go away in a few seconds, it just kept going and going and kept getting harder and harder. There wasn’t really any shelter so we decided to continue walking towards Sunshine Beach. We saw some amazing views of the beach, which would have been incredible if we could actually see.... Everything was just grey and foggy and wet. We made our way down to the beach where we found a tiny bit of shelter we shared with an Irish couple. They were just about to start their 3 hour walk. They showed us the way back to Noosaheads, through the pouring rain, and we walked back to the motel. We must have looked absolutely ridiculous because by the time we made it into the town, the sun was coming back out. We were literally soaking wet, I could squeeze my hoodie (we didn’t have any waterproof jackets with us..) and water would come out. It was insane!

Of course, as I’m typing this, I just watched a beautiful colourful sunset from our hotel room. Typical.

In spite of all that, Noosa is still a beautiful place. The day started off really lovely with blue skies and I took some great photos, the walk was really nice and we saw some really great hidden beaches and a koala! It would have been nice if we had another day to spend in Noosa, but we’ve seen what we wanted to see and it’s time to move on to Rainbow Beach and Fraser Island!

Great Ocean Road Day 2

On the second day of our Great Ocean Road journey we started off by driving to Cape Otway Light house: the oldest surviving light house in mainland Australia. On our way to the light house, we drove through some beautiful forests where we saw some more Koalas. Although the Koalas we saw on the first day were wild too, they were all around a camp site and easy to spot. These were much further up in the trees and seemed more wild. Which made it more exciting too!

The lighthouse is located in it's own little precinct. It costs $19.50 for adults to enter and $17.50 for students. Thanks STA! The precinct includes the light house, a museum, an aboriginal culture site, a World War 2 bunker and a restaurant/cafe. The panorama above is taken from the World War 2 bunker, from there you have a beautiful overview of the area and a different angle of the light house.

The trees on the way to the light house were all completely bare, it was the strangest site. It looked like there had been a huge fire, but it was due to the Koalas. They had eaten all the leaves from all the trees. No matter which direction you looked or how far you could see, everything was bare.

After the light house we went to an Australian wildlife park. It was only a small park but it had tons of Australian animals. We bought a bag of food and went round feeding most of the animals. The photo to the right is me feeding a wallaby. They're a smaller and cuter version of kangaroos. We also saw Dingo's, Kangaroos, emu's and more. It was nice to see wallaby's and kangaroos for the first time, but obviously we'd rather see them in the wild!

There was one kangaroo that had a joey in its pouch. It wasn't like what you'd see in cartoons where the joey pops its head out and looks all cute. This joey was in upside down and its legs were sticking out.

At sunset we made our way back to the 12 Apostles. It was such a beautiful sunset. I originally wanted to time-lapse it, but it was so incredible windy my tripod wouldn't stop shaking. It's such an iconic Australian photograph and it's still unbelievable I actually saw that in person.

Great Ocean Road Day 1

In the middle of March my parents came to visit me in Australia. I got to show them why I love Melbourne so much, and they took my boyfriend and I on a trip to The Great Ocean Road and Wilsons Promontory. They were only here for 11 days, but we did a ridiculous amount in such a short time.

After 4 days in Melbourne, we drove down the Great Ocean Road to the 12 apostles with a few stops along the way. Our first top was Bells Beach, a renowned surfers beach. Bells Beach is where the longest running surf competition, Rip Curl Pro Surf, takes place. It's a beautiful crescent like beach with loads of surfers.

There was a view point at the top where you could see the surfers, and a long wooden stair case down to the beach. The water was freezing. We had a quick stroll on the beach when we were attacked by the waves.

This was just a random stop along the way. It shows off how windy the road actually is. You're driving on the side of a mountain so the majority of the time this is the view, but ever now and then the road takes you through the mountains and you see beautiful valleys. A very different type of landscape.

We had some stunning ocean views along the way... obviously.

We stopped by Kennet River at a place called Koala Cove Cafe. This is where we saw our first wild koalas!! There were 3 koalas just chilling out in the trees surrounded by these vibrant red and green parrots. After we had some lunch (delicious!) we bought a bag of bird feed and were attacked by the birds and ducks. They even sat on my head!

This is also where we saw our first kookaburra. The Kookaburra is found in Australia and New Zealand and their cry is a discordant, abrupt laugh. The cackle of the Kookaburra is actually a territorial call to warn other birds to stay away.

Finally we made it to the 12 Apostles! Unfortunately the weather had caught up with us and it looked a bit gloomy, but it was still an amazing sight. I have seen so many photos of the 12 apostles, but to see it in real life was very different.

We stayed at the 12 apostles for 3 nights in a place called Port Campbell. It's a cute little town but there wasn't really much to do. That's it for the first day!