Holiday Down Under 2.0 - Part 1: Mornington Peninsula
Two years ago, I spent a couple weeks in Australia. This time, I visited another area - the province of Victoria - (the major city in that region being Melbourne). I arrived in the evening after a couple of long flights, got through the total CHAOS that was the Melbourne airport, picked up my rental car (which was a bit of a challenge to find...) and went to my hotel for the night which was relatively close to the airport. I went for a bit of a walk after arriving, but it was already getting late-ish and being tired from flying, I was ready to go to bed.
This was probably the most interesting thing I saw on that little walk. What does this mean?? So many questions!
The next morning, I headed out towards Frankston, where I would be staying for the next few nights. The weather wasn't so warm (only around 15℃), so I also thought I would try to check out the Royal Botanic Gardens since it seemed to be on the way out of the city. Big mistake. Huge mistake. Driving in Melbourne is HORRIBLE! They have 2 sets of traffic lights for each direction (one is slightly set back from the other), sometimes you have to share the road with the tram, there are smaller roads in the middle of the road that you apparently need to get to, but there is no apparent way to access them, sometimes you have to turn from a lane that is counter-intuitive, the trams have their own set of traffic lights different from the normal traffic lights, and you have to give the tram the right of-way, which means you have to pay attention to 3 sets of traffic lights, and then they have roads that you should be able to keep driving straight on, but are actually only for u-turns. It's INSANITY! That being said, after a lot of stress and frustration, I was actually able to get to the gardens.
War Memorial Museum
They have one of the flames that doesn't get extinguished
After a bit of a walk through part of the gardens, I headed back out to Frankston, hoping the rest of the way wasn't so difficult to drive. Once I got out of the city, it was completely fine and much more normal. When I arrived at where I was staying, the staff was really friendly, gave me lots of information and commiserated with me about how Melbourne is hard to drive in (even for locals apparently). This particular accommodation was really nice! It was basically an apartment, and the beach was a 5 minute walk away on one side, and on the other side, there was a mall and a couple grocery stores, so it was easy to get some food for later.
Was excited for this!! Various flavors of kombucha, including my favorite, raspberry lime!
After dropping my things off, I headed out to the information center to get more info on the area. Two older ladies helped me out, gave me lots of information, and even told me they wished they could go out and show me around themselves. Friendly. Right behind the information center, there was a pier and you could walk quite far out into the water. The only problem on that day was that it was quite windy and a bit chilly.
Before getting to the beach area, you can also walk along this little canal
Frankston Pier
Weather was a bit nicer than Melbourne, but windy...
View from the pier
After that, I took the boardwalk along the coast, and walked up to Olivers Hill Lookout. It was a nice view!
Those blues!
It was quiet, but very pretty!
View from Olivers Hill (you could actually see the Melbourne skyscrapers in the distance...just not in this photo)
After that, I headed back for some dinner, and then a beautiful sunset!
The next day, I decided to get better acquainted with my car and the area. Once again, the weather wasn't particularly nice, so I took a drive to some of the scenic areas via the Esplanade Coastal Drive. This road wasn't the main one and my GPS got annoyed with me, but it wound along the coast, which was more what I was looking for. The first stop was Brighton Beach, which is famous for its colorful beach houses.
Following that, I made a quick stop at the information center in Dromana, where apparently they don't get so many visitors...there were two staff and they kind of fought over who could tell me what, and then each of them bombarded me with information about places I could go, history and so on. Anyway, one piece of information I did manage to retain from them was that near there there was the "Arthur's Seat" area, which usually has a lift you can go up for a view, but at the moment it was only going down, so one would have to drive or hike up to the top, and there were other hikes in and around that area. I ended up going up there, saw the view and considered the hikes, but ultimately decided against it because they seemed rather long, and I actually did have one place I really wanted to go to before it closed at the end of the day.
View from Arthur's Seat (maybe its nicer when it's sunny?)
So that place I was talking about wanting to go to? It was a strawberry picking farm, called Sunny Ridge. I got there and was a bit hungry, so before going to pick strawberries I stopped at the cafe they have, and ordered the "Strawberry Temptation". I don't think this was meant for one person...
After eating, I picked up my container (you bought it for $5 and could fill it up with as many strawberries as you could, as long as the top would still close). I have to say, the strawberries were really sweet, and incredibly delicious.
Strawberry Temptation
Strawberry patches!
Mmmm....
Real color, not artificially added
My treasure!!
The next stop for me was a little town called Flinders. It's supposed to have some famous chocolaterie, but that wasn't particularly of interest for me. First I took a quick look at the Flinders Pier, and then I headed out to Cape Schnack Lighthouse Reserve (apparently one of the oldest lighthouses), where I was able to see some beautiful views and took a bit of a hike.
Flinders Pier
Found a little blue wren! So cute!
Lots of wild cockatoos...
Cape Schnack Lighthouse
One of the buildings around the lighthouse
Drop-off into the ocean?! Scary! (Just kidding....)
Was up on top of that hill...now down at the beach
Video on the walk at Cape Schnack. If it doesn't work, click here to watch.
After that walk, I continued on my drive. This time I was headed for the "back beaches" as the ladies at the information center said they had some pretty good views that shouldn't be missed, and are apparently popular because they get bigger waves. First was a place called Mt. Levy Lookout, and then eventually I ended up at a spot called "London Bridge".
Birds can enjoy the view too!
These two were from the Mt. Levy Lookout
This is in the London Bridge area
This is the rock formation they're calling London Bridge
After that, it was getting a bit late in the day, so I started the drive back to Frankston.
The next day, it was dreary, not so warm and a bit rainy, so I spent the majority of the day at the Peninsula Hot Springs. If you ever go to Melbourne area, this is my recommendation for a place to take a break at! It's a huge area, and there are many hot (and cold) "pools" that you can go in, and you can take a walk around or relax on chairs by their little lake. It's a good rainy day activity because you're already getting wet, and yet you can stay warm.
Following that, the next day, I planned to do a bit of hiking. I had read about some trails on the Bass Coast, and I decided on one I wanted to find, called the George Bass Coastal walk. It was a bit of a challenge as the signs were a bit vague. I did find a path that connected with it around the Kilcunda trestle bridge. To be honest, I think I actually ended up walking on the Bass Coast Rail Trail instead though. Where I started, it had some beautiful coast views, but as I continued to walk, it ended up going through farmland, which wasn't really what I was interested in walking through (and the flies were driving me crazy), so I headed back to my car to find somewhere else to explore.
I eventually decided to go check out Phillip Island. One of the recommended walks there was Cape Woolamai, so I went to go find it. When I first got to the location, I thought I was in the wrong place, even though my maps and brochures said that where I was was the location to access the trail. Eventually after some wandering in the parking lot and surrounding area, I found a couple of parks workers and asked them about it. They told me I had to go down to the beach, walk for about 1km or so, and then there would be some stairs, and that's how you access the trail. They also told me it was actually one of the best walks on Phillip Island. So helpful!
See that rock formation in the distance? It's called the Pinnacles and is one of the view points on this hike.
So I saw a brown lump, wondered if it was an animal of some sort, and it turned out to be a kangaroo! I wasn't expecting to see any, so it was a pleasant surprise!
Copperhead snake. Very poisonous. I came across two on this walk. Neither one tried to bite me.
Back down to the beach to head back
After that walk, I went to an area called the Nobbies. There's also a place called the Nobbies Center, where you can see info about Antarctica and so on, but it was closing when I got there. So I took a walk on the boardwalk to see the Nobbies, the blowhole and seal rock. There were lots of nesting spots for penguins in this area (I found one box that had a chick in it!), and quite the variety of birdlife.
Penguin chick inside!
These geese type birds were all over the place.
Sunset back in Frankston
And with that, I was already on my last night in Frankston. The following morning was going off to the next location. More on that later!
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