Some Loons and a Few Odd Little Birds

Here I go again in an attempt to out do my imaginary Uncle Harry in the boredom stakes.
We stopped at the Bay of Islands with the girls. Unlike last time it was not blowing a gale, but the weather was cold and it rained intermittently. But the weather did not deter some loony locals. In the circle in this photo (number one daughter in the corner by the way)...
are these guys, surfing far off this inhospitable coast.Every now and then surfers are drowned somewhere on this coast, when the conditions change suddenly on a rugged coastline they can easily be trapped against sheer cliff faces. When you see them in places like this you can see why.

To continue boring you, another shot of The Grotto.
And London Bridge at low tide in calmer seas.
I took this photo of the cliffs facing away from London Bridge the previous time we were there. I noticed footprints in the sand at the base of the cliff at the time and wondered how anyone could have climbed down there.
Two weeks later and there were still footprints at the bottom of the cliff, lots of them.
So I had a closer look. In the vegetation covered bank at the base of the cliff are dozens of burrows.
Then it went click, Fairy Penguins live along this coast. During daylight hours they fish out at sea, then at night they come ashore to rest in burrows where they raise their chicks.
All these prints are the work of cute little fairy penguins.

This picture is from Wikimedia Commons

Next along to Loch Ard Gorge
Where there are these interesting but rather ugly stalactites.
Out at the point beyond the gorge you can see where the Loch Ard foundered. The formation with the arch through it is Muttonbird Island. The Loch Ard was wrecked on the shelf at the base of the cliffs in the extreme left of this picture. Somehow the two survivors made it past these cliffs, through this gap, to land on this beach.

From here we continued on to the Twelve Apostles. These nifty little helicopters run tourists past the Apostles. We decided not to go last time because it was really windy, and this time because it was raining.
So we made do with looking from ground level

Here they are again from a different angle to last time and in very different light.
We had hoped to go on to Cape Otway, which we have not made it to on either of our previous trips, but the rain continued to get heavier so we decided to head for home.

Having made Uncle Harry proud by boring you all to tears, that is all for a while from the South West Coast.

Of course we still have to head down that way to see Cape Otway, maybe in summer before the high season. So Uncle harry could yet ride again!

Next: I cast an eye over my novel.

Bay of Islands and Martyr's Bay (Or Uncle Harry rides again)

Deb and I slept in at Warnambool, after all it was the weekend and sleeping in is not something I often get to do in my line of work. It was after 10:00 before we were properly on the road again.

From Warnambool it is about 10 km back toward Melbourne before you reach the western end of the Great Ocean Road. The first section of road runs through very lush (by Australian standards) countryside, mainly dairy farms. For this first section you have no glimpse of the coast. Then suddenly as you come around a corner you catch sight of the ocean framed by a bay of very rugged cliffs.A little further and the road reaches the coast at the Bay of Islands. Words are not sufficient to describe the beauty of this spot. Even photographs only give a hint. The coastline here is sheer limestone cliffs carved into surreal shapes by the weather off the Southern Ocean, south of this coast there is nothing but waves all the way to Antarctica.
We spent some time here walking along paths that led to various lookouts. There was a strong wind blowing, so strong it was hard to hold the camera steady enough. With the wind clouds flitted across the sky continually changing the light and the colours of the ocean and the land.
The bay is filled with limestone stacks and islets of varying sizes and shapes, all shaped and tormented by the sea and wind.
The ocean batters, cuts and undercuts the soft stone.
This stack is so undermined it looks as if it is ready to topple.
This stack has an arch cut through its base.

Despite the rugged terrain this is apparently a reasonably popular launching place. This very steep boat ramp virtually runs down the cliff to the bay. There were obviously no boats out today but judging by the size of the car park it must get busy here sometimes.
I followed the ramp to the bottom and took a few photos looking up at the cliffs.

Back in the car, a few minutes drive east you arrive at Martyrs Bay. How the bay was given its name is not documented, but the local folklore is that in pioneering days the men from the local aboriginal tribe were murdered by being driven over the cliffs near here. There are local legends of this sort in many places around the Australia. Unfortunately, given the nature of European settlement and documented massacres in other areas, it seems likely some of these stories are true.
Despite a possibly bloody history this is also a spectacularly beautiful spot, the contrasting colours of the water, limestone and sky taking my breath away.

The wind continued to blow a gale causing the ocean to get rougher and rougher, although the day was still gloriously sunny.
Once again Uncle Harry has reached the end of his tether and will have to sign off to the evening.

Meanwhile Al needs to get back to editing his manuscript:

Next: A nursery rhyme and a few dark and mysterious caverns.

A taste: