SOUTHERN SHORES

Happy 2015!

I saw in this new year in proper holiday mode. As expected, by the time Christmas rolled around I'd had about as much of the endless buildup heat as I could take, so I gave myself a little break and headed down to Melbourne to tick another experience off my personal bucket-list - driving the Great Ocean Road.

Myself and a few friends spent several days in the quaint seaside town of Port Fairy, on the Victorian coast, and did the drive back to Melbourne along the coastal road over a couple of days (via a short camping stint in Blanket Bay, nestled in the Otways forest). It's an absolutely stunning part of the world - certainly packed with tourists once you hit the Apostles stretch, but also quite easy to get away from the crowds without too much difficulty. And despite the endless crawl of traffic and the very busy coastal towns, I was pleasantly surprised to find that we never had to hunt for too long to get a carpark.

I was absolutely ecstatic to see how clean and unspoiled the beaches of Port Fairy are, quite busy but not packed. I had to hunt pretty hard to spot any beach trash. And the cool and crystal clear water was the perfect antidote to a mini heatwave that rolled through early in the new year. The Otways were also simply stunning, though should come with a traffic advisory warning to Watch for Tourists as every koala near the roadside had a collection of hastily parked cars and a gaggle of excited tourists crowding around. The smell of these eucalypt forests is amazing - although we have our fair share of gum trees in the north, they don't hold the fragrance in the same way of the cooler temperate forests down south.

I'm still on the job hunt and looking to move on in 2015, and Melbourne is still ranking highest on my list (though I am looking at other locations also) so this minibreak gave me a lot of ideas for weekend breaks if I end up in Victoria!