As we drove down the road leading to Princetown Recreation Reserve we saw a few kangaroos. Then we turned into the campsite and saw a few more. And then some more. All of a sudden there was too many kangaroos to count. Based on the whimpering noises coming from both Jono and Neddy, it’s hard to say who was more excited between the two of them.

After setting up Claude, acquainting ourselves with the local mob* and participating in a few rounds of “dodge the ‘roo poo” (a fun game you get to play anytime you set foot out of your caravan while staying at Princetown Recreation Reserve) it was time to see what this more rugged end of the Great Ocean Road had to offer.

We of course started with the Twelve Apostles, arriving at the viewing area very late in the afternoon of what was an extremely grey and windy day. Despite the hour and the weather there were still busloads of people around, so we determined that we would rise before the sun – and hopefully the hordes – the next day.

Rise before the sun we did, and it was down Gibson’s Steps and onto the sand. We were lucky enough to enjoy plenty of uninterrupted time with Gog and Magog:

We then took an obscene amount of photos of surrounding landmarks (The Grotto and Loch Ard Gorge being favourites). And, just to indulge in our “full-time tourist” status, we went back to all these same locations on a different day under different weather conditions – and took even more photos.

A side trip of particular note during our Princetown stop was the Bay of Martyrs walk near Peterborough. This was one of the times Neddy has proved his worth because we may not have stumbled across it if we weren’t looking for dog-friendly places. We recommend the Bay of Martyrs as on par with many of the other, more famous attractions in the area. It’s definitely underrated.

And we couldn’t write this post without a shout out to our camping neighbour, a nice local guy called Cameron. Cameron not only took Jono out on his boat one day while Laura was sewing (yes, mum, sewing!), but was also a source of much entertainment and bafflement to us.

On a day when rain bucketed and freezing gale force winds howled, Cameron sat OUTSIDE his caravan, on a camping chair, for the whole day and well into the night. Barely able to see him through the rain though he was only metres away, we marvelled at his determination (insanity?) and also at the fact that he was able to keep a fire alight in the fifty-kilometre-an-hour winds. If he was trying to prove that Victorians are a hardy bunch, well, consider us believers.

We feel no shame in admitting that we spent this aforementioned day huddled in Claude like the pathetic New South Welshmen that we are. In fact, our only achievements were binge-eating and binge-watching (a tray of freshly baked choc chip peanut butter cookies and nearly the whole third season of The Walking Dead** respectively).

We could have stayed in this part of the world for much longer but with Easter looming we thought we’d better get a move on and find somewhere to bunker down for the impending school holiday explosion (yes, that’s our “full-time tourist” snobbery coming out).

* We’ve recently Googled the collective term for a group of kangaroos (our guess being a “hop”). It’s actually a “mob”.

** For the uninitiated, The Walking Dead is a TV show about a zombie apocalypse, and one we have gotten into since starting our trip. We are surprised that we like a series with this plot focus and Jono isn’t thrilled that Laura no longer likes to go outside at night.