Big Trip 2026(1) Day 11 - The Prom

It was a bit of a late start this morning.  The plan was to visit Wilson’s Promontory today.  Rain was forecast, from about mid morning onward, however the rain radar wasn’t showing any signs of it (and didn't end up happening).

Once we reached the boundaries of the Prom there was still a fair bit of driving to do before reaching Tidal River, which is the Prom’s mecca.  School groups were everywhere, as well as a lot of casual visitors (like us).  There was also a a barrage of construction workers present.  There is a lot of construction work happening as a new Visitor’s Centre and Café are being built.  If you’ve never visited the Prom before you might want to leave it for six months to a year as they complete construction.

We had visited the Prom a couple of times for the camping experience (using a camper trailer) back before Ben had started primary school. So I’m thinking 2006 and 2007? I hadn’t been back since then. Nick had been part of a school camp here when he was in grade three (2009?).  Part of returning here was for nostalgic purposes.  The official purpose, as part of this trip, was to visit the southern most part of the state.

So, Tidal River was our first stop.  As the name would suggest, this is a river that flows out to the beach, that is affected by the tides, or something like that.  This beach is one of those where there is a lot of distance between the low tide water mark and the high tide water mark.  It appeared to be low tide as the water was a long way out.

We spent a good half hour here exploring the area.  As more school groups made their way down to the beach we left and drove to Mt Oberon.  More specifically, we drove to the car park at the base of Mt Oberon, Telegraph Saddle, and admired the view from there.  The walk to the summit was almost 7 km return, not something I wanted to do, or was able to do.

 From there we drove down to Squeaky Beach, named because the sand makes a squealing sound when you step on/through it.

At Squeaky Beach there is a walk that you can do that takes you through to Picnic Bay.  Nick took the opportunity to walk there and I met up with him at the Picnic Bay Car Park.  Whilst waiting for him I ducked quickly to the next Bay in the vain hope of finding the source of its name. I was not surprised but a bit disappointed.

Whisky Bay (it's a little blurry)

After I picked Nick up we decided we were done with the Prom.  We then headed to Foster for a late lunch (review below).

On a family recommendation tea tonight was at The Fish Creek Hotel,  Nick had fish (whiting) and chips whilst I went for the BBQ Pork Back Ribs.

We don’t normally talk a lot whilst eating however I felt our mood was particularly quiet.  I don’t know if it was because neither of us rated our tea highly (the sauce on the ribs was too sweet, and Nick thought the whiting was bland), whether we were tiring from our trip, or we were fully aware that tonight was the last night of our trip.  There comes a time in most trips when you realise that you are slowly making your way back home and that you’re either happy, or not happy, for that to happen.  I think that was where are heads were.

Food Review

The Hot Bread Shop in Foster was where we bought our lunch. (Sorry, I forgot to take a photo).

Nick bought the cheese and bacon sausage roll. He really like it, however thought that it was a bit too greasy, most likely because of the oil from the bacon and cheese.  He still rated it highly 8/10

I had a tomato and onion pie.  This was a great pie.  The pie case was solid and well cooked, the top crust was the right amount of flakiness and the filling was very tasty, with small pieces of both tomato and onion amongst the beef mince. 8.5/10

Today's Album Thriller Michael Jackson

Kms Travelled Today 160

Kms Travelled Total 2,306 

Big Trip 2026 Trip(1) Day 10 - Mini Golf and Street Art

We started the morning at a café I have been to many times before to have a cooked breakfast. 

An important public service announcement.  When you have run out of spinach to serve with your Eggs Benedict, kale is not a good replacement.  The texture of the kale does not work with the rest of the dish. Actually, kale doesnt work with any breakfast dish.  Best to avoid.

Another one of the many traditions that we have developed over the years is playing at least one game of mini golf anytime we have stayed in Lakes Entrance. The town has three mini golf courses on the main esplanade, two of which are next door to each other.  Our favourite course is the third, weird one – Footbridge Mini Golf.

We were offered professional putters. Mine was Tiger Woods and Nick had Greg Norman. 

Helpful signs were dotted throughout the course:

Nick won by two shots.

If you have read my blogs of earlier travels you will know that I’m a big fan of street art.  Lakes Entrance has 6 wood carvings of figures relating to the war. The original Monterey Cyprus pines were planted in 1924 to honour the local soldiers killed in “The Great War”.  In the 1990’s these needed to be cut down due to either disease or the forces of nature at work.  Chainsaw artist, John Brady, created these sculptures in 1998.  Here is Simpson and his donkey.

Maybe this counts as street art as well? 

There were more murals and other works of street art after we left Lakes Entrance, however I was either not quick enough, or too lazy to take some photos of these.  That changed when we hit the town of Yarram.

Heesco Khosnaran is an artist who moved to Australia from Mongolia twenty odd years ago and is known for his street art and also silo art.  After the 2020 bushfires and COVID Yarram decide to go all out to make Yarram a town of murals.   Heesco went to work and over the next 3 years or so created 24 murals.  Here are only a few of them:

I didn’t know this until I had gone to their bakery and picked up a map of all the murals in town.  It is so well known that it has won awards and the town is now marketing itself as Heesco Town – Yarram.

I could have spent a couple of hours exploring and viewing all the murals, however I had another person with me who was slightly less interested in all of this.  Maybe another time.

After another hour or so of driving we reached our destination for the night.  We are staying in a cottage midway between Foster and Fish Creek and will be looking forward to visiting Wilsons Promontory on our last full day of this trip, tomorrow.

Food Review

Yarram Bakery Cafe was our lunch time venue today.  Even through it was almost 2:00pm they still had a good range of pies and other hot food available.

Nick chose the plain sausage roll, ahead of the bacon and cheese one.  His verdict 7/10

My choice was the beef burgundy pie.  This was mostly a great pie and full of flavour however the beef was unfortunately very fatty which did lose it marks. 7/10

Today's Album The Miracle Queen

Kms Travelled Today 320

Kms Travelled Total 2,146

Big Trip 2026(1) Day 9 - Mallacoota to Lakes Entrance

** Note : Google, owner of both Blogger and Google Photos is being particularly glitchy today. It will only allow me to access a very limited amount of photos for this blog. If these programs decide to behave themselves later I will update this entry **

I woke up and managed to get this shot of the rising sun.

**Image of spectacular sunrise to be inserted ** 

After packing everything in the car to head off, Nick wanted to take a last walk down at Quarry Beach.  Whilst I wasn’t into the full walk of the beach that he did it allowed me to sit down and enjoy the area. I’m glad I did that as I was able to see a pod of dolphins swim over and through the waves. They seemed to be heading to the township area where dolphin food beckoned.  Or maybe they were on their way from a feed. Or they were just having a nice morning swim.  I won’t know. I was looking at them for so long, I almost forgot I had a camera; however the shots I did take were hardly the evidence to prove nine or ten dolphins swimming past.

**Image of fairly dodgy looking dolphin in water to be inserted ** 

As we hadn’t had breakfast before we left, we stopped in Cann River for morning tea (food review below).  We had a very cheeky currawong(?) hop on the table where we were eating hoping for a tiny morsel of food.  We obliged, which was a big mistake, as it had a lot of mates that identified me as a soft target and also wanted their own tiny morsels.  Three or four of them were lucky birds, but the rest missed out.

Whenever we are driving between Lakes Entrance and Mallacoota, if time allows I will make a detour along the coast to Cape Conran.  Not content with limiting myself to the beaches at Mallacoota, I find the beach at Cape Conran particularly stunning.  It also has a walkway at the west end that leads out over the rocks which Nick used.  Having had a couple of heavy days of walking I was content to sit and admire the view.

 Neither of us were hungry for lunch so only stopped briefly at Orbost and then headed on to Lake Entrance.

Once we unpacked and had a break, I was on a mission from Lesley to a) visit the Shell Museum and b) procure a present for her.

The Shell Museum has been there as long as I have been travelling to Lakes Entrance.  It is not only a “museum” for shells but also features an old model railway out the back, once you walk through the largish (and also old) aquarium.  Nick used to be interested in model trains when he was much younger, so this we had visited this quite a few times in earlier years.  Now, it feels a bit kitschy.  The presents that we bought Lesley celebrate that kitschiness. 

As we walked around some of the shops, we came across a chocolate shop that had n=only been around a couple of years.  We had to go in, and I had to buy more presents.

 Tea tonight is a bit of a tradition with Nick and I when stopping in Lakes Entrance.  We go to one of the fish and chip shops – there are plenty of them.  The chocolatier had recommended Awesome Fish and Chips.  Nick ordered some local fish (gummy shark), chips and “sides” (scallops and potato cakes). I ordered a hamburger with the lot (I am not a fish eater).  A proper hamburger with the lot must include beetroot and pineapple, in addition to the standard egg, bacon, lettuce, onions, tomato, cheese (Kraft Single unfortunately) and beef patty (obviously).

Tomorrow morning will feature a game of mini golf before heading onto Foster.

Food Review

Cann River Bakery was today's chosen bakery. 

** Insert picture of  bakery here**

The sausage roll was OK, according to Nick 6/10

The chosen pie was a pepper steak pie. It was a very, very peppery pie, which gets bonus marks from me. It did feel a bit undercooked as the pie needed to be supported by its tin base, which is never a good sign. 7/10

Today's Album  Storm Front Billy Joel

Kms Travelled Today 240

Kms Travelled Total 1,826