← PreviousRoad to MelbourneWe were already on the road at 7:30 when we realised we might not make the distance with the petrol we had left. We'd only gone five kilometres, and I decided the risk was too great not to make a quick U-turn. We filled the tank just enough to have some leeway in case of trouble, as the price per litre was exorbitant for Australia at almost two dollars. We drove for twelve hours that day; we'd decided to reach Adelaide come what may, and apart from toilet and petrol stops, we only made one quick stop to eat at a grotty roadside joint, where we had burgers too bad for their too-high price. We reached Adelaide, the capital of South Australia, at 9 pm, "épuisés mais ravis" — exhausted but delighted — as Charles Aznavour sang in the song echoing inside the Honda CR-V.
Romain and Emelyne, the couple of friends we'd met in Darwin, had kindly agreed to lend us their apartment for Christmas. They'd gone back to France for the occasion, and Romain had sent me a whole series of codes so we could get into the building, then into the car park to collect the keys from his bike bag, before finally going up and settling into their little home. This return to civilisation delighted us, and we spent a long time in the shower before going out to a restaurant and rediscovering the joys of city life. It had been hard, but we'd triumphed over the Nullarbor Plain, so dreaded by Australians, eating up almost two thousand kilometres in two days. We weren't in Melbourne yet, but the rest of the way would be easier.
When you're young, you always think you're stronger than anything. When we decided to leave for more than a year, we knew we'd spend the holidays far from our country and our family, but we brushed it aside: it won't affect us! And yet here we were, and the atmosphere wasn't the cheeriest. Of course we had each other and our relationship was still going strong, but something was missing. We went to the city's covered market to find some tasty food so we could treat ourselves a little all the same.
As usual, Australia charged high prices for anything from France. Australians had this curious idea that everything French was luxurious. A single croissant cost four dollars, a saucisson fifteen and a cheese twenty. We found a few slices of salmon, artisanal taramasalata and pâté, which we served with toast. That would do for our Christmas dinner, the first of our lives away from home.
We didn't plan to linger too long in Adelaide, the capital of South Australia, so we toured it at a brisk pace. It was a pretty city, more modest in size than the other Australian capitals. The locals know it, too: they call it "town" rather than "city", as would befit a capital. We walked around its historic centre before going on to the river and its huge Australian football stadium. The day was beautiful, the sun as fierce as ever, and it was pleasant to stroll. We then went north of Adelaide to admire our first koalas in the wild. We'd seen some at a sanctuary near Brisbane, but of course we preferred to see them in their natural habitat.
Morialta Conservation Park lets you follow a path along a river and try to spot the animals in the trees. It was our lucky day, as they were right by the path, clinging to their branches, and there were dozens of them. The Australians out walking didn't even look at them any more, probably tired of this everyday sight, as we are of pigeons in Paris. But we were on the verge of wonder every time, watching for long minutes a little animal whose main characteristic is sleeping.
Ridiculous or not, we were delighted with our walk and headed to a supermarket to buy chocolates. Our friends had refused to let us pay them for the loan of the apartment, so before leaving we built a pyramid of chocolate boxes for them to find on their return. We had four days to cover the road to Melbourne, so we took our time. We stopped to see a seal colony, a dark blue lake and a gigantic sinkhole garden, then took the Great Ocean Road, the object of many travellers' fantasies. It was supposed to be a clifftop road for more than two hundred kilometres — or so we expected. In reality, more than half the route is in forest, far from the coast.
Only one part of the road is truly spectacular, and indeed it was worth the trip. We met a couple of friends doing the road the other way in Port Campbell for dinner and a walk together. It was with them that we visited the world-famous Twelve Apostles. Once called the Sow and Piglets, the name was changed by the government for the more glamorous apostles. These limestone stacks rising out of the water in such a small space made for an unusual spectacle, even though only eight of the original nine were still standing. Nobody could explain why the place had been named the "twelve" apostles when there were only nine, but we put it down to the Australians' mischievous side.