An Unknown Adventure

What did we do the day after Rachel left? We drove to Melbourne for the weekend. It’s about 600 miles away, so not your typical weekend destination. Yet, the four of us girls: Sharon, myself, Cecilia, and Anna did it anyway. The boys flew down - they’re pansies. The reason for this convergence on Melbourne (which is located in the southeast corner of Australia, for those of you following along at home on the map) was a first profession of vows Mass being held for 3 Capuchin brothers who had just spent a year of formation in the States and had now returned to Australia to continue their studies in their homeland. Since the boys on team will be joining the Capuchins and will very likely be doing the same thing in a few years, it was nice to see the ceremony, but also nice to take a roadtrip and to see a new city! I had very much been wanting to go to Melbourne, and I was not disappointed!

We drove through the Thursday night (beginning of August), and I was the lucky one who got the 3AM –Melbourne shift behind the wheel. It can be a very lonely hour to be driving, I discovered! However, I found ways to entertain myself. The road we were on (the stick-straight Hume Highway, paved from Sydney to Melbourne with almost no deviation) was lined with eucalyptus trees and every now and then signs appeared with koalas on them, saying they were in the area for the next 25 km, or whatever. I was so determined to see a koala: I turned on the bright lights and instead of peering at the road, peered intently at the trees whizzing by – but to no avail. I still have not caught a glimpse of a wild koala, which I find unfortunate!

When we left Sydney, everyone was convinced we were leaving late, because we were in for a 12-hour drive and we needed to get to Melbourne at a decent time in the morning so we could take naps, etc. so a 9PM departure from the CYS house was just pushing it. I don’t know who took 12-hours to drive that road, but 9 hours later, at the early time of 6AM, these four girls pulled into Melbourne before the sun, and…weren’t really sure what to do. Anna’s cousins live there and were expecting us at 11AM to stay with them for the weekend. Seeing as they were being such hospitable hosts, putting up 3 girls they didn’t know and a distant cousin, we didn’t think waking them up to tell them we had arrived 5 hours ahead of schedule would be the best “Hi there and hello” we could offer. And yet, that is what Anna did – and her being the relative, we just went with it. However, her cousins were extremely nice and had reserved us a hotel room because they felt it was too cold for us to be sleeping on the floor of their spare bedroom. Of course we protested, but she was adamant about the arrangement, and so gratefully, we checked into the motel just down the street and slept for the better part of that day.

That night we finally roused from our slumber and headed into the city to meet up with the boys (who were sleeping for some reason as well! I know for a fact they didn’t drive through the night, so I don’t know why *they* were tired!) for dinner and a wander around the cosmopolitan city of Melbourne, checking out the riverside walk and even the Casino. It’s really very artsy, with some different-looking architecture and a definite sense of culture. Sassy but classy, I think I might quite like to live in Melbourne! Although maybe not - that’s creeping a little too close to Antarctica for me. It was cold there!

And there are some interesting characters roaming the streets: a man in a full space suit, complete with space shoes and a helmet, was standing on a box with heaps of little sound gadgets connected to him and the box he was standing on playing a “space tune” and ‘singing’ or something…it was very weird. But funny! My favorite part of watching him though was when an ambulance drove by with the siren on and this space man had a siren sound that he started playing as well! We were just laughing hysterically at that.

The next day we went to the Capuchin’s profession, which was really lovely, and around 1PM, without any real plans for the rest of the day, I began scheming. The one attraction I just couldn’t stand to leave Melbourne without seeing was the Great Ocean Road, a long highway along the southern coast of Australia which is supposed to be beautiful! Along that highway, there are some natural sights worth stopping at, and as far as I know, the most famous ones are the 12 Apostles – you’ve probably seen pictures of these formations without knowing what you were looking at! They are the result of erosion: they stand just a few hundred meters from the coast, and their tops are level with the cliffs they presumably were separated from ages ago. At one time, I hear there were 12 of them but since their discovery, it would seem they themselves have eroded and collapsed, so now there only stand 11, or fewer even.

I was determined to see them, because it is unforeseeable that I will ever get to that part of the world again, and so I got a few loose directions from one of the Capuchin priests, rounded up the girls and jumped in the car, headed on a 2 hour journey (according the GPS) down the Great Ocean Road. By the time we really got going it was about 2PM, and even though a few people had mentioned the length of this expedition, I stubbornly didn’t believe them. They said it would take 4 hours, naaaa…surely it wasn’t THAT far to see these rocks.

After an hour of driving towards the coast, we hit the Great Ocean Road and it was BEAUTIFUL! A gorgeous day for the drive – it had been raining off and on throughout the morning but the sun was shining and so guess what was popping up everywhere? Rainbows! They were over the water and so fabulous to see. Some of them were just sitting on the horizon, others were off in a field next to the highway, but all were spectacular! And the scenery is just gorgeous on this drive – I really enjoyed just winding around the coast line, driving the speed limit which afforded a gaze or two towards the sea every now and then. We passed through lots of little tourist towns along the way, and I was just so happy to be alive that day – it was truly magnificent!

But it would seem that even in all my stubbornness, the GPS was wrong and the others were right. When, at some random point in the road, TomTom said “You have reached your destination.” There were no Apostles in sight. Cecilia, who had been napping in the back, called a friend who confirmed the inconvenient truth of the matter: It *WAS* a 4-hour drive from Melbourne to the 12 Apostles!

I pause here to simply interject the fact that I don’t know many occasions when I have actually jumped in a car driving in a general direction headed for something that I just assume is a certain distance away and that signs will point me there. It was so exhilarating to live such a free and whirlwind sort of day! No plans, no real direction, no sense of time…or distance…Just enjoying the ride, eventually hoping to get to a destination.

And so, two hours into the drive, we stopped and had a decision to make. Do we keep driving, pushing on towards the 12 Apostles, or do we turn around because it’s getting late? I desperately wanted to keep going, fighting time and sunlight until we reached those rocks, but I did have two other people along with me and I had to consider them. So I was quite surprised when they both said, “Just keep going! We’re already half way there, and what else are we going to do? It would be disappointing to have driven so far only to turn around.” I was just in such a state of bliss – I felt a bit bad, because I was ignorant of the true distance to these rocks, but in some ways, I wondered if I had known, if we would have gone at all? Probably not, and so I was grateful we had all been happily in the dark, not really caring!

So on we drove, and as the sun sank, along with our spirits (just a bit), we hit a drizzly, dark rainforest with windy roads – the kind where you can’t see around the bend and the speed limit, for that reason, is only 20mph. Because it was dark and slick, I was not taking any chances going faster than the recommended speed – not that I really could anyway! The curves were really tight. However, at one point along the journey, there were a few cars behind me, one of which was so impatient – I couldn’t even see his headlights he was riding my tail so closely! I suppose he finally decided he had enough, because on one of the curves he overtook us, but was quickly rebuked for this because his tires lost grip and he smashed into the guardrail – thank God there was a guardrail! It was a couple teenage boys…who knows what they were in such a hurry for, on such a dangerous road! We pulled up along side them, asking if they needed anything, and we got a very cold no, so praying for them, we drove on. I hope they learned their lesson not to be such idiots – at least no one was hurt.

A bit shaken, we pressed on further, and finally emerging from the rainforest to most darkness, we drove and drove till we reached the 12 Apostles. So it was dark, but the rain ceased long enough we could get out and walk down towards the lookout. The tourist center was closed and deserted, and only one other car was in the parking lot. We were actually a bit scared to walk through the dark to get out to the lookout, but luckily once we got past a certain patch of darkness there was a lit pathway (how nice of those people to install those!) and so down we trekked to see…the silhouettes of the 12 Apostles. At the time I was very positive, and actually very happy about the whole situation, saying how nice it was to see them in the dark, because almost nobody would ever get to do that, and how it was like a pilgrimage and we had really accomplished something in driving all that way, and that even though we couldn’t *really* see the natural wonder, everything had played out just how God had intended it and we were very blessed. I still believe all of that, but I can’t help wish we could have seen them in the daytime. If that was the case, I would still be able to see them in my memory! Because of the nature of the situation, for some time after our little trip down the Great Ocean Road, I had to remind myself that it actually happened – it felt something like a dream!

It was all very exciting though, despite the lack of visibility. It’s ok, I kept saying, we can look at pictures of them in the light – you can’t ever see them but in person in the dark! And so, that’s how our unknown adventure came about. And yes, we did then have a 4-hour drive back to Melbourne. In the dark completely.

The next morning, we got up, went to Mass at the Cathedral, grabbed some lunch, and headed back home – to Sydney. All in all, we decided we were a little bit crazy for driving over 2000km (1300 miles) in 3 days, but it was so worth it. I was so excited to be able to do it! An adventure I will remember for the rest of my life.