The 12 Apostles...

The 12 Apostles is a geological limestone formation located by the great ocean road in Victoria. It's the main highlight of our road tour which started 250kms away from Melbourne. The weather was fine when we reached the look out point and we started taking pictures almost immediately. If only we can keep count and charge all the pictures taken just like web hits, somebody could already be a billionaire by now!

sweeping views...

Soaring 45 metres high above the Southern Ocean, these giant rock stacks are formed from constant attack by the sea. The cliff faces are being eroded at the rate of about 2cm each year. From the look out platform, we could only count less than 9 rock stacks. Where's the other 3 we wondered? There's one quick way to count and audit all the stacks. Take the helicopter flight tour!

co-pilot seat again...the instructor told us not to wave our hands for obvious reasons while walking towards and away from the chopper.

After a quick safety briefing, we were escorted to our bright yellow coloured helicopter. The morning flight over Geelong was nothing short of spectacular but this was something else. It was my first ever helicopter ride (after thousands of simulated flight hours..hehehe). And flying over the imposing limestone cliffs makes it even more memorable. The problem was I couldn't capture the flight on video as there's no more space for me to record. I had to delete some of the pictures during the flight to create more precious bytes! I only managed to take a handful of pictures.

It's confimed, there was never 12 rock stacks. Infact there were only 9 in the past. Today, only 8 left standing. (click to en-large the picts)

While the viewing platform provides great views, the helicopter ride offers unparalleled vantage, but there's one place that I wanted to be for a different perspective. Which is from the beach itself. It must be amazing just to be able to look up at these gigantic rocks. But due to time constraint, at day's end, we left the 12 Apostles and drove back to Melbourne.

L to R: me, Akmal, Sai and Sherene...

For someone who loves the outdoors and appreciate beautiful landscapes, this is the kind of place that I could just sit for hours and enjoy the view. I wish I could stay there over night and just watch how the colours change throughout the day, especially during sunset and sunrise. That's a good reason to go back to Melbourne isn't it??

More pictures here