Driving an Australian peninsula in a temperamental campervan

Cursing loudly and repeatedly at the mercurial gear stick of a hired VW Kombi van was perhaps not the dream start I had imagined to our retro Australian road trip. For years I had fantasised about owning one of these vintage buses, nobody had ever mentioned that their gearbox has a mind of its own.

My wife Christine had unexpectedly come up with the idea for the road trip a few days earlier which was surprising as she’s certainly not the camping type. We had been staying with her very welcoming family outside Melbourne for a week but it was time to strike out and have our own adventure. Dash, our 7 year old son, has been listening to me banging on about owning a campervan for some time and he was equally excited about the trip.

After picking up Applejack, our yellow 1979 home for the next few days, we spluttered along the Bellarine Peninsula until I eventually got a vague handle on the gears. A signpost for Oakdene Vineyards loomed up ahead and a quick stop for a glass of Peta’s Pinot Noir proved the perfect tonic for my frayed nerves.

A steam train chugged alongside us as we drove towards Queenscliff, a particularly grand seaside town, where we inched the van on to a ferry and sailed across the mouth of very blue Port Philip Bay to Sorrento. Australians seem to love a vanilla slice, sausage rolls are popular too and a bakery on Sorrento's main street offered up perhaps the most delicious version of both I've ever tasted.

Covered in puff pastry we returned to the van for round two with the gearbox. A sweaty drive across the Mornington Peninsula ensued connecting up with the Bass Highway and as we rolled into Kilcunda we were hit by a mesmerising vista of enormous ocean rimmed by a slick of wild, white beach. A pit stop at the seemingly modest Kilcunda General Store offered up unexpected foodie treasures, world-class coffee and outdoor tables from which to admire our yellow bus set off by a background of blue sea.

We popped the roof and set up camp in the grounds of our friends’ summer house nestled nearby in the middle of tea tree infused bush. A much needed swim in the Powlett river washed away my lingering aggression towards 1970s engineering.

Dash took on the role of bouncer and bossily managed the queue of kids waiting to get up into the bed in the van’s roof. That night we cooked outdoors and craned our necks skywards at the swirling Milky Way before an unexpectedly comfortable sleep aided by several more glasses of Pinot Noir.

The next evening we set off at dusk for nearby Philip Island to watch hundreds of Fairy Penguins swim to shore and waddle across Summerland beach to their burrows in the nearby dunes. The joy of witnessing this nightly parade was not lessened by the hundreds of other people gathered on the beach with us, everybody was quietly humbled by the spectacle. Almost at midnight we trundled into Rosebud back on the Mornington Peninsula and in the inky darkness we searched for our pre-booked pitch in a packed campsite on the foreshore.

Our Kilcunda friends had made us promise to visit Gunnamatta Beach on the wilder side of the peninsula. We had the wind ravaged sands to ourselves that morning and our breakfast of dry Special K in the empty car park could not have been more perfect.

Peninsula Hot Springs wasn't far and we spent the next few hours wallowing in dozens of thermal pools strewn across a stunningly landscaped hillside. Dash's fast found friends taught him how to do cannonballs and 'horseys' into the ice cold plunge pools and we especially loved the authentically Turkish hammam and the Playboy Mansion inspired grotto pool. Dragging ourselves away that evening was a struggle and we barely made the ferry to return to the other side of the bay.

Torquay is Australia’s surfing capital, Ripcurl and Quiksilver were founded here and both companies have giant outlets on the road into town. It’s at the beginning of the Great Ocean Road, one of the Australia’s most scenic stretches of coast with endless beaches and vast swathes of rainforest.

My surfboard had come half ways across the world with our luggage and I was glad to finally give it an outing at Torquay’s surf beach. The water was warm enough that a wetsuit wasn’t needed and I watched jealously as the local kids caught wave after wave effortlessly while I struggled to barely get up on my board.

We headed inland in search of The Farmer’s Place, an ingeniously designed eco building daubed with messy hand-painted text listing all the food stuffs on offer inside. A bag of their salted caramel donuts kept us quiet for the next stretch of the journey through Anglesea, past its iconic lighthouse and on to Lorne to visit Christine’s school friends.

This part of the coast suffered terrible bush fires over Christmas and Lorne narrowly escaped being razed by a last minute change in the wind direction. We walked down the main street and Dash had a bounce at the town’s famous trampoline park. The beach was packed with multi-ethnic Australian families, it was reassuring to watch how easily the country seems to absorb so many new cultures. Large groups of older Italians and Greeks gathered around bbqs in the shade of giant trees that line the foreshore. That night a koala climbed up the tree in our friends’ driveway and nibbled on leaves while we watched entranced for an hour. Cockatoos soared overhead and a wild parrot landed on the balcony and happily pecked on seeds from Dash’s hand.

Back in Queenscliff we reluctantly handed back the keys of the van, despite the teething problems with the gears it had been an amazing trip. Applejack had a unique personality and we missed all the smiles, waves and comments from random passersby.

Before returning home we spent a few final days in Melbourne. A giant wall of hundreds of interlocking bicycles in the lobby of the National Gallery of Victoria was the highlight of the gallery's innovative Andy Warhol | Ai Weiwei exhibition. Dash was completely taken by a room Ai Weiwei had fashioned from Lego incorporating pixilated portraits of Australian human rights campaigners.

The Australian Open was also on and armed with electric fans and water bottles we braved a searing 40 degree day to watch Caroline Wozniacki endure a shock loss to a Kazakhstani newcomer. We cooled off with watermelon granitas at Pellegrini's, an old school Italian diner on Bourke St and later went for extortionate cocktails on the terrace of Siglio overlooking Parliament House. Melbourne's trams are free in the city centre and traffic is remarkably non-existent. It's a very comfortable city and is often voted the best place to live in the world. I can see why.

Getting There

We usually fly with Etihad or Emirites but this time we went with British Airways and Qantas as the tickets were considerably more affordable. www.britishairways.com

Transport

We sourced our VW van from Hire a Kombi on the Bellarine Peninsula, 2 hours from Melbourne. www.hireakombi.com

The Searoad Ferry between Queenscliff and Sorrento shaved hours off our journey and it's a very scenic cross. www.searoad.com.au

Stay

www.riparide.com lists lots of different accommodation options in the region including glamping, rustic wooden cabins and updated caravans.

We stayed at The Prince in St Kilda the very first time I visited Melbourne, it's still great with a small pool and an enviable location seconds from the beach. www.theprince.com.au

Eat

We had an amazing breakfast at Rudimentary, a café in the edgy Melbourne suburb Footscray built from several shipping containers with an onsite vegetable garden. www.rudimentary.com.au