Recommended 2-day itinerary
The tight version — leave Apollo Bay in the morning, sleep in Warrnambool, finish in Nelson the next afternoon in time for a cruise the morning after.
Day 1: Apollo Bay → Port Campbell → Warrnambool
About 4.5 hours of driving with stops.
- Apollo Bay morning.Coffee in town, walk on the beach, fuel up. The road from here gets twisty and there are fewer roadhouses than you'd think.
- 12 Apostles around midday. The light is harsh in the middle of the day, but the buses have left by 2 pm and you can have the boardwalk to yourself if you wait them out.
- Loch Ard Gorge, Bay of Islands. The whole cluster of stops between Port Campbell and Peterborough is worth pulling over for — most are a five-minute walk from the carpark.
- Stop in Warrnambool for the night.Big enough for a real dinner and a proper room. In winter, the Logans Beach whale nursery is a ten-minute drive from the centre — if you're here between June and September, go and look.
Day 2: Warrnambool → Port Fairy → Portland → Nelson
About 3 hours of driving.
- Port Fairy. Heritage village, working fishing fleet, and the best lunch on the drive. Park anywhere and walk the river loop — half an hour, easy.
- Portland. Deep-water port, the blowholes at Cape Bridgewater, and the gannet colony at Point Danger — one of only six mainland colonies in the world. Worth the ten-minute detour.
- Nelson by late afternoon. Check in, walk down to the river, and settle in for the cruise the next morning.
Recommended 3-day itinerary (slower, recommended)
The version we'd actually do. Three nights on the road, one proper sit-down in Port Fairy, and the cruise as the closing chapter rather than something you race to.
- Day 1: Apollo Bay → Port Campbell. Walk the gorges in the late afternoon when the light turns warm and the buses have gone. Overnight in Port Campbell.
- Day 2: Port Campbell → Warrnambool → Port Fairy. A short driving day with a long lunch. Overnight in Port Fairy.
- Day 3: Port Fairy → Portland → Nelson. Stop for the gannets. Arrive at Nelson with time for a walk along the estuary before dinner. Overnight in Nelson.
- Day 4:Cruise the Glenelg in the morning, then drive home via Mt Gambier — it's only thirty minutes away and a sensible place to rejoin the highway.
Where to break the drive
Between Warrnambool and Nelson there are two real overnight options. They're different towns and which one suits you depends on what kind of evening you want.
Port Fairy — the prettier option
Historic cottages on tree-lined streets, a working fishing fleet in the river mouth, restaurants you'd actually book a table at, and accommodation that's easy to find outside the March folk-festival weekend. If you only have one night between Warrnambool and Nelson, this is the one.
Portland — the more workmanlike choice
Bigger town, more services, full supermarket and chemist if you've realised you forgot something. The gannet colony at Point Danger is on the way out of town and worth a stop in its own right. Less postcard, more practical.
Why Nelson is the reward at the end
Nelson is the end of the road in more than one sense. The population is around three hundred. The Glenelg meets the Southern Ocean here, and the South Australian border is a few minutes' drive west. There's no bypass and no through-traffic — you only end up in Nelson if you mean to.
That's the point of it. After three days of carparks and boardwalks and queues at the Apostles viewing platform, you arrive somewhere that has none of that. Most people who make it this far cruise the river before they turn back.
The cruise as the “arrived” experience
The cruise is what makes the trip make sense. After two or three days of driving — windows open, radio on, eyes on the next bend — two hours on glass-flat water with a thermos of tea is the right kind of ending.
The boat runs up into the limestone gorges, fifty metres high in places. Sea eagles patrol the cliffs. Pelicans loaf on the snags. Nobody is hurrying anywhere. You sit with the kettle on and watch the river go by, and at some point you realise this is what you actually came west for. The cruise line-up is here — most road-trippers slot in the two-hour scenic, but the longer lunch cruise is the right call if you've got the time.