Hello all!! I'm so excited to be knee-deep in my Aussie trip planning. Hope the experts can shell some advice.

My friend and I will have 5 days, 4 nights in the Melbourne area. Our plan is:
MON - arrive and stay in Melbourne
TUES - hit the GOR first thing in morning, stay overnight on GOR
WED - GOR, then back to Melbourne that night
THURS - Melbourne touring
FRI - depart
Ideally, we would rent a car for only Tues and Wed.

1) Given those restrictions, any suggestions on the best place to stay overnight (Tues night) on GOR? I don't know if the sights going East to West are east-heavy (meaning we should stay in Apollo Bay) or west-heavy (meaning stay in Pt Campbell or Pt Fairy). Or, stay somewhere else?

2) We'll likely take the inland route back. Is it worth a stop at Ballarat on the way back?

3) We'd like to squeeze in a stop at Phillip Island to see the penguins, but not sure the best way. Options:
a) drive straight from GOR to Phillip Island on the way home (Wed evening)
b) cut time out of Melbourne city touring to see Phillip Island on Thurs evening (but would have to rent car again)
Not sure what the most efficient and economical use of time and resources is.

Thank you!!!!

PS - If nelsonian is around, I know you did GOR + Phillip Island back-to-back. Any specific insights on the drive connecting the two? (easy drive, how long did it take, etc)

Traffic will depend on when you are going? What month?

If you want to do both the GOR and Phillip Island I would suggest heading down to Phillip Island on the Tuesday. You could easily still spend a fair bit of the day having a look around Melbourne before heading off. Do the penguins that night and stay on the island.

First thing the next morning drive over to Sorrento on the Peninsula and take the car ferry across to Queenscliff. With a little bit of luck you will see some dolphins on the way. Queenscliff is a lovely litle town itself so you may like to spend an hour or two there itself depending on your timing. From there you head to Torquay and the GOR.

You could fit in the whole trip all the way through to Warrnambool on that day but it would mean pushing the pace somewhat and not too much lingering. You give no indication as to what time of the year you are travelling. If it is not during the holiday season I would be inclined to not book accommodation but just see how far you want to do that day. That way, if you have had enough driving you don't have to keep pushing onwards and you just simply finish the drive the next day.

Thursday morning finish off the drive (if needs be) and then head back inland from either Port Campbell or Warrnambool. At that stage you could then make the decision as to whether you still feel like including Ballarat or Grampians or just simply want to head back to Melbourne. To come straight back to Melbourne is only about 3 hours.

If you want to do Sovereign Hill you really need to be aiming to be in Ballarat by lunchtime to make it worthwhile and, of course, you would be cutting into your time of actually spending time in the city.

Hi again, we will be traveling in early Nov and partly aim to avoid the crowds at the Melbourne Cup by getting out to the GOR. Our Melbourne hotel is already booked for Monday night, but the rest is flexible. We'd like to allot 2 days to GOR and 2 for Melbourne City, and squeeze in the penguins either at the end of one of the Melbourne Days or at the end of day 2 of GOR. We're definitely doers, and have no problem pushing to do lots in a day, hopefully not at the expense of rushing though!

In terms of accommodation on the GOR, you certainly don't need to worry about pre-booking at the start of November. You will have no trouble finding a place which gives you quite a bit more flexibility as to how you want to pace the trip. There should be vacancies at all the main towns along the route.

The book-as-we go approach definitely appeals to me in terms of flexibility, but I also worry about affordability and how we wouldn't know rates walking into the most conveniently located establishment. I recognize that most B&Bs are of a certain minimum price range / caliber, but can anyone point me to specific B&Bs along the way that are generally just clean and friendly places to lay my head for the night? That way, if we have a short list of what's relatively economical then we can at least target certain towns/B&Bs even if we find ourselves ahead/behind schedule. Thanks!!