Melbourne, Day Off:1: Woken by points of light through the blinds at about 9am. Gradual consciousness. Wanyi noted that the drive to Apollo Bay to buy Scallop Pies would take 3.5 hours rather than the 2 hours I estimated. I thought everything in Victoria was 2 hours away. So we had to speed up into full consciousness. 2: Left home at 11am, across the city, then down the M1 West. Stopped and ate Hungry Jack emergency food at a petrol place. Took a left turn to the Otways Mountains somewhere and stopped for a cigarette and for daughter to be photoed doing a star jump in the middle of the road. 3: The Otways are tall and very beautiful mountains and forest and the narrow road along the high ridge was a perfect place for both terror and vomiting. 4: Exited the Otways down on Wild Dog Creek Road and joined the Great Ocean Road. 5: Found Apollo Bay and the Scallop Pie Shop. $12 each now, so bought 6. 6: Put on big coats and the 3 of us wandered along the massive empty beach looking with wonder at the Great Ocean. Beautiful. Sun comes through the mire of the sky and in the breaking blue pristine waves are shards of crystal whiteness lit by Mother Sun. 7: Watched with wonder as some girl went out to the near horizon on a surfboard. 8: Spent an hour in the freezing beachside wonder. 9: Drove back along the Great Ocean Road noting that it wasn't a Short Ocean Road nor a Wide Ocean Road but rather a Long and Winding Vomiting Type of Great Ocean Road. 10: Turned inland at Lorne to get just get away from the Fucking Great Ocean and its Road and got nauseous going up through the wonderful forests. 11: Emerged back on the M1 at Winchelsea and went flat out to Melbourne. 12: Mrs Fitz and Daughter having running arguments regarding navigation as I just drove along. 13: Arrived in Glen Waverley, which was wrong, and then tooled the car to Box Hill and arrived sitting down to dinner at 7.45pm. 14: Then came the Sichuan food. Daughter, sitting down first, possessed the menu and wrote down what we wanted, then Wanyi jotted down a few items. 15: then there came The Enlightenment as to why folk like Sichuan Food. We each had our own boiling soup, mine with pork bones and lotus root, and we sat bits of food, abalone, prawn, wagyu beef, pig stomach, and pig vocal chords, pig's blood, tofu skin, cabbage, coriander and whatever that was, into the soup then fished it out and put it in the bowl with the sesame seed oil, the chilli oil, the whatever it was...and we became fixed in passionate composition...3 great white sharks consuming everything in a blizzard of tastes and smells. 16: Then we drove 5 minutes home. 17: Best day Mrs Fitz has had for years, including the nausea. Tianshu was happy. I was happy, though tired of driving. 18: Fell asleep by points of lights through the blind. We don't go out much or often. Incidentally, the Scallop Pies, that used to cost $10 2 years ago now cost $12 each. At $10 2 years ago they were stuffed with fresh salty sea scallops and well worth $15. Now, in 2018, at $12 a pop, they were just as fresh and sea salted, but there were fewer of them in each pie, so worth around $10. 18: Will we go back? Will we venture along the Great Ocean Road again? Nope. Never. At the same time, we had a wondrous day and Wanyi had a great, magnificent and unforgettable birthday. We will look for somewhere else to go to next year, just 2 hours away. My favourite moments: Saying "Wow! Isn't that amazing!?" John exclaims. Looks around, Mrs Fitz and Daughter, studying their phones. 7 hours later...someone says "Wow!"