One thing that I’ve loved during our time in Australia is how we’ve found such great experiences in the most unexpected places. Sometimes it’s the people that we’ve met, sometimes it’s a great hike that we never planned on taking or sometimes it’s just a hidden gem with amazing food.
We stumbled on the aptly named Wye River General Store in Wye River one day when we were starving and way overdue for a lunch stop on the Great Ocean Road. It was basically the only place in town to get any food and it didn’t look like very much from the outside to be honest. Our plan was just to go in and get some snacks to hold us over until the next decent sized town where we could find a restaurant.
It was such a great little place to discover. They have part of store that is a small market and then the other half is a little café. We walked in from the blustery day and they had a wood-burning fireplace going and it smelled amazing! We ended up ordering lunch there and sat on the glassed-in patio. There was a playground right next door, so we could sit and watch Jack burn off some energy while we waited for our lunch.
Jack was loving the play break so much that Matt and I decided to enjoy a local microbrew from Forrest Brewing Co. with our dessert after lunch! Because, really, why rush?! As a side note, we actually visited the brewery on our way back to Melbourne and it’s a great little spot as well!
The guy working there was great and gave us a lot of great recommendations on where we should stop along the way and some lesser known sights we should check out. He even packed us a small bag of treats on the house before we left for the rest of our drive.
It’s so fun discovering places like this when you go in with low expectations and are wowed by the great experience and the generosity of complete strangers.
The Detour Diary 