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On Sunday 3rd February we were up and out of the YHA early for our Kangaroo Island trip! We were picked up from the hostel and taken to the Cape Jervis ferry terminal at 7am. The local taxi company took us and two Swiss ladies down to the terminal with the price included in the tour and once at the ferry terminal, we boarded the ferry leaving 9am. It was quite a grey day so far but the 45 min ferry ride was nice and smooth journey and we enjoyed a cuppa on board. As we approached KI we could see a group of tour buses including our Adventure Tours parked in the car park so once we disembarked the ferry we walked over to a lady waiting outside the tour bus gave over our names and met our tour guide named Jenny, best name in the world :) Threw our big bags into the trailer and chose back seats on the bus and awaited everyone else to hop on to start our KI adventure, yay so exciting. There was 19 of us in total only a small coach which was nice feels more personal and cosier when only a smaller group than a big coach load. There was 4 English in total including us two, a French family of 3, 2 Swedish and all the rest were Swiss, a lot of Swiss around and the two in our taxi this morning to the ferry port were not on our tour! Jenny talked all the time she drove haha full of facts, information and knowledge of the Island and she also had a sense of humour which is always good. The ferry terminal is in Penneshaw, east of the Island and our first stop was Rob's Sheep Shearing where Rob gave us a presentation of sheep shearing. We watched his two sheep dogs round the sheep, he also had a cute little pup dog :D Once the sheep were inside the shed, he chose one and shaved him naked. It was interesting to watch and listen to Rob and we will definitely think more about the process undertaken when next purchasing wool items. It took us around half an hour to drive to Rob's and we were there for 45 mins or so before moving on to Penington Bay, just a quick stop for photos, gorgeous beach very quiet and relaxing area. Emu Ridge Distillery was our next stop we watched a little video about how Eucalyptus oil is made and the history of the company itself. Afterwards we got to look around the shop there, there was also wine tasting which we sampled some of and we also had our dinner here. Chilling on a decked outside area Jen had prepared our lunch like a subway so you chose your bread, your filling, salad etc there was juice, biscuits and fruit too very nice. At the distillery they also had one Emu called Psycho apparently a very angry b****y bird who killed her two mates!!! We bought some of the Eucalyptus oil as its good for all kind of things like colds, coughs, cuts, skin conditions and so on.
Back on the bus we drove another half hour heading further South until we got to Seal Bay. Here we were given 30 minutes with a tour guide and were able to walk along the beach with Australian Sea Lions :) we were able to get really close and there was so many, it was great to learn about the Sea Lions although without going into to much details there are much like most animals dying out and well they are not evolving well rather like the Giant Panda, an evolutionary dead end as I would say. We did get to see some pups too playing in the water and with other pups on the beach while the adults were napping enjoying some free time. The females are preggers for 18 months!!!!! Once that pup is born within 5-10 days she mates again and falls pregnant so basically the females are always pregnant. When the pups are born they also have to be shown everything from learning to swim, turning left and right in the water to catching food and kept away from the males as they will either crush them if the pups get in the way or will kill them as they have no care for their young which doesn't help when your species numbers are low! It was a great experience and we must have hundreds of photos of these gorgeous Sea Lions.
Another hour south of the bus got us to Little Sahara an unexplained desert area with huge mass of sand dunes, pure white sand dunes at that, a little life mystery to the island and totally awesome for sand boarding. Jen had boards in the trailer and so we enjoyed the sand dunes for good half hour before we were all too knackered from climbing up the big dunes. We got sand everywhere in every possible cavity in the body and yeah especially up ya bot. It was 4pm by the time we hopped back on the bus, Jen still filling us in on Island information as she drives, info on the wildlife, the Aboriginal stories of the island and also the people living on island past and present. There is only 4,300 people live on the island which is 155km long, it is very expensive to live on the island as everything is imported from mainland including electricity, food and other supplies. There is also no water supply so everyone counted on rainwater. The only way to cross from the Island to mainland is on the Sealink ferry which is pricey especially to take your own car on and then from there its a good 2 hour drive to Adelaide or 45 minutes to Victor Harbor. The island is very quiet, relaxing but there is not many job opportunities, McDonalds or any other fast food joints are not allowed on the island, neither is there a Coles or Woolworths supermarket. Very selective clothes shops, food stores and also the cost of fuel is very expensive on the island. Anyway, after our fun on the sand dunes we drove a further hour or so to our accommodation Vivonne Guest House, where there is a big outside and inside decking area, small bar, kayaking, bikes, table tennis, darts, pool, common room you name it there and free (well not the drinks at the bar). There is huge amounts of land too so it was a remote place but only 1km away from Vivonne Bay which was voted Australia's best beach 3 years in a row since 2009. On the grass area there was Kanagroo Island Kangaroo's, the island have unique Kangaroo's and weren't too creative when it came to naming them but yes there was plenty of them to see, we even experienced Kangaroo porn on the grass which went on for over an hour!! Only on the island and in our area there was Tamar Wallabies, very cute.
We had around 2 hours of free time so Gary and me first grabbed some kayaks and went along the Hudson river gorgeous so relaxing and quiet and special as we got to see a koala in a tree and a kangaroo hopping along the water edge, unreal experience. After an hour or so of kayaking fun we returned and headed out on a bike ride to the beach, little walk along the beach and splash in the water before cycling back, showering, changing and chilling with everyone outside with a beer ahhhh. Exciting, awesome and fun packed day and it wasn't finished. At 7.45pm our tea was ready, Jen had been busy cooking on the BBQ outside and we had a feast of steak, sausages, chicken, veg and even apple crumble for pud! After we cleaned our plates and tided up a few of us headed back on the bus for a penguin tour at 9pm we drove to Port Ellen in Vivonne Bay and Jen guided us with torches along the shore front where we spotted two Little Penguins. One was standing round outside his burrow and we could see him so clearly it was amazing, unfortunately much like Granite Island the Little Penguins numbers are drastically declining :( Gary and me had game of darts before heading to bed for the night. We were in an 8 bed dorm with others on the tour but the room was lovely and beds very nice and cosy ZZZZzzzzzzzz.
The second and last day of our trip on KI we were up at 6.30am showered, dressed and breakie in our tummys on the bus for 7.15am ready for the busy day ahead. Breakie was cereal, toast, juice and fruit yum yum with tea of course. First stop was Hanson Wildlife Sanctuary, all the wildlife here are still wild and are free to come and go as they please. We walked along the forest walk and saw around 10 koalas up in the trees so cute, surprisingly hard to see in the trees, they camouflage so well. We also saw more kangaroo's, wallabies and some bird wildlife was really nice morning stroll. We drove further south of the island into Flinders Chase National Park, named after the English explorer Matt Flinders who first discovered K.I and Chase, a Scottish term, as a remembrance to the efforts of a Scotsman who fought for a long time with the South Australian Government to protect Kangaroo Island and make the area a national park. The park covers 213km of land and is primarily a sanctuary for Endangered species and home to a few geological wonders such as Remarkable Rocks and Admirable Arch. Along the 2 hour drive through the National Park to Cape de Couedic South West of the Island Jen filled us in on certain fauna and flora in the National Park and also the aboriginal stories of Kangaroo Island.
Years and years ago and to this day Aboriginal people from all over Australia will not speak of or visit Kangaroo Island, although back 19,000 years ago they did once visited the land, no one knows if they lived or what they did on the land as they have not found any settlements or markings on the Island. However, we do know that the Aboriginal call the Island 'Karta' which translates to 'Island of the Dead' due to a story about a creator of the Southern Coast tribe and his two wives. The creator of the Aborigines of the Southern Coast was believed to have 2 wives, sisters to one another, of which he went travelling throughout the Southern State. The wives grew very tired of travelling and wanted to return back to their families and friends in the group. The two wives disobeyed the creator, a forbidden action, and ran away from him. The creator was very upset and annoyed and hunted them down. As he arrived in Cape Jervis he saw his two wives in the swallow waters which divided the island to the mainland. He was determined to punish his wives and angrily ordered water to rise up and drown them. The wives tried frantically to swim against the tidal wave but they were powerless and drowned. Once this happened the creator felt very lonely when he was travelling and whenever he rested he could hear howls in the wind which he believed was the screams of his wives fighting against the wave. In the end the creator could not cope with this guilt and noise of his wives and jumped off a cliff. In all Aboriginal tribes once someone has died you are no longer allowed to either speak their name or talk of the individual and so because of this story because the two wives were killed and also the creator, KI is known as 'Karta, Island of the Dead', as they believe if they were to visit the island they would also hear the screams of the wives. I find all the Aboriginal stories very interesting, we have been learning a lot of these type stories in KI. Another belief they have which I quite like is once a spirit has gone they become a star in the sky and that is why there is so many stars in the Southern Hemisphere.
Anyway moving on, next stop on the trip was the Remarkable Rocks a natural wonder of rock's risen from the sea and formed in an interesting manner. We walked along a boardwalk to the rocks and enjoyed walking around, taking photos and appreciating such marvels. Cape de Couedic was next stop just a bit further west and south of the Island, we walked down a broadwalk to see rocks full of New Zealand Fur Seals chilling on the rocks, these were very smelly, big and dark in colour compared to the Australia Sea Lions, also another comparison is that the New Zealand Fur Seals numbers are exploding in various colonies along the Southern waters of Australia, something in which is largely blamed for the declining Little Penguin numbers. Also here is Admirable Arch another world wonder and stunning area where land had eroded underneath and the tree trunks above stagger the ceiling of the arch. There is also two islands of the coast here and a lighthouse, a very handsome one too. Afterwards we drove back through Flinders Chase NP to the Visitor Centre where we could read up more about the National Park, Aboriginal stories and wildlife, we also had lunch here in an outdoor picnic area lovely chicken kebab wraps yum.
Next stop was over an hour drive back North of the island to Hanson Bay of which Jen thought was one of the best beach on the island and recommended a swim. We had an hour or so to just chill here so Gary and me got our swim stuff out and headed down and indeed it was a gorgeous beach pure white sands, aquamarine colour sea so so so clear it was bloody cold but lovely and refreshing once in. We noticed a strong rip in the water straight away we were getting pulled to the reef. The swimming area was only narrow big rock area one side and rocky reef the other side. Over the big rock area was a huge bay ideal for surfing, no one else was so interested in the swimming just us and an older couple and after a few minutes of being in the sea the older couple were struggling. At first I asked Gary to go and check on the lady as I heard him tell her that she needed to move away from the rocks but when he went over they didn't seem to be swimming away. It was clear to see after Gary went over they needed help so I went over and I took over helping the lady while Gary swam out to the man as he was now way way out. Eventually got the lady onto the beach and asked a few girls and a guy around for help with the man as I am not a very strong swimmer in the sea but no-one was diving in to help so I went over and then a young guy also swam out and the three of us together managed to get him also safely onto the beach was a very scary 10-15 minutes but everyone was safe and sound with just a few scratches here and there from the reef phew! After that excitement Gary and me went for walk along the beach to calm down and chill out before getting back on the bus. We drove through the main town on the island called Kingscote only very small if you blinked you would miss it but was good to see it we didn't get out of the bus, Jen just drove us round. Just up the road we stopped off at Island Beehive for some honey ice cream yum yum before heading to American River to see some Pelicans :) It quickly came round to 6pm and Jen dropped us off in Penneshaw which is the small area where the ferry terminal is on the island and we could go for food or walk around for our last hour or so. Gary and me opted for fish and chips and chilled on picnic bench by the sea and enjoyed them before ferry at 7pm. Ferry ride back to mainland was as nice as our journey going and we got another cuppa. We did venture out onto the deck on the way back to see if we could see dolphins as Jen had said we might and also to take photos. It was a lovely night we got to see the sunset behind the island as we approached mainland. Our taxi was awaiting for us to drive us back to Port Elliot and another English guy joined us in the cab for a ride to Victor. Once back at the YHA we sorted our bags, uploaded the photos, talked to home etc. There was no phone signal on the island and we couldn't get online so had missed texting home and friends so was nice to catch up on all those kinda things chilling for our last night in Port Elliot YHA and in South Australia.
We had an awesome trip thank you Mam and Dad for buying us this for Christmas present one of my best pressies yet if not the best!!! We loved Kangaroo Island and would definitely recommend people to go especially if you haven't before. We fitted so much into our 2 days but there was so much more to see and do, a great island.
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