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Monday 3rd September up at 5am to start our journey to Phillip Island, 5.30am we left our nice, warm, cosy flat and walked up to Bondi Junction for our 6am bus to Sydney airport, about an hour journey. Checked in no problems and headed through security into departure gates straight away for our McD breakie. Our flight to Melbourne was 9am and overall flight time was just over an hour, the views down were amazing of Sydney and the snowy mountains on our way to Melbourne. We arrived and walked to the littlest arrival room ever by 10.30am. We aimed straight for the airbus stand just up the road and caught bus out to Southern Cross in Melbourne a short 20 minute journey. The airbus runs every 20 mins and costs $28 return so we were happy. Got to Southern Cross and booked train tickets to Frankston, we had researched our journey the night before as Phillip Island is good few hours from Melbourne and quite tricky to get too, we even called our hotel reception for guidance which was bit pants in all honesty. Gary found a route in which consisted of a ferry journey so we were game with that. We had 10 minutes before our train to Frankston departed Southern Cross in which we managed to rush to Hungry Jacks for dinner on the train (there is always time for food). The journey took about an hour and half to Frankston, good way to see some of Melbourne, passing by the stadium grounds and various suburbs. Frankston is lovely seaside town, unfortunately we hit our first bump our next train was not for 2 hours, the weather was so hot and well we just wanted to get to hotel asap. I was planning tocatch penguin parade tonight as well as tomorrow, make the most of our trip. We ventured out the train station and found out that there was a bus to our next place Stony Point in 15 minutes so we waited for that as much sooner than our train. The journey went to very small towns out and about and finally after another hour we got to Crib Point and walked the further 2km to Stony Point for our ferry ride. Stony Point was really nice fishing harbour with a very small beach, there was a small cafe which sold tickets for ferries, but was closed for 10 or so minutes for a break so we checked out the timetable, ferries to Phillip Island run 99am - 5pm everyday and takes 30 minutes, it was 2.30pm so we guessed we had half an hour to chill, get our tickets and walk up the harbour to ferry port. As soon as the cafe opened Gary left me with the bags ad went to buy our tickets, however, he came back with some terrible news, the timetable actually means the ferries are 9am and 5pm no ferries inbetween so in actual fact with had 2 and half hours to wait and would miss the penguin parade that night :( we were gutted. We tried to make the most of our time, went for very short walk around the area, we were lucky enough to see pelicans, a seal and some funky fish (shark!) being caught. We had nice cuppa from the cafe and enjoyed a chill. At 5pm we finally got on the ferry to Phillip Island which took 30 minutes as stated, when we got off at Phillip Island I couldn't believe the size and the non island feel of the island. We set off from the harbour up Cowes' main street which is islands main town, which consisted of a Coles and Woolworths supermarkets, various shops, bakers and restaurants. We walked up into the island for 40 minutes to our hotel. We bought our hotel stay on Scoopon, a cheap two night deal at Ramada Resort. However, a lack of research let us down yet again as the hotel was actual Centre-Parc like resort, it was now nearly 7pm and reception was closed, there was a phone to call for a safe number and inside the safe was our key and map of the resort which was massive. We walked to our lodge, a spa studio which was lovely, dropped our bags and headed to the spa which closed in next hour or so. Following our unluckiness the spa was closed for cleaning maintenance and the restaurant on the resort was closed through week days there was a pizzeria but as people may know about me I don't really eat pizza so again we were a little disappointed. Deciding to make most of the night, we headed back to the lodge, got dressed up, had what happened to be a lovely pizza and bottle of wine in the restaurant. There had no puddings but the friendly waiter nipped across to closed restaurant and got some choc cake and ice cream for us, score! We went home, opened our free bottle of wine in the lodge and enjoyed our spa bath with choc pudding, ice cream, wine and lots of bubbles.....bliss. The bed was so comfy we slept great after our long day, took 12 hours to get from Sydney to Phillip Island!! Bless Gary, he got woken up nice and early. With jet lag from my home trip I was wide awake at 5am so excited to be on Phillip Island I used my phone to research the island, find information about pengiun tickets, bike hire and things to do on the island. By 6am I was starving and thought I would get up and dressed and go for a walk to stop disturbing Gary, however, I did disturb Gary and he decided he quite fancied an early morning stroll with me around the resort as it was starting to get light, so together we went out and it was great. We found a separate spa area called the Club, had an outdoor pool and lounge area with hot tub, an indoor sauna and heated pool. In the main area where the pizza restaurant is, there is the Numbers restaurant (main one that is closed throughout the week), there is indoor game room and an outdoor play area for kids and also a health room with a gym, outdoor pool and inside giant hot tub and sauna. So we weren't sure what the club area was, we assume its for VIP guests or something as it was a lot more fancy than the more public main area. We walked around the resort nosed around the other lodges, the place was a ghost town, obviously not a busy resort out of season, the amount of wildlife in the resort or on the island was awesome. We saw possums, rabbits, geese, crazy birds we hadn't seen before, lorikeets and lovely sun rise. After our walk we chilled on our decking and had a cuppa on our gas cooker kettle and talked about our plans. First thing we noticed about the island is that it is definitely a car place, the island is 27km by 9km and the attractions are far apart from one another and not much in between them. Not doing well with our research we failed to look at the size of the island, thinking it would just be small enough to walk around, neither of us had our license details on us (the counterpart anyway) so we figured we would hire a bike. As soon as it was 8am we walked to reception to find out more info and get a taxi into town to visit the tourist information. We found out with the main spa area closed for maintenance we were allowed to us the club spa and the lady on reception gave us the code for the door so we were happy there. The taxi into Cowes town was $10, the driver was very informative and the car stunk of eucalyptus which at first was nice, rather strange and very strong. The ladies at tourist information were so canny, a little like tweedle dumb and tweedle dee both volunteers and so booking our penguin parade tickets and shuttle took about half an hour, an error with the card machine in which Gary fixed for them haha. We were happy though, we bought Penguin Plus a slightly more expensive exclusive ticket for the parade costing $44 each and a shuttle that would pick us up from the hotel to the parade and back for $15 each sweet!! Afterwards, we walked further into town to find the bike hire shop, it was closed the lady from shop next door said he is known for running late so we headed across the road for breakie, place called Gullivers, great menu and cosy lodge fire. Thought we would fuel up for the day which will be full of bike riding yum yum. 10am we headed back over to bike shop to see a note had been put up closed today. Unamused we headed back to tourist info so see what other bike hire places there was, to find none! So we thought we'd give car rental a shot even without counterparts but all rentals were out and we had to be 25 of which of course we are 24. b*****! Next idea, kayak hiring, it was lovely day so set out again along the Esplanade in search for the one boat hire place on the island, after and hour we decided to call up and the guy was not very helpful and basically said you have to book and wasn't interested in bookings today, so we walked along Cowes Beach, lovely white sand, clear waters and though right lets get taxi to South of the island, we had read that the beaches over that side were wild, fun and where the surfers hang out. Taxi cost us $20 and well although the views were stunning the beaches weren't much fun, all rocks. The waves were awesome and the surfers were out but swimming was not an option, neither was a stroll along the beaches as the tide was in. We walked along the beaches up back on the roads and enjoyed looking at the houses and views, there was a beach called Sunderland Bay that amused us for all of 2 seconds. After a hot, sweaty and slightly annoying half hour we called a taxi to take us back to our hotel, we waited on the end of a busy fast road for 20 mins no taxi, called again told us another 15 mins we were fed up, very hot in the sun and disappointed that our day on the island was not going so well. We needed a car. Having a few huffs and puffs at one another in our self annoyance at not researching our trip better, a very nice man offered us a ride to outside our hotel resort, phew. Our resort was opposite a wildlife centre which we were tempted to check out as something to do but it seemed very odd to have a small wildlife centre full of animals that were already wild on the island. Moving on, we headed to the club at our resort and chilled on the loungers by the outside pool, unfortunately the pool was icy cold, we still enjoyed a nice chill listening to music and feeling the sun on us. There was a strong breeze coming every now and then which interrupted our chill and after a small while we opted for the outside hot tub which in fact was not hot more lukewarm at 34 degrees in the shade with a breeze, not the best but we enjoyed it nonetheless. Around 4pm we went home to our lodge, showered and dressed for our shuttle to Penguin Parade at 5pm, having a cheeky glass of wine on our decking. There was not enough people for a shuttle bus so we had own personal taxi service to the parade around 14km away from the hotel. There is a big building for the parade, had restaurant, shops, information which was cool, Gary bought me some lovely presents at the shop before we headed out to our stand. The penguin plus stand was to the right of the normal stand, only holds 190 people where the main stand can hold up to 3,000 people! We were so lucky we had a gorgeous night, the sunset down behind the beach was amazing and the night was so clear that thousand stars light the night. We waited for an hour or so until the sun was well and truly gone and the surf was barely visible for the little guys to appear and when they did all anyone could say was AHHHHHH THEY ARE SO SMALL, hundreds upon hundreds waddled out of the surf, in small groups, all you could see was silver shimmers moving in the distance, then they reach the rocks of the beach which takes their little bodies forever to climb over, so cute. Eventually, they made it past the rocks and up a little sand dune, where they seemed to stop for a breather. It is important they move in numbers and wait in the sea until its dark as predatory birds survey the beach awaiting their arrival. The actual journey across the beach is a fair distance and takes a lot of energy for these penguins so once clear of the beach, they take a break. Our stand was perfect as 60-70% of the Little Penguins made their way over to our stand, on top of this sand dune, some went for the drop and a lot of them seemed scared and anxious. Once the first group started taking the plunge we headed down the stairs to the broadwalk we had walked up to the stand to watch the penguins waddle their way to their burrows. You could hear the chicks screaming for food and it was great to see the penguins so up close, see them figure out their way home. After we watched group after group making their way home we headed back to the stand and watched as more and more groups headed out onto the beach. By this time there was a big group of penguins not daring enough to take the plunge from sand dune to water, as the next wave of penguins came there was a lot of noise and all of a sudden a rush of penguins flooded into the waters, the most recent group maybe older and wiser rammed into the scared penguins and knocked the majority into the water, it was very funny to see and good for the dudes as they made it passed the dreaded sand dune haha. I could have stayed there all night. We arrived at 5.15pm the penguins arrived around 6.35pm and our taxi ride home was 7.30pm, I didnt want to leave as the penguins were still waddling there way from sea to burrows by 7.40pm all the people were starting to leave and the workers were encouraging us to leave. Gary went ahead of me to grab our free hot drinks which came with the Penguin Plus, while I slowly made my way up to the centre towards our taxi ride, on my way I witnessed penguin mating, penguin chicks and moulting penguins, it was such an amazing experience I am so delighted we could finally experience it at least once but would have been magical if we could have experienced it twice, damn ferries!! The taxi driver was not too impressed we were 15 or so minutes late but to be honest I wasn't going to miss out on that time with the penguins, the penguins arrived much later than planned so I didnt really mind. This was our first taxi ride on the island were we weren't given a guide tour on what we were passing so we were worried we had upset all the 4 taxi drivers on the island, all of which by the way know Gary's name and stink their rides out with over strongly Eucalyptus. We kindly asked whether he could drop us off in Cowes town for food instead of the resort, think we pushed our luck a little but he dropped us off nearby, we didn't even get a goodbye, ooopsie. We headed to a busy bar called Hotel for tea was very yummy, but we were pretty tired so didn't stay out long. Decided to pop to the Coles and grab some breakie ingredients before getting taxi home. For such a ghost town of an island it amazed us that we always had to wait 15-20 mins for a taxi, the island isn't that big. We finished off our bottle of wine in the room, chilling to the music channel before sleep got the better of us, me sooner, unfortunately for Gary. The next morning, we decided that if we woke up early we would get taxi to Nobbies, a coastal walkway at the south west end of the island, if not we would chill. We woke up early but weather was evil, near hurricane levels so we chilled in bed, I made us breakfast and we made most of our late check out option with our hotel package and enjoyed the massive hot tub which was now available to use, however, the island as losing power due to the high winds so the tub was still not hot, the jets didn't work and the sauna wasn't working without power, but we enjoyed our chill, packing and leaving the resort at 12pm. We got taxi down to Cowes town, had cuppa and snacks in Gullivers with log fire before our bus to Melbourne at 2pm. Whilst in tourist info yesterday we found a bus timetable of a bus that runs daily from Southern Cross to Phillip Island only takes 2 and half hours, so wish we knew that before coming!!! Although we wouldn't have seen Frankston, Stony Point or got a ferry to Phillip Island. At 2pm we caught the bus costing only $11 each, we popped to bakers beforehand got some lovely homemade fudge for our trip. The bus left island on small bridge linking to mainland, Phillip Island just felt like an extension of mainland wasn't much different, didn't feel like an island as such. There was two big supermarkets, industrial factories, lots of housing estates, shops everything really. From Southern Cross we got the airbus back to Melbourne airport. The departures area wasn't much bigger than the arrivals but we were able to get beers to celebrate the ending of our getaway :) Our flight was 5.50pm and we got back to Sydney 7.30pm, the flight home was interesting as we got talking about things we wanted to do, places we wanted to go, trying to figure things out, kinda lead to a very quiet flight home as we got snapping and disagreed hahaha but made up with a McDs in Sydney airport waiting for bus to Junction. We had an awesome getaway, lessons were learnt, research where you are going and plan ahead!!! The resort was lovely, would be great to see in season when busier and everything is open and the penguins were magical. The locals or people living on island where very friendly and informative but slightly strange, robotic almost, like they went to tourism only school are very good guides to the island but lack in normal human conversation or any type of humour. Finally to finish off our weekend we had an awesome burger at a place I have passed before, Burger Crave nom nom nom!
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