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We arranged a 3 day hire of a VW Polo and organised a ferry to Kangaroo Island from Adelaide. We were so excited as everyone says how amazing it is, and it truely is.
On our first day we saw so many animals. A list for you.
Kangaroos (obviously)
Wallabies (many species)
Echidnas
Sealions
Dolphins
On the ferry over, I happened to glance out the window and saw something moving in the sea, I took another look and there were 5 dolphins swimming by the side and chasing the ferry jumping up out of the water having fun. I loved it, so amazed, to think we went out in a boat in India searching for them and now I was looking at 5 upclose.
Driving off the ferry we wern't to sure on where to start so we went to the information centre first off, and luckily we were only the second people there, as while we were being served there were dozens waiting, and still arriving. The lady was so helpful. She basically highlighted all the things to do on day one, and then all the things to do on day two with another colour, she even found our accommodation and gave us the telephone to book with. With our itinary in hand we headed off.
We decided to head south first, where the lady instructed us to go, to Seal bay. Seal bay is where all the native wild sealions live, the largest colony of Australian sealions in the world. You can even take a tour on the beach right there with them.
It was fantastic, never experienced something that great before. With the tour fee (which was minimal) you can go down the boardwalk and watch the whole beach from there. That was great in itself. There was 3 sealions right next to the boardwalk and a pup suckling, and you could see a couple playing in and out of the water.
The tour was unbelievable, we walked down onto the beach with the guide. she pointed out an offspray (bird of prey) It was huge. she explained that today is what they called a closed beach! You cannot walk up and down as the sealions are scattered throughout, so when we got onto the beach we had to stay close and there were sealions surrounding us. They were so used to groups on the beach that they were totally at ease.
One amazing thing happened. One sealion actually came upto our group. The guide quickly moved some people out the way incase she wanted to go up into the dunes behind us. The adult female apparrently didnt want to go up the dunes but just to snifff the guides leg. The guide was amazed, she said she had never had an adult come upto anyone before. Pups often do being inquizative but never adults. The adult decided to move on and and walked, well plodded, upto a girl in the group who was scared and acked off, but the guide kept telling her to stay still. After a while the sealion decided to wonder off. It was so amzing, just half a metre away from us. We just thought the experience of seal bay was worth the whole trip to kangaroo island!
We next stopped at some sand dunes called little sahara, Richard refused to walk up them as they seemed steep, i just wanted to run down them, but i wasn't doing that trek alone, so we basically turned around and went back to the car.
Kangaroo Island is known and visited for it's wildlife. You see most on the side of the roads, or even right in the midle of the roads as theyve been freshly killed, when we hired the car the woman begged us not to drive at night as we would most definatly hit something, and just to be careful during the day too. You cannot drive a couple of metres without seeing some kind of road kill and after experiencing kangaroos jump out onto the roads while having our van, we did not want any accidents.
Never did we think we would see an echidna, they are so cute.We spotted 2 just along the side of the roads. The first, we stopped and got out to take a better look, and a tour bus behind us thought 'Hey what have they spotted' so they pulled up behind us and all the people got out to take a look and photograph it. Good job we stopped hey!
The next time we stopped was at a field full of Australian geese which made the weirdest sound, and a couple of kangaroos were in the middle of the field. there was a family on the field already taking pictures, so we decided to follow and go onto the field. It was a joey and kangaroo, a little timid, but the surrouding scenery with the geeses and bush, and even a gorgeous rainbow in the background just set the scene.
We carried on into the carark of the closed national park information centre to see a kangaroo slowly making its way across the road. I got out to take a picture and it hopped right upto me. I was taken aback, I did not expect it to come bounding for me, so I screamed and ran back into the car. Males cant be trusted so I just didnt want to chance it. It just stopped at the window and looked up at me with huge watery eyes. Didnt move or anything. Richard got out the drivers seat and went round the car to get a closer look, and i felt trapped in the car, but eventually trusted it and squeezed out the door. Another one came over a younger smaller one, and as we drove slowly off we spotted another and as we were driving it came bounding over to us. We couldnt believe how docile and inquizative they were, we didnt have a chose but to stop again, and as we stopped, they other two from before came over to us! So here we were surrounded by kangaroos. All they did was look up at us and stared. I stroked one of them and it didnt seem to bothered, we had to be so careful driving off as they were literally all around the car. It was so surreal.
Our accomodation we stayed in on the first night was amazing. Its right on the outskirts of the national park and its called Flinder chase farm accommodation. Its a real nice place, has a living/dining area with sifas/chairs, a dining table and a log fire. Richard was so excited about this, he started making it straight away. There were 4 bedrooms with 2/3 bunks in each, ours had 2 but there were only 2 other people in the whole place and they were were lthe other side of the house. The kitchen area was outside but again sooo nice, theres been a lot of effort but into the accommodation, theres even a garden in each bathroom facilities which i found very bizarre. Richard couldnt get the fire going, so i had to change roles, and he took over cooking, while I made the fire.
We were speaking to the other 2 people and they said to go outside with the torch and we would see so much wildlife. we stepped out the kitchen and you could hear all the animals in the bushes.
we shone the torch and we must have seen 10 wallabies, and later on we spotted a huge kangaroo. It must have been a red! It was massive. We just sat out in the dark with the torch watching all the animals forage for food and hopping about.
The next day was just as amazing. First off we went to Flinders Chase national park, and vistited the Remarkable rocks. Quite a Apt name, it's a hill of granite, much of it cracked fissured into weird and wonderful shapes. Next up was Admirals arch, beautifully eroded in a similar style to some of the great ocean road. The main attraction though is the colony of seals that live there. This was nothing like the sealion experience though. We could see the seals via a long boardwalk, but never got very close to them. still worthwhile though. They were playing in pools of water and swimming in a group out in the sea.
Now we had to travel halfway across the island on dirt roads to Pauls place. It would have been worth going 10 times that distance though- what a bizarre but amazing experience we were to have.
We were quite confused as the leaflet said there were tours of the wildlife sanctuary at 12 and 1. We arrived at 12.30 but Paul called us through to join the current tour. Turned out there wasn't one at 1, don't know why, but we were there nearly 2 hours. As we walked through the gate we were greeted by an utterly bizarre scene: About 10 tourists feeding about 6 kangaroos, 3 sheep, 20 chickens, 10 ducks, and an Alpaca! To top it off, Paul shoved a kangaroo into my arms and got me to bottle feed it milk! Surreal. We all fed the animals. The 'roos were so gorgeous, we were feeding them grain. One of them was putting their hand on Richards hands whilst eating from them, as if to keep it there whilst it took a mouthful an chew on it for 2 to 3 minutes. They stare up at you with big wet eyesm they were the cutest animals, and it's something you could never (or should never) do to a wild one.
we moved to another area, There were more of the same animals, plus emus, and randomly, a young deer. Feeding emus by hands looks painful, Richard tried several times and managed alright, whilst I held out a hand of grain and before they even peck me I throw it into the air! Not on purpose,. it was just a reflex!
After this we entered an enclosed area with small Tamar wallabies and ..... Koalas. Paul got one down from a tree and we all took it in turns to hold and cuddle it. The kangaroos title of cuteness had been usurped! He was so lovely.They're becoming rare on the mainland but on Kangaroo Island there are too many of them!
Next Paul lined an old english guy up by the fence, then shouted that there was a 'Pommie' for dinner. Suddenly, up pops this emu's head over the fence, and paul put a pile of grain on the guys head- and the emu starts pecking away at the guys head! But then he got another guy upto do it. (hehehe) Right.... I kindly volunteered Richard for the experience. He was not happy, but the other guys had no hair but Richard had plenty so i figured it wouldn't hurt half as much as it did for them. It was so funny. If you havent seen it already theres a video in the video section of this site. if you have seen it, now you understand what was going on!
We then saw a sheep being sheared before he got the carpet python out. It was big and as i have worked with them in the past so I didn't mind holding them. They are constrictors which mean they don't have any venom, but when it was richards turn (after telling me he wanted to hold it) he ran away. It wasn't as bad as he thought he just doesnt see why people want to hold them, and the snake is probably wrapped around groups of people everyday so it must be quite docile. The whole thing was great, such an amazing experience for only a fiver!!!
We made our way back to the main 'town' of Kigscote. On the way, again along the dirt roads i couldn't believe the sheer number of dead animals, every 5ft or so. At Kingscote we checked into the hostel, and seeing as we hadn't eaten a bite all day tucked into gorgeous fish and chips. We wondered down to the pier to watch the pelican feeding. this was good, got right up close to them (got whacked by wings a few times). Later we went for a night time penguin walk. They were fairy penguins and we saw lots on the harbour rocks or going into their nests, even one in the water. so all in all a Great trip.
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