December 8th Fun With Wildlife!

Good evening everyone!

Sorry for no blog yesterday, we were at sea, so nothing interesting to blog about. Except for dinner I did get to eat a little lobster looking thing (it looked like it should have been still alive), that was interesting. Also correction our dear sister from the Carolina's was from N. Carolina not south, she brought that too my attention (sorry about that ;-). but lets jump to the good stuff of today!

So today was an exciting day! We got to do our first excursion, where we got to see Koalas and Kangaroos in Melbourne Australia (actually west of the city about 45 minutes). We were on a bus with about 40 people. We drove to the You Yang national park. This was an exclusive tour not available to the general public; we were able to walk right into the wildlife sanctuaries!

First we went to the Koala area. Our tour guide Sarah told us there were 3 specialist looking for the Koalas and Kangaroos so we didn't have to. We got to see two Koalas in particular, a male and a female which were both high up in the trees. We caught them both sleeping (they sleep about 18 hours a day!) Sometimes they wake up during their sleep to groom themselves or to lap water off of the tree. They look pretty cute, but the guide said they make a terrible noise (didn't expect that). The females are usually smaller physically but their hair is more fluffy. (Can't really see the fluffiness because she was wet.) Very neat animals, check out the pictures.

After this we stopped for tea. I actually had a form of hot chocolate called Milo (pronounced Meelo), which was made of wheat and cocoa, it had almost a bitter taste, but still good.

Our next stop was the Kangaroo sanctuary. It wasn't much of an enclosed area with the 3' fences because a kangaroo can jump 10' high from a standing position. Another interesting fact, the top speed of the kangaroo allows it to jump in 30' increments, amazing! We all entered the big field and had to slowly and indirectly (in a big arc) walk towards the Kangaroos, making frequent stops when the kangaroos got on edge. Also our group of people had to stay close together so we posed only one threat to the Kangaroos. Sarah told us that the kangaroos have been caught and tagged for studies, so they are scared of groups of people that spread out. One other interesting fact, we often hear of Kangaroos boxing, and there is some truth to that. They don't actually box with their forearms, but they do jump back on their tail and begin to hit each other with their hind legs. This is the males when they fight for being the head of a mob (a group of Kangaroos). So anyways, We got soo close to them! We were only 30' away from the Kangaroos. I got some neat pics again, but I suspect Justin's camera got some better ones, lol (his camera is 7 megapixels not 4 like mine).

On our way back we got to see some Emus. We were able to get close to these too. They are a funny bird. Kind of like ostrich but their feather seemed heavier and bounced up and down when they trotted.

Other pictures included are a beautiful mountain from the kangaroo field, and a picture of Melbourne from the boat.

Well that will conclude my entry for today.

Have a g'day mates!

Dan