Thursday, 29 December 2011

Heading back from Victor Harbour


Some terrific views on the way back from Kangaroo Island via the main highway this time not the back roads! Heading for Gawler where we plan to rest up for a bit ready to begin the trek homeward.



Not much to see except more green hills, more vinyards, lots of traffic, but behind our caravan park a tranquil little paradise. We also got to catch up with the Schonig kids (all grown up now) and got to meet the newest generation. They visited us at the caravan park and we had a great afternoon. Some ducks obliged the kids by sticking around for some bread. This mother duck down at the creek showed off her new hatchlings and then bolted when she thought we got too close.




Tuesday, 20 December 2011

Kangaroo Island

It was cheaper to take the Day tour over to Kangaroo Island then to take the van and car or even just ourselves! The tour was  great but very rushed. It became very rushed towards the end because certain people of eastern persuasions, couldn't keep to time limits and made us later and later after each stop. The poor old bus driver had to keep chasing them up to get them back onto the bus. He had asked them at the beginning if they could understand English and they had all said yes, but when we were out touring they all became deaf or kied about understanding the rules and requirements of the tour.  Rude mob!!!!

There was lots to see on Kangaroo Island and not enough time. It's a huge island, with a large agricultural economy, however due to rising costs many island businesses are struggling to survive.


First stop SEALS! Yeah! We got to go right down on the beach with Australian Seals at Seal Bay.
Look at me! Aren't I just so cute?

Mummy? I want my mummy! This young one had been out fishing with mum but when they get tired they come back in and have tow ait until she's finished her hunting for the day.
Seals were all along the beach, it was wonderful to see!


Dinner time for this young cub.



One of my favourite photos.

This little fellow got quite upset when the other cub came out of the water and tried gate crash his tucker time. He chased the interloper down the beach!

 No more time tonight and still have the Birds of Prey show, Remarkable rocks and Admirals Arch to share. Oh well I will jsut have to get busy. I promised myself I would get the blog up to date for  Christmas!

Victor Harbour

The hills in the area sloped down towards the sea, emerald green paddocks leading to sandy beaches and azure blue waters...sounds like heaven doesn't it? We thought so anyway.

Graphite Island is just off Victor Harbour and is reached by a large jetty.  Normally you can travel across by a Percheron driven horse cart, unfortunately due to major repairs at the Victor Harbour foreshore it wasn't running while we were there.

We were also told the penguin colony was gone. Disappointed big time, let me tell you!
The weather was a bit gloomy but there was no rain which was good.

 You can see how close the island is to the mainland at Victor Harbour.
Busy place, lots of retirees down this end of the world, can see why. I was tempted to join them,.

Port Elliott South Australia

We decided to stay at Port Elliott at the bottom of the Fleurieu Peninsular, before we headed over to Kangaroo Island. It was a wonderful little park with its own little bay and beachfront. Port Elliott itself was a small township sandwiched between the larger Victor Harbour and Goolwa.







While we were at the caravan park a Morris car club booked in and we got to see all this cute little morris cars. Aww gee!






Can't wait to go to Kangaro Island, we are going into Victor Harbour tomorrow to book our tickets.  At Victor Harbour there is supposed to be a penguin colony at Graphite Island that would be cool to see too.

Monday, 28 November 2011

Cudlee Creek Wildlife Sanctuary

I orginally wanted to go to the Cudlee Creek Zoo because I wanted to see the white kangaroos. You know the song..Six White Boomers? Well we saw where Santa gets them from when he visits Australia! The Cudlee Creek Wildlife Sanctuary of course!

You can buy a packet of food to feed the animals as you go round.

This young white joey with his mum, took awhile to get brave enough to come up for some food but when mum was getting some and the other kangaroos started to come over, he decided not to miss out.

The sanctuary had obviously had the kangaroos for a while as some of the bucks were quite big.



The middle of the sanctuary was a large walkthrough area with a central lagoon which had a large bird population.  They obviously felt safe because there were many babies and we even walked past a nesting pair of  Magpie Geese, who weren't phased by our proximity at all.

Western Australia has the black swan as its emblem. When I was in Perth nearly twenty years ago there were still swans on the Swan River which runs through the city. This time there were none (that we saw anyway). In fact the only swans I saw in WA were at Cape Le Grande near Esperance.

It was good to see them up close at Cudlee Creek. For a large bird it has the shortest legs!


They had a wide variety of birds included these beautiful predators, white bellied Sea Eagles.

 I was simply astounded to see a pure white one of these also!

 I'd been trying to get a pic of a Tasmanian Devil at the two other zoos, but they were always hidden away. There were two at Cudlee, one was spread out in amongst some logs, but this fellow was out sunning himself! funny looking things! A bit like a giant rat crossed with a wombat and a quoll.
In amongst the bird avaries was these lovely pheasants. It was hard to get these shots due to the wire, but I still tried.


This wombat woke up when we came past and came out of his nest to see what we had to offer for lunch.  Geoff started to feed him until I noticed the sign that said "Please don't feed me, I'm on a special diet" Whoops!

There was a walk through farm area and we came across this duck with a crazy hairstyle. Weird, funny and cute. It was also very friendly and followed us around hoping for a handout.

The little marmosets were hopping through the trees in their enclosure, but were quite inquisitive when we stopped to say hello to them. One even came over and ate a sunflower seed out of Geoff's fingers!

Strange bedfellows in the farm area. This pigeon and bunny were quite happy in their little hidehole.
There were many large male peacocks flaunting their fine tail feathers. But later we saw this pretty white peahen.  Obviously hiding from the noisy males. I don't blame her.

This large rodent (can't remember what it was called now) was the size of a wallaby, it was quite timid but came out for a nibble on some seeds that we threw into the enclosure.

Bambi! No it wasn't being bred for venison you hungry meat eaters! How can you even contemplate eating anything this cute? Savages!


This littel wading bird was no bigger than the a coke can but it had abnormally long legs to assist it walking across lilly pads etc.









The sanctuary also had a number of monkeys but because I've shown pictures of them before from the zoos I won't do so again here. 
Entry to Cudlee Creek Sanctuary was very moderately priced and well worth the visit. Make sure you visit if you ever go to Adelaide!