We woke up early because we had an early flight to Adelaide today. The hotel room was fine, but my back was a bit sore from the somewhat soft bed. We got dressed quickly and headed to the airport via the Train. Once at the airport, it was again mass chaos. We were taking Virgin Blue and thought we were smart checking in via kiosk instead of waiting in line. Turns out the bag drop off line was 3 times as long as the check-in line.
Took forever. Good thing we gave ourselves 1.5 hours before our flight. Actually, it turned out we were fine cause our flight was delayed over 45 minutes.A tour bus was expected to pick us up at our hotel in Adelaide at 1:00pm to go to Cleland Wildlife Park. We were thinking that we were running super late, but then our flight attendant announced that we needed to set our clocks 30 minutes back now that we're in Adelaide (30 minutes is weird). There was still hope! We were able to quickly pick up our bags from baggage claim and caught a cab to our hotel, the Quest on King William. There, we were meeting Marianne, James, and Amy. We were sharing a two bedroom at the hotel (or serviced apartments).
The plan was to go to Cleland Wildlife Park to see the Kangaroos and Koalas. But first we got a little tour of the town from our driver. Not that interesting and we ended up sleeping through most of it. We want
ed to see the animals! Once we arrived, we were sad to learn that we could not hold the koalas today. The weather was too hot for them. However, we did get to feed kangaroos that were roaming around and saw joeys! Also saw tazmanian devils, emus, wallabies and, according to Amy, "disgusting birds". We also got chased by these rodent like creatures.We did get to see some koalas up close. They seemed like gentle animals. Like stuffed animals.
Our driver picked us up at 4:15pm. He had to make another stop and for some reason dropped us off in this German town - Hahnsdorf. It sounded like he was trying to encourage us to spend money on German beers. We didn't know what to do, so we walked around to kill some time. It was a hot day, like being in Arizona and being Monday afternoon, almost everything was closed. He eventually pi
cked us up and we all pretty much passed out on the way back to the hotel.For dinner, we ate at the nearby Sushi Train. We were starving so we immediately grabbed a bunch of dishes off the train. Not the best sushi, but still good. We later took a stroll down some streets. It wasn't that late but all the stores (except for the Woolworth) was already closed. Seemed like a sleepy town in what looks like a big city.
We all called it an early night. We are off to Kangaroo Island early in the morning.
Day 50 - "The Island of Kangaroos (and Flies)" - Kangaroo Island, Australia
Our flight to Kangaroo Island was delayed by an hour, but we finally got on our regional express (REX) 33-seat plane to kangaroo island. The flight was only 25 minutes. It was both exhilarating and scary at the same time. Because the plane is so small, you could feel and see every turn and pivot very clearly - that was the scary part. It was exhilarating because you are so close to the ground and you can see the land and ocean so clearly especially when you are about to land. Landing was a bit rough. I think we landed on one side first before
the other wheel touched down. Amy was not pleased.We were picked up at the small little airport by Brian and Kate, who were our tour guides with Exceptional Kangaroo Island Tours. Also on our plane was a family of three from Toronto who were doing a day tour. We all piled into this Isuzu tour bus and were off to see the sights. Our initial attempt to spot koalas in the eucalyptus trees was a bust, so we headed to Stokes Bay to check out a local beach. It was small, but very fine white sand and sparkling clear water. There were people diving for abalone so we got to see a huge black rimmed abalone. We then enjoyed afternoon tea at Stokes Bay with chocolate cake and some oat-based cookies. They were delicious!
After refueling with the food, we took off. Eric was our designated spotter and he did not disappoint. Even though we were going through non-eucalyptus trees at a fast pace, Eric managed to spot a koala napping in a tree. It was a rather dirty koala, but a koala nonetheless. The weather was hitting 100 degrees, so most animals (including the ants) had gone into hiding. The poor koala looked so hot. I guess I wouldn't be happy to be wearing a fur coat in 100 degree weather either. Eric gets high marks for such a good find!
We then went into the bush to do some wallaby and kangaroo spotting. (Side note, I just realized the kookaburra song is an Australian song). It was 2 pm and hot, hot, hot! We did successfully spot a few kangaroos, no wallabies though. Afterwards, we were famished, so we headed to this sheep farm to eat lunch. We took a mini-tour into another section of the bush and then sat
down to a tasty lunch cooked by Brian and Kate.Lunch consisted of grilled King George whiting fish, grilled hallumi cheese, roasted potatoes and a feta salad. It was really, really good. One thing I forgot to mention. There are a lot A LOT of flies in Kangaroo Island. They swear it's only a 2 week thing, but I am not so sure. It got to be quite painful with constant buzzing in your ear. You could barely smile for a picture, for fear you'd swallow a fly. They surrounded us. A few flew into my ears. We were constantly swatting. Regardless, we enjoyed our picnic meal. We topped it off with cantaloupe.
After lunch we headed to the Seal Bay Conservation Park to check out the Sea Lions. We were actually on the beach walking along side them.
Maybe a 30 ft distance. They were all passed out on the beach, occasionally turning or getting up to cool off in the crystal clear water. Must be nice to be a sea lion, well, until a great white shark comes to feast on you. Last stop on our tour was another beach for us to play in. We had a white sand beach all to ourselves. It was pretty amazing. One of the nicest beaches I'd ever seen.We then dropped the Canadian family back at the airport and we headed to American River to check in at our B&B, Wanderers Rest, which is run by Chris and Ros, a very sweet elderly couple. They took our orders (app, entree and dessert) and we settled into our rooms before coming back out for dinner.
After dinner, Chris drove us to Penneshaw to do the 9:30 viewing of the little penguins that come out at night. We almost hit a wallaby and a cat on the way there. We walked around in the dark with these red light flashlights (the penguins apparently can't see red so the light doesn't disturb them as much). There were lots of happy penguins making whoopie all night. It was quite funny. There was one sad moment though when this male penguin kept making this sound. We learned from the tour guide that he was calling for his mate who hadn't come home yet. Most likely, his mate had been eaten by a predator :(.
In addition to the penguins, what was amazing were the stars above our heads. It was incredible how many stars you can see when there's no pollution and very little light. We estimate that in California (and maybe even Florida) we only see about 1% of the stars you can see on Kangaroo Island. It was truly breathtaking how bright and plentiful the stars are in the sky. Strangely, it was about 11pm and we couldn't see the moon. Chris said that was because the moon hadn't come out yet. Strange.
On our way back to the hotel, we saw many wallabys on the side of the road. They're almost like squirrels or raccoons for us. We were joking that us asking Australians to show us wallabys is like them asking us to show them squirrels. They're everywhere at night (nocturnal creatures).
After a long day, we showered and quickly passed out. Another day of touring tomorrow.
For the pictures of days 49 and 50, go to: http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/sredir?uname=bigtandeze&target=ALBUM&id=5403075860211047105&authkey=Gv1sRgCI7CxJHjuImMPg&feat=email
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