Melbourne Day 3 - Phillip Island

I awoke to the smell of bacon, sausage and eggs drifting through our accomodation. No, the farm wasn't on fire, Anna was preparing us breakfast. Our hosts at Rangers Run B&B provided us with all the necessary ingredients for a scrumptious aussie breakfast.

After devouring our food, we went outside to explore the farm a little more, where a friendly male goat developed a bit of a crush on Anna.

Written by Anna:

Our next stop was Phillip Island. The reason for visiting Phillip Island was to see the lovely wild fairy penguins (only about a foot tall full grown) that come back to shore from the ocean every night. Instead of going to the usual viewing area, we booked the ultimate tour that takes us to a separate beach to see the little ones. Since they come in at night, we had to find something to do on the island during the day.

After checking in to The Castle, we headed to the Koala Conservation Park. It has several koalas in the enclosed area and some just hanging around the rest of the woodland. We weren't able to spot any in the woodland, but we did get to see about half a dozen of them in the enclosed areas. The highlight here was definitely seeing the baby koala.

Next stop was the Wild Animal Park. We didn't have this place on our agenda, didn't even know it existed. Glad we saw the sign and made a stop. This is why we came to Australia for! Inside the park, wallabies and kangaroos roam around freely. They not very shy and will come up to people to get food. (They gave us food to feed them.) Again, we were lucky enough to spot some more babies. The baby wallaby below was closed enough for me to touch, but I didn't want to scare it and patted the mommy instead. The strange looking creature below is an echidna.

In the evening, we went to the beach armed with night vision binoculars to watch the little, somewhat clumsy penguins walked within feet of us to their burrows. It must have been a good night because we saw hundreds of them. We were told that there had been nights in the past that only 3 penguins showed up. Unfortunately, we were not able to take any photos because it may scare them away.

Annas Aussie Tidbits:

Darn birds! For some strange reason, many birds like to hang around the highways. Instead of being on the grass, they would walk across the road, slowly, walk across the road! Some of them also like to glide across the road at bumper height. I think I hit one....and narrowly missed several others.
If you want ketchup (they call it tomato sauce here), mayo, bbq sauce, tartare sauce, or even salad dressing, be prepare to shell out 30 cents or so. No free sauces here! Well, maybe at McDonald's....