Australia Zoo

This was to be a highlight of our trip, a golden nugget. It was, but not for the reasons expected.

We’d watched Steve Urwin back in the day, never thinking we’d get to his zoo. Then all the more poignant with him having died.

We bought a two day pass and set off. It had been continuously raining since Friday morning (now Saturday) and it literally bucketed down wallabies and kangaroos for the full two days we were there (and the nights). I’m not a fan of squelchy shoes, but I had to endure them this time. Fair to say my mood was a little grim by day two (donning the previous day’s cold wet shoes was a low point!). The rain, cold, constant flood alerts and a bad sleep unfortunately suppressed my enjoyment a tad 😬

Anyway, it is a fab place - but defo best visited in the sun as there is a LOT of outside walking, or in our case trudging through cascading surface water 🫤

The place was very spacious, and whilst not ‘the wild’ obviously, the inmates live well and have spacious enclosures. Largish lizards darted about, playing ‘statues’ for long periods of time. We squelched thru paddocks full of kangaroos and wallabies (you could feed and stroke their rough fur). The adorable koalas had their own habitats, as did Tassie devils, wombats - to name but a few!

There was a ‘crocoseum’ show, featuring amazingly trained parrots, lorikeets, birds of prey, and a stork which flew in on cue. How they trained these birds is beyond me 🤷‍♀️

Then Robert Irwin came on (Steve’s son) to interact with Casper a very large saltie croc, with a stubborn disposition. We didn’t feel it was demeaning to Casper, Robert made it informative and educational, with some jeopardy thrown in on his part.

We ended day two with a walk through their animal hospital. As well as caring for the zoo inmates, they have a constant influx of wild creatures brought in by the public, mainly koala and joeys, often casualties of some sort of thoughtless human behaviour (destruction of habitat, building, road injuries etc). Very moving.

If we’re ever lucky enough to come back, please let the sun shine 😊Read more