Raymond Island Koalas

Up and moving at a reasonable hour today, we had plans to head to Paynesville to get the ferry over to Raymond Island. Needed a feed first so we walked down the esplanade and spotted the Salty groms cafe - it was very busy compared to the others so that was a good sign. We ordered a coffee and breaky wraps, a bit of a wait but not an issue as we took turns taking Pup for a walk while we waited since he wasn't happy about just standing around. I popped into a kayak hire place to see if they'd mind if we took pup out with us, if we made a booking, they were all good with it, good to know for tomorrow. We enjoyed our wraps, then got on the road. It's about 40 minutes to Paynesville, an easy run over. We parked up and followed the signs to the ferry, it's free for pedestrians, although quite cheap if we really wanted to take the car over. While map searching I'd spotted 'Ride the Koalas', a small company with Surrey bikes. There were pictures with small dogs on them, so we went over and spoke to the bloke to see if we could make it work. Pup was a perfect fit, glad we grabbed his cafe mat, as it padded it out perfectly for him to spread out a bit. We cruised around, keeping an eye out for koalas. There were heaps! They were introduced a while ago and the population is thriving, it was really nice. We got in and out of the bike at times as we didnt want it to scare them, even though they didn't seem concerned at all. One turned its head and looked right at us, we're pretty sure it had a joey, and Pup probably alerted it we think. Haha little do they know, leaves startle him. Although! Pup has been a real dog lately, sniffing things, peeing in public, and drinking communal water at some pubs and parks, weirdo haha. We bumped into a couple that were on the cruise yesterday, they said they recognised Pup, haha. They're over from the UK and the fella has been working with an animal rescue charity for a number of years now. We shared some stories and kept koala spotting. We did spot something walking down one of the roads, it didn't quite walk like a koala, then we realised it was an echidna, just meandering along. We hopped off the bike again so we could get a bit closer and take some photos. It was a really nice activity, very glad we found it. We returned the bike then jumped back on the ferry to the car so we could head to lunch.Read more