Koalas, Raymond Island

Raymond Island is on the Gippsland Lakes, Australia's largest inland waterway, about 200 miles directly east of Melbourne. Being home to more than 200 wild koalas, Raymond Island is possibly the only place in Australia where you can walk just over a mile and in that distance be guaranteed to see the celebrity marsupials. It is only a wee hop over the McMillan Strait from Paynesville where we were staying, via a five minute free ferry. Excited!

Signs told us 35,000 visitors enjoy the Koala Trail each year. Luckily on the day we seemed to be the only ones. Perhaps the weather had something to do with that… As soon as we stepped onto the island the ferry man pointed up into a tree next to the pier. Huddled in a sad little ball we saw our first wild koala! Poor thing looked very forlorn buffeted by the wind and dismal rain.

Luckily the shower soon cleared and we spent three hours tootling about the unpaved roads and little trails on the island. Looking up into trees for little grey balls of fluff - I think we saw about ten in total - enjoying the fragrant flowers and the moody ‘sea’ of huge Lake Victoria.

We very much enjoyed our grey furry meetings with such professional nappers. What’s not to like in a creature whose peaceful life goals are to eat toxic foliage and to doze?Læs mere