The Australian Zoo

Text: Ulli, Photos: Thomas

This is the place to tell about our encounters with the exotic wildlife. No, we have never been to a zoo!!! We have seen all the animals in the wild.

Darwin, our first stop, delighted us with a variety of completely unknown birds. Until we realized that among them were flocks of colorful parrots. Their green backs shimmer in flight, their bodies shine yellow, blue, and red. On one of our campsites, many days later, there was a parrot feeding. They shamelessly landed on people and ate from their hands.

And then there are the pelicans in Noosa!

The birdworld also included flocks of cockatoos. We celebrated the first sightings, but later we were accompanied by whole flocks, including during meals. Don’t feed the wildlife.

The highlight of the birdworld for me is the kookaburra that lives on our campsite in Noosa. Seeing such a creature up close, with its strange, wide beak, is simply fascinating.

On the way to Kakadu National Park, famous and dangerous for the salties, the saltwater crocodiles, we had an interesting encounter with a dingo.

A dingo is an Australian wild dog, resembling a wolf. It stood, yellow and thin, on the side of the road. Thomas stopped, the dingo looked at us through the window. It was not afraid, it did not move. We saw a dingo again at the gas station on our campsite. They are always so thin, it is not a sign of malnutrition, and they can also be very aggressive. A great experience for us. Unfortunately, the pictures were lost with my phone.

One evening, we reached a campsite in the wilderness already in the dark. In the headlights, we drove around a curve and directly towards a herd of grazing wallabies, a small kangaroo species. They stood there motionless in the headlights, we drove by very carefully.

Unfortunately, you often see dead wallabies on the roads. They just don't know the traffic rules. We also saw a dead big mule or donkey, and nearby, a dead horse. Unfortunately, there are no fences to prevent wildlife from crossing the road.

The drive on an off-road track with a four-wheel-drive car was impressive. And suddenly, we saw a wild horse next to the track, a beautiful animal, light brown with a white mane and tail. Later we saw a black horse.

Then came the Great Barrier Reef. We went out on a speedboat for snorkeling, apparently to a spot where snorkeling is not very common, because we were allowed to swim with shoals of colorful fish. It is an incredible feeling when the fish don't flee, but rather look at you with a little curiosity. It's a good thing we didn't know at the time that there are also venomous snakes swimming in the sea. On the way back, a beautiful yellow and white striped snake approached our boat. Our guide had an underwater camera, the snake looked into the camera, found it inedible, and dove back down. We were told it was highly venomous. While diving, we were more interested in avoiding the shark that was swimming somewhere. It was a small, harmless shark, nothing that made our guide nervous, but it did make me nervous.

We also had two interesting encounters with lizards. In the rainforest, we saw a huge lizard slowly moving through the undergrowth. The Australians were also fascinated. Unfortunately, I didn't quite understand its name. And much later, while hiking on a completely deserted trail, we came across another large lizard sitting on the path in front of us, although it was clearly smaller than the first one. At first glance, it looked like a tree trunk, basking in the sand of the path. When we approached, it walked away, on two hind legs, its upper body held upright, almost majestic. We still haven't found out the name of this creature.

On the same day, in the evening, we drove on a lonely road, kangaroos grazing on both sides, undisturbed by our presence, at most they observed us for a while, until we continued driving. These are truly one-of-a-kind images!

I almost forgot about the koalas. On Magnetic Island, they hang in the trees and sleep. The baby, sitting at eye level in the tree and sleeping through the excitement, was the favorite of us and all other hikers on the Fort Walk.

We thought we wouldn't see a possum, until one evening at the campsite, something marsupial-like approached us, clearly expecting something edible. And I have to admit, it was the first time I did not follow the instruction 'don't feed the wildlife'. We got to know each other very carefully until it ate a little piece of toast from my hand. But its young was not allowed to come close, the mother chased it away.

So we could safely pass by the zoos.