Day 4: Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary / Brisbane

June 25, 2018

My internal clock hasn't quite adjusted to the time difference yet. At 3am, I'm wide awake and chatting with my friend back home. It's 7pm for her...
I force myself to go back to sleep. I wake up again at 5am and get up at 6:30. There's no help for it, the jet lag will have to last a few more days. The kids are already awake and playing with their phones and Nintendo. Great!

At 7am, we're sitting at the kitchen table (it's slowly getting light outside) and nibbling on cookies. It's the only breakfast we have on hand. The idea was to find a cafe or, worst case, the cafe with the big 'M' in front, but after eating 2 packets of cookies and having an instant coffee, we don't really need any more breakfast.

We quickly check the weather forecast on our phones: sunny and 23 degrees! I think that's great! But for now, it's still a fresh 11 degrees outside, so I should probably bring a fleece jacket just in case.

Today, we're planning to visit the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary (http://www.koala.net/en-au/). According to the internet, you can feed kangaroos here and hold a koala. The kids are naturally super excited about that.

Since we're so early, we arrive at the park at 8:45, but it only opens at 9. Not a problem, because there's fresh coffee and cake at the entrance. The kids get a hot cocoa with a muffin, and I enjoy a latte macchiato. It's time to fill up after those cookies :-)

We buy kangaroo food at the entrance and head straight to the kangaroo enclosure. The enclosure is huge and kangaroos of all sizes and colors are standing, lying, and hopping everywhere.

As soon as they see our bag of food, they're there, delicately nibbling food from our hand and willingly accepting petting.

Ohhhhh, they're so cute!!!
We don't want to leave them.

A baby kangaroo in its mother's pouch is particularly cute, sticking a foot out or stretching its head out. So cute!

At first, we're a bit wary of the large emus, but they're actually very tame and even let us touch them.

The wombat being led on a leash by its caretaker is especially funny.

We spend quite a while watching the young koalas in a separate area.

In contrast to the adult animals, the little ones are very active and extremely cheeky. They tease, bite, kick, and climb on top of each other, always on the hunt for the tastiest eucalyptus leaf and the highest and most beautiful fork in the branches :-)

By now, it's already afternoon, so we take a look at the rest of the sanctuary, admire the platypus (will we see one in the wild?), check out the Tasmanian devil, and walk past the kangaroo enclosure again.

There's action here. The kangaroo herd suddenly goes on alert and all at once, about 100 kangaroos start hopping at high speed through the 'prairie' around us. What a sight! Amazing!

The emus desperately try to save their food from the small colorful parrots that swarm the emu feeding stations and eat everything right in front of the emus' noses. Those little devils.

By 4:30 pm, it's already getting dark and we leave the sanctuary. We make a quick stop at the gas station to grab some sandwiches for dinner and some drinks, as well as muffins for breakfast.

Tomorrow morning, we need to move a little faster because it's the big day:
we're picking up our camper van!

We're completely exhausted and in bed by 7pm. My last look at the weather app makes me feel a bit sick: rain is forecasted - and not just a little, but heavy rain - for the next few days! Oh no... please no rain... sigh. But hey, we can't change it. So far, it doesn't look like rain at all - maybe the forecast is wrong!?

I keep waking up in the middle of the night at 3am, every hour. Darn it, I can't seem to get this jet lag under control - or maybe it's just the excitement... I don't know. I finally fall into a deep sleep at 6am - pretty dumb, considering the alarm goes off at 7am..


For the record:
Accommodation: Arena Apartments
Cost: €126 / night (2 bedrooms)
Distance driven: 30 km
Animal sightings: kangaroos & wallabies, wombat, koalas, shepherd dogs, crocodiles, cassowary, platypus, Tasmanian devil, parrots, parakeets, birds of prey, dingos, emus, owls, reptiles, and more
Weather: Sunny / cloudy, 22-24 degrees
Conclusion: We're missing kangaroos and koalas in our backyard ;-)