February 18, 2009

Phillip Island, Victoria

Made Phillip Island today after more and more driving. Currently we are over 5,000 km since we left Sydney in only two weeks or so. Since we seem to have finally outrun the rain maybe it’s worth it.

Phillip Island is connected to the mainland by a big causeway and is a mixture of agriculture, beach resort and nature reserve – in that order. We looked at the beach (not bad), looked at the souvenir shops (T-shirts are on their way to someone) and saved the nature reserves for the next morning.

Went to the Nobbies, a rock formation on the coast, to look at the seals and bird colony. By chance we saw a penguin hiding under the boardwalk (probably moulting). It was a blue penguin - the world’s smallest.

Next we went to a Koala sanctuary and saw lots of koalas. These were the southern Australian sub species and they were huge. Instead of the grey fur of the ones around Sydney they were brownish and the big males weighed up to 11.8 kg (26 pounds). Amazing.