More Images from the Australian Zoo

Here are a few more pictures from our trip to the Australian Zoo yesterday. We had lots of comments about the pictures.

The crocs are BIG and always wait for some unsuspecting prey to come along.

This little beauty is lethal. Apparently one bit has enough venom to kill 50 men.

This croc actually was captured by Steve Irwin several years ago and this of course is a likeness.

Nope there are not any elephants native to Australia but they had a few on display.

We loved the koalas.

Crikey! Karen and Bob Go to the Australian Zoo

Australia Zoo

Meet my friend, Fang 2. Yes that is his name. He lives at the Australia Zoo. He is one of the many crocs who make their home at the zoo. They have been captured for a variety of reasons. Some were in places that were dangerous, some were dangerous in places and some just needed to be relocated because of changes to their environment.

We arrived at the zoo at 8:50 a.m. after a 75 minute drive from Mary's school. We dropped her off at work. This is the greeting at the zoo entrance. Great cruiser, right?

The zoo is located near a national park called the Glasshouse Mountains. The mountains are interesting formations from a volcanic era.

We saw many koalas and loved them. We decided to have a picture taken holding a koala. It was really neat to hold one. They are very heavy and very stinky but I loved it. His little hands were right into the sleeve of my shirt, holding on to me for dear life.

The enclosures at the zoo are very open and we walked among the trees that they had placed for the koalas to feed from. We could stand and see them at eye level. The koalas eat eucalyptus leaves only. These are very hard to digest and give very few nutrients so the koalas spend 18 to 20 hours a day sleeping.

We saw so many beautiful little koalas. We even saw a mom and baby koala up high in a tree.

You also can buy kangaroo food and feed the kangaroos. This is fascinating. They really like to come right over and feed out of your hand like a rabbit. They are beautiful creatures.

We really enjoyed how close you could get to them. We were able to pet them and watch them for quite a while. These are smaller kangaroos. It was really neat to watch them hop around. We saw one kangaroo sleeping on its back and you could see the joey moving around in its pocket, with one little foot sticking out.

CRIKEY!!!! That is the word of the day every day at the Australia Zoo!! We were very impressed with the quality of the zoo. The staff were so approachable and they were all very animal oriented and able to share a lot of information. Everyone was very friendly here. The enclosures for all animals were spotless and being cared for all day. Once you are in the gate, all shows are open and free and there are a lot to choose from. We really enjoyed the conservation show. We saw many more animals and birds. The crocs were plentiful and beautiful and each croc was accompanied by the story of its life and its capture and reason for it. You can tell that the love and passion for the croc was certainly the starting place for this zoo.

The zoo is a great legacy to Steve Irwin. His passion to the animals is very visible in the culture and the quality of the facility. We were very impressed.

Back to Surfers Paradise...Life at the Beach

READ with CARE!

Today we originally planned to go to the Australian Zoo but Mark had business up the Gold Coast SO we jumped in and were off loaded at Surfers Paradise for the day. It's definitely a tough place to spend the day. Not! We got dropped off and started walking. In the distance of the first picture, you can see the world's largest apartment/condo complex. We walked down there to swim and do some shopping. The surf was up today. Big waves with lots of punch as we found out. It was easy to have a "clothing malfunction" while riding the waves. Everybody was holding on or adjusting their swim suit. The sand beneath your feet was constantly moving and the rip tide was dangerously strong. Several big waves pushed us towards shore really fast. We even saw a PE class surfing today. The poor PE teacher had no idea where half the class was. The waves would have made me nervous if it was my class. Oh yes, for those of you who thought I was a cheap bum, I did buy Karen a Hard Rock Cafe t-shirt today. We didn't see the Meter Maids today. I was disappointed. What's with that? The beach was quite crowded by noon.

...off to the Australian Zoo tomorrow

We walked about 50 minutes down the beach. As you can see from the sign at the top of the post, lifeguards were on high alert all day. The surf was pounding. The lifeguard were on their megaphones a lot with warnings and today they sat in their trucks ready to go. The trucks bomb down to the surf, when needed. With the ocean as unstable as it was today, there would be no time to waste in a rescue.

It's a great day to be on deferred salary.

Yahoo!

The waves were BIG for those of us who think the West Edmonton Water Park has great waves.

Can you find me?

Rainforest, Leeches and Fudge

Today we went for a walk in the rainforest - Springbrook Rainforest to be exact. We drove to Nerang and then headed to Springbrook. Our trip out there was about 75 minutes. When we arrived the rain had begun to close in. Yes, it was raining. The clouds were very low and we were wet. It rained for the first couple of hours. The rain is very warm though so it does not matter at all. As we walked the ground was very saturated. We walked through some really thick and fabulous forest. The sounds are magical. The birds have such different calls and cries. There is always the feeling that something is scuttling away in the undergrowth -which there is.

The Warrie Circuit is actually 17 kilometres long. It is a circular route that goes around and down into a rain forest to the spot called "Meeting of the Water" where all the water from the valley gathers to head to the Pacific Ocean. The walk is a narrow trail with spots where steps have been carved out of stone. The steps were treacherous as they were wet and covered in leaves.

This magical spot is called Twin Falls. The water falls many metres into the rainforest valley.

After a few hours the rain stopped and the sun shone through rainforest. The funny part is that as we kept walking it felt like it was raining as there was so much water on the leaves.

Here I am looking up at the water teaming down the side of the gorge. There was so much water everywhere. As we walked, we discovered that we had a leech problem. My friend, Mary, let out a screech that she had a leech on her. As we looked down, we discovered that we were also covered in them. Around our ankles, on our socks, and on and in our shoes, leeches were crawling around. They were small, but determined. They were about 2 inches long, on average. Mary had salt with her so we quickly doused ourselves and got rid of them. We soon realized that the leeches were everywhere on the leaves and soil and were also dropping down on us. Not much else we could do but keep moving, so we did! As we walked, we would keep checking and removing any that we could. Interestingly enough, Mary has lived in Australia for many years and has never before had a leech on her in the rainforest.

At times, the light shining down into the forest was spectacular. The vegetation was so dense and very different. There were many vines - 40 different species of vines grow in this rainforest.

A rainforest fiddlehead. The ferns are spectacular. We also saw a frog, a lizard and a possum.

Here is a large tree that has vines growing up and around it. Some of the vines are parasites and actually take over the tree and kill it from the inside.

Many of the waterfalls are spectacularily spraying right over the trail. Bob is standing on the trail as the water cascades over from many metres above him.

Here we are coming through the same spot on the trail. As we ended our hiking, we headed for the car and found an information centre to go and change. We searched for leeches and tried to make sure they were all gone. We then ate our lunch that we had carried with us but could not stop to eat. We stopped in Springbrook, a township, to get a cappuncino and some fudge at The Fudge Shoppe. After our trip, it tasted fantastic.

This parrot visited with us as we drank our coffee. Bob drove us back to Brisbane. When we got home, I picked the clothes out of the boot and got another leech on me. I then decided it was all out war, so Mary and I took all our clothes and our shoes and washed them with soap. We were still pulling leeches out of our shoes here at the house. I think I have won!! The shoe and the clothes are now drying and we are leech free!!! Was it worth it? You bet it was - we saw some beautiful sights!

A Short Video from Manta Ray Bay from our Sailing Trip

This is a short video from Glen's I-phone while on our sailing trip to the Whitsundays.

Super Bowl Weekend Aussie Style

If you think that football is big in North America, it is crazy here too although it's Aussie Rules Football. No gear, a rugby type ball and 4 goal posts. Yesterday was the replay of last weekend's Grand Final that ended in a 61-61 tie. Yesterday though, the Magpies whipped the Saints. The game brought in 90 million additional revenue dollars with the replay. I think there will be overtime next time. As we found out, this Victorian game is a religion down under.

Today is the Rugby League Grand Final. You get 6 tackles to score a try. I am looking forward to seeing this game. My money is on St. George Dragons. They play the Sydney Roosters. Should be interesting. The newspapers is full of pregame hype.

My son-in-law Adam, would love to see today's game.

Great Sandy National Park Cooloola Section

Hi Everybody!

It's a rainy Sunday morning here in Brisbane. We have had a mixed bag of weather since arriving here in Brisbane although it has only slowed us down a bit. Yesterday Glen, Mark, Mary, Kate, Karen and I headed to the ocean to go 4x4 ing. It was a very interesting day for sure. We had hoped to hit Fraser Island but we did the next bext thing which was to drive the sandy beaches just a few kilometers south of there. We could see Fraser Island when we hit Rainbow Beach. We drove to Noosa on the M1 and then worked our way to Great Sandy National Park. We took a small barge across the Noosa River and drove right on to the beach. The tide was rising although there was lots of hard sand initially to drive on. We drove to Red Canyon about 15 km away, went for a hike on a massive sand dune and then headed to Rainbow Beach which was at least another 15 km down the beach. Now imagine driving 30 km down a beach in a 4 x 4. The sand near the ocean was rock hard and we could drive 60-70 kph. People were bush camping in designated areas and there were fisherman with ocean rods that were 15 feet long casting between the two lines of breaking waves. Aussies love their beaches. Families were on the beach fishing, surfing, boogie boarding down dunes and 4 x 4 ing. On the way back the hard sand on the beach was gone because of the rising tide so we had to drive the loose sand. Now that is a blast. I quickly learned that momentum is the key to not getting bogged down.  It is a lot of fun. I think every bone in my body was rattled by the 5 hours of beach driving. Kate collected colorful sand on the dunes. She will truely have a rainbow of sand. We all appreciate Glen's efforts to borrow his son's 4 by 4 for us.

It took us about 90 minutes from Brisbane to get here along the M1 down the Sunshine Coast.

We were driving Toyota trucks that were called Hilux which is basically the equivalent of a Tacoma back in North America. I was driving a 91 Hilux. It was lots of fun shifting gears with my left hand. Everything is backwards. You wouldn't believe the number of times I turned on the windshield wipers while driving in Brisbane instead of the signal lights because everything on their vehicles is on the other side. Left hand driving in a big city can be stressful especially when you hit round abouts with lots of traffic.

You can see Cooloola National Park. The island immediately to the north is Fraser Island which is the largest sand island in the world.



Karen almost to the top of the dunes at Red Canyon. Two steps up and slide one step down until you get to the top. I figure the dunes were 300 feet high. Amazing!

Mark, Mary and Kate goin' up.

This picture gives you some perspective about how BIG these dunes are.

Gear down, drop that baby in 4 wheel drive, keep that truck moving. It's all about momentum. I bogged the truck down a couple of times and had to get out of the sand with the stump pulling gear. Apparently there is quick sand in the area although we never encountered any.