After leaving the Kangaroos we went in search of Australia’s other famous marsupial the Koala. On Philip Island there is a Koala Conservation Centre where you can get up close and personal with these beautiful creatures. Unfortunately you can’t touch them as they are wild animals and are not as cuddly as they appear! Here however they do tolerate us being close and posing with them, within reason. Koala numbers were ravaged in the past as they have a number of predators, man included, and their numbers dropped to just 800 which resulted in them being listed as endangered. The conservation centre has re-established Koala numbers out in the wild and continues to do this today. As they are nocturnal most of them were sleeping up in the eucalyptus trees during our visit but some naturally inquisitive ones were awake and ready to pose with us!
We ended the evening with a much anticipated visit to the Philip Island Penguin Parade. Each night along the coast of Philip Island, hundreds of little penguins, the world’s smallest penguins, return to their nests to rest and preen themselves. They spend about 2 weeks out at sea feeding and then come home but the trek from the shoreline to their nests (which could be up to 1.5km away) is the most dangerous trip they make. So once the sun has gone down they start arriving on the beach and calling to each other so that they can form a group before they set off on their overland trek. We watched from the Penguin centre at Summerland Beach along with about 300-400 other tourists. The penguins were so tiny and cute (only 20cm high) and we followed groups of them on their trek up the beach. We were standing within a few inches of them at times, it was very special!
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