Phillip Island

A 45 minute ferry ride (or if one of you engines, say, breaks down an hour ferry ride) is the small (or, say, what you thought was small but really 26 km) island of Phillip Island; Home to some awesome sand beaches, the Phillip Island grand prix, fur seals (on rocks), a wild life park, a koala reserve and the penguin parade. With a weekend we looked to do some of the most well known parts of the island, including the koala reserve and a must see, the penguin parade. On the first day we experienced Cowes (apparently related in some way to the Cowes on the Isle of Wight) and headed to the penguin parade in the evening. The parade is essentially the fairy (or little) penguins heading in from the sea at sunset. They wait off shore for the sun to set behind the island before heading onshore to their nests on the cliffs and dunes. They’re nervous, and timidly run part way up the beach before running back to the waves and trying again. Unfortunately picture taking and camera recording is prohibited, but i managed to get some film so that will be around soon.
On the way back up to the car park you walk up through the dunes where there nests up, a chorus of penguin calls (barking, squawking, singing…I don’t know what you would call it) greats you. Oh, and the stars were so clear it was absolutely unbelievable.
We spent the night in a camper caravan before getting up to go to the koala reserve. We rented bikes in Cowes and rode there as it was a pretty good distance out of Cowes. At the koala reserve the koalas live (almost free), they have large sections of land full of eucalyptus trees. In between two sections there are wooden skywalks that bring you to the level of the koalas. Koalas sleep most of the day, but we did get to see some actually moving about through the trees and along the walkways and even eating. We were also informed that koala poo smells of eucalyptus, which is incredibly true (and it’s incredibly potent).
On the way back to Cowes to meet the ferry we rode through a forest like reserve. Actually we rode through it twice after reading the map wrong and doing a complete circle. Apparently there were really wild koalas out here, but we only managed to spot some wild wallabies and what I think was a kookaburra. It was good to be out of the city again, and into a place that could easily be mistaken as any English country side if one didn’t look too hard. The weekend went quickly and gave us the chance to be tourists again, and see something that is fairly unique in the penguin parade and koalas up close.

Sunday at St Kilda

(What I’m going to attempt to do this week is to go through some of the major events that have happened since being here so I can work on being a little more current, interspersed with some anecdotal/random posts)The Sunday before classes started a friend from AustraLearn, Victoria, and I took a tram ride down to St Kilda—the closest beachside resort for Melbourne. Of course, in typical Melbourne style (or at least the Melbourne I know) it rained for most of the morning before trying desperately to break through to sun in the afternoon. The actual purpose of the trip was to go to the Sunday artist festival but because of the rain not many of the artists showed up, so we did the town, beach and pier.
As you get into St Kilda you’re greeted by a giant face, creepy amusing scary it covers them all and it also fronts Luna Park which looks eerily like Coney Island in New York (in fact its modeled after it)—a mini amusement park. There was also one of those human statue people, interesting enough, took a picture. Getting past that you hit the sand, and your first good shot at the sea. And while it is technically still inside the Melbourne harbor due to two giant peninsulas that leave a singular 5 km straight, the feel is still the seaside. The sand was crisp and the water was…ABSOLULTY FREEZING. Turns out the Melbourne Sea, like everything else in Melbourne in winter, is cold and wet. We made our way along the pier (apparently pretty famous) up to the end where there are supposedly little fairy penguins (we didn’t see any—only a load of dead starfish and a couple of fishermen). There’s a reserve up the end for these little critters, and they’re apparently joined with some sort of, and what can only be described as a, sea otter (rakali). We walked into the café on the end of the pier, partially to warm our hands and partially to see the prices—to expensive.
We went back into town to find something a little more pocket friendly and stumbled upon several very good looking cake shops (identified by crowds of people drooling on store fronts). There were lots of other small shops along the street, all small personal business each with their own little culture. I had no idea what the one pictured to the right is selling but it had an awesome shop front. Taking a hot pie and a cup of tea from one of the delicious-looking cake shops, it was just right for the cold weather and rain, and with that the sun began to come out. Yay! With the sun came more people including a couple of people rollerblading—one of whom wiped out spectacularly. St Kilda’s is literally filled with scenic beauty and hinted with grunge attitude. It would probably be a lovely place to live, though we went in the middle of winter and I can only imagine how crazy this place must get in the middle of summer.