Phillip Island with the Little Penguins and Koalas

Phillip Island is 11/2 hours SE of Melbourne in Bass Strait between Australia and Tasmania. It is famous for the Little Penguins or Fairy Penguins or Blue Penguins depending on where you live. We also were amazed and entertained by the koalas in their sanctuary.

The board walks on Phillip Island where you can usually spot young penguins in their burrows.

A chick waiting for parents to return from the sea in the cover of darkness.

"I'm starving, where are they with the food?"

"Oops, I know I can be picked off by a fox, large birds of prey, etc, but I really am getting hungry"

Stands overlooking the beach where the adult penguins arrive after sunset. We were not allowed to take any pictures. The penguins can walk up to a km inland where they have their burrows. Some of these banks are up to 50m high!!

oh, oh, Dave is cheating with the infra red!!

This is a professional photo of these little guys. They grow up to 13cm (13") high and weigh around 1 kg( 2 lb). Their average life span is 7 years. The sounds that the babies make when they hear them coming is very fascinating.

Well we couldn't resist the use of the infra red feature on the video. Dave and many others were told "no photography" by rangers patrolling the boardwalks. The parents were closer to us as they approached their burrows.

Feeding the pelicans

Cape Barren Goose

Sting Ray waiting for the left overs from the pelican feedings

Oh there are the camels that Dave was to ride at sunrise at Ayer's Rock. No, no these are Phillip Island camels.

And the koalas were so cute. They sleep up to 20 hours a day. Drugged induced ? from their sole diet  choice of eucalyptus leaves

The koalas choose only certain types of eucalyptus leaves.
The males weigh up to 9.5 kg and females are 6.5 to 7.5 kg.
Males can be distinguished from the females by their large Roman noses.
Females tend to have feathery tufts on their ears.

"What is everyone doing here?"

"I'll show them my tree climbing skills then"

"I looovvee my eucalyptus leaves"

Is this striking the monkey pose from "Tarzan"
It's a bit of a stretch.