Crickey! It’s the Irwins. Brisbane may be Australia’s third largest city, and it may be the capital of Queensland, a state larger than all but sixteen countries, but that wasn’t enough to entice us to stay in the city when we docked here this morning. Our sights were set on the Irwin family’s Australia Zoo, 70 minutes north of Brisbane. We wanted to see the animals, Australian animals.
The zoo has actually been around for a long time, though it has certainly changed and grown since it was founded as a two acre reptile park by Steve Irwin’s parents back in 1970. It’s now a first class zoo spread over 110 acres, with large, well maintained enclosures for the animals and excellent viewing areas for the guests.
We arrived at the zoo at 10:15 am, and had to be back on the bus at 2:00 pm, giving us almost four hours to stroll the grounds and admire the wildlife. We needed every bit of it, both because the grounds are large and because there was a lot to see. Skipping lunch helped us get all the way through the zoo. Not what I would have preferred, but it was worth it.
I should mention that we really lucked out on the weather. It was overcast and threatening the whole time we were there, and it did sprinkle several times and rain hard once, but overall it held off enough for us to get through the park without much need for our rainwear.
I’ll let my photos do most of the talking, but I will say that I was delighted that I was able to get up close to most of the native birds and animals that were on my bucket list, including kangaroos, koalas, wallabies, cassowaries, wombats and some non-Australian animals like meerkats, lemurs and a Komodo dragon. An additional bonus for me was that I saw an Australian pelican in the water next to our ship early this morning. I’m something of a birder, and I love pelicans anyway, but Australian pelicans are especially beautiful— black and white and quite large. It was a treat to see it swimming around and fishing next to the ship after we docked.
Tomorrow is a sea day, then we stop at Arlie Beach, a tendering port, where our next adventure awaits. See you then. Crickey!
Koala. They sleep most of the time. We were lucky to see some eating.
You could get up close to the kangaroos.
Really close.
Wallaby. Pretty much a smaller version of a kangaroo.
Rhinoceros Iguana.
Komodo dragon trying to figure out how to get out of its enclosure and eat me.
Tasmanian devil. Poor photo, but it was sleeping in the corner of its enclosure, and the reflection off the glass was an issue.
Cassowary. Their head is dinosaur-like, and those feet have been known to kill people. Beautiful bird though.
Emu. Pretty ordinary looking compared to a cassowary, isn’t it.
Tortoise.
Jabiru.
Wombat.
Lemurs.
You could get really close to them.
Close to the lemurs.
And speaking of getting close, check out the meerkats.
They’re cute little things.
They have an African section at the zoo. Tiger.
Elephant.
Giraffes.
Great day at Australia Zoo.
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