Bonorong Wildlife Sanctuary

For the first two stops in Australia, we did a city tour and a country tour (and wineries!).  For this third port of call, to do something a bit different, we visited the Bonorong Wildlife Sanctuary that focuses on those animals native to Tasmania, or Tazy natives, as they called them. I admit, my dream was to see a Tasmanian Devil in Tasmania.  Jeff told me not to get my hopes up too high, as they are nocturnal critters.  Still, hope sprang eternal! 

“Bonorong” is derived from an Aboriginal word meaning “native companion”.  It is on land originally owned by the Mumirimina people, who did not survive the early colonization of Tasmania.  It’s currently owned by the Palawa, today’s Tasmanian Aboriginal Community, and is used with their blessing.  However, nobody told the kangaroos that – they seem to feel it’s totally their space, and they are very welcoming to guests, albeit at time curious as to what else we’re checking out in their “home”!

The sanctuary is set up with several wooden boxes of “Roo Food”, free for the taking.  We were encouraged to feed the kangaroos, and were assured they would always be “up for food”!  The food seemed to be dried corn kernels, or something similar, and all we had to do was hold our hands out with the kernels, and the ‘roo’s came around.  Jeff quickly became a two-fisted feeder!  I had my hand at feeding them as well, and they were very gentle as they took the food from our hands.  I also petted a kangaroo – the place they love to be petted/scratched is at the base of their throat, just above their chest.  They are in kangaroo heaven when you scratch them there!  Petting them on the head or back just tells them to back off and leave you alone, so it accomplishes exactly the opposite of what one would be trying to do!

There were a couple of things I noticed about kangaroos – one was their claws!!  They are incredibly long and seemed really thick.  I have heard of people being killed by kangaroos, when the kangaroos felt threatened and used their back feet to lash out.  Can you imagine the damage getting kicked with those back feet?  Thank goodness, these kangaroos know they are safe and don’t feel threatened in any way.  The other curious thing is how they drink – if I were to try to drink from a pond (not that I would do that), I’d tumble in in about a minute…..or less!

I decided to include this image just because I really like the reflection of the kangaroo in the manmade pond in their home area.

Isn’t this little guy just the cutest thing?  Regardless of how we’re supposed to scratch them, it was all I could do to stop myself from trying to hug this little guy!

Jeff got some food and went up to the little guy to see if he wanted to eat, and of course, he did.  Check out how small this little guy really was!  And, Jeff said when he was feeding him, the little guy kept patting his hand, as if to tell him he was doing a good job!  So cute!

The kangaroos weren’t the only animals to see, tho!  If we looked up, we could see some very colorful wild parrots!  There weren’t any in the sanctuary, but abundant in Australia, are white cockatoos!  They are all over the place – almost like pigeons back in Chicago!

Here are the next two animals that we came across – the emu, which I’d heard of before, and the Tawny Frogmouth, which I’d never heard of before!  Turns out, the tawny frogmouth is only found in Australia, and is somewhat related to owls.  They are carnivores, and are considered pest control birds, as they eat moths, spiders, bugs, etc.

And, get a load of this little cutie pie!!   Koalas generally are asleep most of the time - about 19 hours per day, which leaves only 5 hours per day for eating and everything else.  But, this little one woke up long enough to say hi to everyone!

And, I got my wish!!  We did see some Tasmanian Devils!!  I was getting really disappointed, as we’d been thru almost the entire sanctuary, and didn’t see any.  The enclosures we expected them to be in were very quiet, with them in hiding there.  However, there was another set of enclosures, closer to the top, and the ranger was in one of those and the Devils were out!  For reference, they are about the size of a not-overweight pot-bellied pig.  I would say it might come up to my mid-calf in height.

And, contrary to the old Bugs Bunny cartoons, they are not really mean, vicious critters.  In fact, they are quite shy, and frequently will hide if humans are around.  Even if we had come across them in the wild, odds are we wouldn’t have seen them, as they would have seen us first and ran and hid.  This little one was barely peeking out from her hiding place, a hollowed out log.

And, altho they are considered nocturnal animals, the ranger said that they also love to lay in the sun.  And, if you’re wondering how such a sweet looking little thing came to be called a Devil, the ranger said it was due to 2 things.  The first is that if they lay in the sun, sometimes their ears will appear to glow red, and they sort of look like the horns of a devil.  The other reason they are called Devils are that they are known for making an absolutely horrible, screeching, guttural type of noise.  But, they don’t do that all the time – only when they are angry, afraid or having sex (hmmm….let’s not go there…).  And, when that happens, their ears take on that red glow, as the increased blood flow changes the color of the inside of their ears. But, during this visit, there was no sex, so Celina was a  safe and happy little Devil!

The last animals that we visited were Toby & Millie, the wombats.  Toby was with his friend, the ranger, and was quite shy, hiding his face in the ranger’s arm.  And, Millie was a little baby wombat and was wrapped up in an appropriately pink blanket and held by a volunteer.  That’s why I was able to get such a close-up of her sweet face.  I wanted to pet her, but that’s not really acceptable, so once again, I had to restrain myself!  Millie was fairly new to the sanctuary, and was still getting adjusted to living there and feeling safe.  By the way, all the animals (not birds) in the sanctuary are considered marsupials.  A marsupial is an animal that carries their young in a pouch or on their backs, etc. until they are old enough to be on their own.

Enjoy!

Tidbits from Tasmania

Our last port of call in Australia was in Hobart, Tasmania.  Tasmania is an island about a 10 – 12 hour fast ferry ride from mainland Australia.  Lonely Planet rated Tasmania the 4^th best place in the world to visit – my guess is it’s one of the least known of those places, as I know I hadn’t much thought about it before this cruise!

We arrived early in the morning, which is typical for this cruise, as well as the others we’ve been on.  The sky was very gentle and the water in the harbor matched it.  It was sort of a nice way to ease into the day.  Tasmania is about the size of the state of Rhode Island, and about 40% of the land is set aside for parks, public lands, etc., so it’s a great place to explore nature.

Hobart is the largest city in Tasmania, with a population of about 200,000.  The entire island of Tasmania has only 500,000, so the majority of people live in Hobart.  It’s interesting to note that Hobart is sort of a retirement city, with most of the residents retired.  We’d been told that retirees like it because it has a much more relaxed pace to it, and a sort of small town feel to it.  

This is the main bridge in Hobart, and we crossed it twice going to/from our excursion here.  There is an interesting story about the history of this bridge.  It was opened in the 1960s and about 10 years later, there was an incident.  A large cargo ship, much like the one in this image, was heading out and needed to travel under the bridge.  The captain of the ship traveled the river often, and felt he didn’t need a tug boat and/or pilot boat to keep him on track.  Well, that might have been true for the captain, but he left his second in command in charge of getting out of the harbor, which included passing under the bridge.  Too late, the second in command realized he wasn’t headed for the center part of the bridge (where the cargo ship is in the image).  Instead he was headed for a pylon off to the right of center, where the black star is in the image.  He tried turning on the back thrusters to stop the ship, but that only succeeded in turning the ship sideways, and it crashed into the pylon that used to be where the black star is and took it down, along with a chunk out of the bridge.  Interestingly, it didn’t knock out the entire portion of that bridge, so the other half of the roadway was deemed safe to use while the bridge was being repaired.  You will notice that the pylons are not evenly spaced on that side of the bridge, however.  Due to the weight of its cargo and the weight of the pylon and concrete from the bridge that fell onto the ship, the ship sank right there, under the bridge.  Apparently, the waters of the bay are very deep, so it was determined that the ship, pylon and bridge portion would just remain there.  We didn’t hear that any of the crew’s lives were lost, so our assumption is they all got off the cargo ship ok.  And, regulations were put in place that require a tug or pilot ship accompany a ship wherever it crosses under the bridge. They aren’t visible in this image, but they were there with the cargo ship!

More about our day in Tasmania in my next blog post! 

Enjoy!

Blue Dandenongs, Puffing Billy and the Yarrow Valley

And, it’s on to Melbourne!  Our second stop in Australia was Melbourne.  We visited the city sights in Sydney, and for a change of pace, we took it to the country for this port of call.

Melbourne is the second largest city in Australia, second only to Sydney….for now.  At one point in the past, Melbourne was the largest city, but then lost that title to Sydney.  However, due to the population growth in Melbourne, they believe they will once again regain the title over the next few years. Our port in Melbourne, in Phillip Bay, was in the 4^th largest bay in the world.  (Excuse the morning sunspots, please!)

We began our excursion for today with a bus ride out to the Belgrave Train Station to get on Puffing Billy, a charming little steam engine, narrow gauge locomotive.  Thank goodness for us, we were able to ride the “steaming” Billy.  When the danger of brush fires (called wildfires back home) is too high, they can’t use the coal burning Billy, and have to use an electric engine instead.  I really love the front facing image I got of Billy – he’s really steaming!

We began our journey at the Belgrave Station.  One of the interesting things about the entire Puffing Billy operation is that it is run and staffed by volunteers (about 850).  The original line (prior to the volunteer effort) began in 1900 and ran until 1953, when a landslide wiped out a portion of the tracks.  However, there was enough local interest in continuing the history of Billy to form the Puffing Billy Preservation Society.  After much work and the blessing of the governmental powers that be, Puffing Billy again began operations to the Menzies Station in 1962.  Services were expanded to other stations in 1965, 1973 and finally was completed to the Gembrooke Station in 1998.

A narrow gauge railroad is one that runs on a narrower track than typical trains.  Narrow gauge was what was used in the early days of railroads.  I believe the reason for the narrow gauges was that they were good at tackling the mountain climbs back in the early 1900s when they were first put into use.  It was very cool to be able to stand and sort of lean out of the open sides of the car to get a great view of what lay ahead, and to give you an idea of how close to the vegetation we were.

The Blue Dandenongs are the rolling hills that are part of the Blue Mountains of Australia.  If the skies hadn’t been so hazy in Sydney, we would have been able to see the mountains from there.  But, here, we were right in them!  The forest did have some flowers blooming – we traveled by them too fast (about 35 – 40 mph) to really get a good look, but they sort of reminded me of calla lilies.  Another interesting thing was that the forest consisted of traditional trees, but also of fern trees!  I’m used to ferns being a sort of low growing plant, but here, they can be low, but also grow into trees.

After our train ride on Puffing Billy thru the Blue Dandenongs, we moved on to the Yarrow Valley, a big wine region in Australia.  There are a number of wineries there, and we had tastings at three of them!

They do seem to like white wines here.  Our first tasting was of what they called a white pinot.  I always thought white pinot was pinot grios, but they didn’t call it that.  Apparently, this is made from the pinot noir, but is “unstable”, in that some years it’s red, and some, like this vintage, it’s white!

The wine country views were certainly a match for the lovely tasting wines, and we did find a pinot noir (red in color) that we particularly  liked, and decided to take that one back to the ship to enjoy!

Enjoy!

Sydney – City and Harbor Sights

We pulled into Sydney, Australia, in the wee hours of the morning.  Jeff had been hoping that we’d catch a glimpse of the iconic Sydney Opera House from the ship.  What luck!  As it turns out, we pulled in as close as a large ship could possibly be, and I tumbled out of bed to a wonderful sight!

The Sydney Opera House was built based on the Danish architect, Jorn Utzon’s, design.  It had been an international competition, won by Jorn.  Work began in March, 1959, on the Opera House and originally was to be completed by 1963.  Ten years later, in 1973, and 1,357% over budget, it was finally finished and opened by Queen Elizabeth, on October 20, 1973.  An interesting note was shared by the tour guide we had to see Sydney’s sights – a large portion of the remaining cost owed for the building was paid for by some sort of lottery tickets sold.  Gamblers across Sydney paid for a good portion of the building costs!  

Later in the morning, we took a bus tour of some of Sydney’s sights.  Of course, we couldn’t see it all, or stop at everything we did see, but one of our stops was at a point in the Sydney Botanic Garden.  We got to get a good view of the Opera House and Sydney Harbor Bridge.  This bridge was seen by many when local TV stations showed the fireworks of Sydney welcoming in the year 2000 – one of the earliest celebrations, a day ahead of the US, due to the International Date Line.  The carved chair, Mrs. MacQuarie’s Chair, was at the spot of a great view of the Opera House and Harbor Bridge.  This chair was carved in 1810 for Elizabeth MacQuarie, wife of the then Governor of New South Wales, where Sydney is located.  Legend has it that she liked to sit on this chair and watch the ships from England arrive.

As we drove along, we passed thru different areas, each with increasingly expensive homes and impressive views of the harbor.  One of the most striking views is one that is enjoyed by the students of the School of the Sacred Heart, an all girls’ school, in Sydney.  I’m not sure how much I would have paid attention to the class given that view!

As we moved along, we stopped at a place called Gap Park.  I’m not sure how it got its name, but the lookout from there allowed us a view of the entrance to Sydney Harbor from what a called the Sydney Heads.  The point on which we stood and the one across the harbor entrance are the headlands of the harbor, now nicknamed The Sydney Heads.  Looking in another direction revealed a very thin layer of rock, above what would be a long fall to the rocks and water below.  I got the impression that perhaps this might be a site for those contemplating suicide.  Even tho the edges of the cliffs are fenced off, I’m guessing people have found ways around them.  I say this because there was a phone with a direct connection to a suicide prevention hotline, and several public service announcement type boards talking about how there is always hope.  It made me sad to think that others would look out at this beauty and be in too much pain to see it.

Altho Gap Park wasn’t very large, they did have some interesting flowers blooming. And, I know its fall and most flowers aren’t blooming at home, down here, the seasons are opposite, and October is spring time, so the flowers are in bloom! I have heard of a bottle brush tree, but never saw an actual bottle brush bloom. I finally got to see one.  It does really look like one of those bottle brushes used to clean bottles, etc.  However, I definitely wouldn’t try that with this bottle brush! And, I believe the yellow bloom is a type of daisy, but I’ve not seen one with the perfect little black accents on the base of its petals.

When we started into Sydney Harbor at o’ dark thirty in the morning, we couldn’t see the Opera House yet, but I did see what I thought was a lighthouse beacon.  I couldn’t see any lighthouse then, but on our drive, we did come across the lighthouse whose beacon I saw much earlier in the morning!

We then drove by a cemetery located up on a high bluff in a Sydney suburb (yes, they call them suburbs).  We didn’t stop, so I couldn’t get individual shots of some of the headstones.  However, perhaps the most interesting – and unique – of the headstones was the one of an Australian race car driver.  His headstone has a statue of him sitting in his race car, looking out toward the open sea.

Our furthest point away from the harbor was to a very popular beach, Bondi Beach.  It is Australia’s most famous beach, and is visited by more than a million people every year. What is interesting is that this now beautiful beach was once the outlet for sewage pouring out of Sydney – yuck!  It took quite a lot of persuading on the part of those concerned, including concerts by popular musicians, to get the government to clean things up, but, as you can see, the finally did.  However, there are other reasons why swimming at any beach in Australia can be problematic.  The rip tides here can be really bad – in fact, at Bondi Beach, there was a relatively small section that was indicated to be safe for swimming.  In addition, there are a couple types of marine life that aren’t compatible with human life.  The first is the Blue Bottle Jellyfish, who is blue in color, and has tentacles long enough to wrap around a person, and then they sting him/her multiple times, which can cause a fatal heart attack.  The second threat to humans, are, of course, sharks. I guess the waters surrounding Australia are really popular with sharks.  We were told that they have helicopters that routinely patrol the area and when either the jellyfish or sharks are determined to be in the area, the beaches are closed.  I guess you really need to like swimming at the beaches here!

On our way back to the ship, we drove thru some charming neighborhoods.  We saw a few (not many) open markets – I love the colors of the flowers, fruits and veggies!  And, there are this narrow, connected homes called Sydney City Houses.  These homes were modeled after the row houses found in England.  However, the problem is that the summers in Australia see temperatures easily into the 90s and sometimes into the 110s!  Housing is so expensive in Sydney, however, that people make due with these homes as best they can just to live in Sydney.  I wondered why they didn’t put in air conditioning, but that wasn’t listed as something that people routinely would do.  Perhaps the cost is prohibitive.  As a point of reference, our tour guide said that a somewhat roomy home in Sydney is about the size of what we call “tiny homes” in the States.  Wow!

After we got back from our bus tour of the Sydney City Sights, Jeff and I decided to take a walk around the harbor.  One of the interesting things I noticed was the Ferry Terminal.  There are ferries coming and going all day.  Where do they go?  Well, the harbor has over 400 miles of coastline, so mostly they act as a sort of water commuter vehicle – watching the ferries come and go reminded me of the Metra trains in Chicago’s Union Station!

We came across many open air restaurants that lined the harbor directly across from our ship.  We did enjoy a lunch – but it was interesting.  We had a hard time getting someone to wait on us at first, and then a British woman came up to me and told me that service in Australia is much worse than in the USA.  She said she once asked a waitress in Australia if she (the woman) was invisible.  The waitress gave a cheeky response – “No, you’re not”, and moved on!!!  Our service wasn’t that bad, thank goodness! Food was tasty, too!

We even walked all the way to the Opera House, so we could get an up close view of it.  It’s really quite amazing.  We didn’t have enough time to go in, but, it was nice to see it from all angles!!  I also really liked that it’s such a gathering place for people.  We saw at least 2 groups of school kids heading there while we were eating.  School outings!  (Oh, by the way, in Sydney, all kids were school uniforms, both public and private schools. Interesting.)

Once we were back on the ship, we still noticed some interesting buildings – one seemed to be an old church, and I really liked the lines of the building.  The other image is of two rows of buildings.  I don’t know what they are now, but at one point, these were cargo ship warehouses.  Companies would ship many different products over from England, etc., and have them stored in these warehouses until they were ready to ship to other companies, etc.  Personally, given their stated housing shortage in Sydney, I think they’d make great lofts!

As I walked around the outside deck, I caught this great image of the Sydney Harbor Bridge.  Did you know it’s also known as “The Coat Hanger”?  Just imagine the hook part that hangs on the rod coming out of the top of the bridge, and you can see why.  The bridge was opened in 1932, and then modified in 1942, for WWII, to include parapets and anti-aircraft guns.  It is the tallest steel arch arch bridge in the world, and the 6^th longest spanning arch bridge in the world.  It’s also great as a fireworks firing point…..just sayin’.

And, we ended the day, as it began, with a look at the Sydney Opera House.  I loved all the activity around it.  You can see some people walking around, if you look close, and the ferry coming in and the sailboat heading further down the harbor.

Enjoy! 

Along the Shore at Tadine, Mare, New Caledonia

We spent a short day at the tiny seaside village of Tadine.  We actually tendered a few miles away from the village, and as Jeff and I opted to just explore around the wharf, instead of riding a shuttle into the village, we had limited exploration options.  However, that doesn’t mean we didn’t get a taste of paradise!  Just check out these images from the area next to where we were let off our tender boat.  Oh, and the colors are from Nature, and not due to any processing on my part!

Enjoy!