Advertisement
Saturday was an easy day. Gene and I had breakfast at a nice restaurant with a view of Perth across Swan River. From there we did some shopping and later I worked on this travelblog, which takes a lot more time to do than I had thought it would. Mostly it's the amount of time it takes to upload photos onto the site. But now that I know how to resize them (making them digitally smaller), I've cut uploading time considerably and my time on the computer as well. But you do meet some interesting blokes in internet cafes, mostly backpacker types, so I fit in really well... not. My hosteling days are over I think, except maybe elderhostels.
On Sunday, we had a full plate of activities. We drove up north to Yanchep National Park. Only 2 years ago they survived a devastating bush fire. You can still see the blackened trunks of trees. But the park has recovered quite well. The undergrowth grows quickly.
As soon as we got to the gate, we found out that the last cave tour was about to begin, so we had to rush about to buy our tickets and drive
to the entrance of the cave. When we got there, we descended about 60 feet to the cave floor. We had a quirky little tour guide who was amusing in a dry sort of way. She told us that the crystals that are shown in the photo grow only 2 cm in 100 years, and that the big crystals in the cave take thousands of years to form.
Funny little story on the lines of the most stupid criminal cases. A year ago some 20-somethings broke into the cave and broke a few crystals to take as souvenirs. One day a ranger was driving down one of the local roads and noticed someone had put big crystals as decorative ornaments in their front yard. Well, guess where they got them. Yeah, the court case is coming up soon and will sure to be front page news in the paper. There apparently are little, clever people everyway you go.
From the Cave tour we went to the koala enclosure. It's not really an enclosure as much as the place where they put out the ecalytus leaves, the only plant the Koala eats. But since the little fellas are nocturnal,
they were asleep high up in the trees. That's why the picture I took isn't very good. I read that the ecalytus leaves don't provide a lot of food energy, being mostly fiber, so the little guys spend a great deal of their time sleeping. Why don't they eat anything else? Don't know. I'll have to look that one up.
When I overcame the "excitement" of watching the koalas sleep, we walked around the rest of the park. There were plenty of birds and flowers to look at.
Eventually we came upon a herd (?) of kangaroos. Can't come to Australia and face going home if you haven't seen a kangaroo, right? I actually got a picture of a joey (baby kangaroo) nursing its mother. It was amazing to see so many together. But it was hard to get a picture up close. They are a wee shy. Yet the mother let me get within 20 yards or so. Now I can leave Australia satisfied.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.168s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 9; qc: 56; dbt: 0.0671s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
Paula
non-member comment
kangaroos
hang in there, paul. You're not ready for elderhostels yet! Adorable picture of the joey nursing.