Naughty Wombats

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Day 59

We thanked Derek and Karen for putting us up, and they thanked us for doggy sitting Moffy and Charlie. We left their place in Caloundra at around 08.30 am, hooked up with the trailer on route to Australia Zoo, today was NAUGHTY WOMBAT DAY.

We checked in through the group bookings aisle as we had been told and then went across to information to book in for the Naughty Wombats, really just to tell them we were there, we saw uncle Alan, who we were out having dinner with last night, and managed to pull his leg a little.

We walked around the zoo and with our past knowledge of working there we had a better perspective of the layout and saw some animals we had not seen before, like the komodo dragons, the perentie lizards and some more of the wetlands area. Caroline was chuffed as the weather was not that hot the tigers were quite active, getting some good digital images.

We walked around until lunchtime, we decided on an early lunch, as we had to be at the information centre at 2.00pm for our Naughty Wombat experience. Walking up to the food court

Twice while we were sat eating our lunch, I was crashed into, the first time a little boy, sitting next to me not thinking about his actions, leaned on a chair and sent it flying into my leg, then no more than 5 minutes later, I heard ‘Oh S**t, then crash as this chap using an motorised disabled carriage, crashed into my chair. Hurriedly made his apologies put the carriage in reverse and went racing off!

Just after lunch we went around the back of the crocoseum on the upper level so that we could see the huge crocodiles that they use in the shows, we never thought much about seeing the group of security guards around there and just gazed at the immense size of these creatures (the crocodiles that is, not the security guards). However after a few minutes our thoughts were interrupted as we heard a door open behind us, we both swung round and standing in front of us was Terri Irwin, Bob and Bindi. Bob went running off, closely chased by his security guard and closely followed by the voice of his mother. The security guards all swarmed around Terri and her family and off they went. A little later on we did see Bindi walking around the zoo with her security guard.

Promptly at 2.00pm, we were by the information desk awaiting collection by the photographer up to the Wombat enclosure, where the keepers were waiting and we would receive a briefing on the activity.

There were only six of us and were told that you must stay behind the Wombat, and stroke him from its neck backwards and try not to get to the side or in front as they are very territorial.

In the Wombat enclosure were 3 Common Wombats Tonka, Dozer Mini-Bus and a Southern Hairy Nosed Wombat called Grotty, quite an unfair name for such a beautiful creature.

The Common Wombats have very coarse hair, whilst the Southern Hairy Nosed Wombat (Grotty) has very soft hair. They have the face of a beaver, a nose of a Koala, and the body of a bulldozer and they grow up to about 1.3 metres in length and weigh about 36kgs. They have an extra layer of muscle on their backs so any potential predator will be unable to injure them as it acts lie armour plating. The closest living relative of the wombat is the Koala.

We spent about 30 minutes in with the Wombats, they were fantastic, such brilliant creatures. They were very well behaved except for one who sloped off only to be found having a sleep in the cool shade of the bushes. In our opinion though I do not think that they were very naughty. We were expecting that they might have bitten someone.

We took loads of photos; the zoo photographer also took some good shots, which we purchased on CD Rom. We waited to delivery of the CD Rom and we headed back to the truck.

The fridge had had an explosion in side, a can of coke split, and sprayed coke all over the inside our Evacool fridge.

At around 4.00pm we headed off 10 minutes down the road to Ruth and David’s house, where we were having dinner and staying the night.

They share their beautiful home with rescued animals; Ruth has such a passion for helping other animals. As we have mentioned previously on the blog, we met Ruth, who is the Business manager for Gary Crick Nissan, where we purchased the truck from and her Husband David works for Australia Zoo driving the coaches.

The Cockatiels are called Dudley, Deirdre, Daisy and Barney, they are all boys and Malee the whippet, King the Greyhound and Oakey the Jack Russell/Fox Terrier are the dogs and Millie the cat. Oakey reminds me of Sherry, a dog we had when I was growing up, Sherry was also a cross with a Jack Russell/Fox Terrier, but she was a lot taller than Oakey.

Ruth is an avid Arctophile “A human who enjoys the company of a teddy bear” originating from the Greek word Arktos and Philos meaning Bear Friend, she has absolutely loads of bears.

Ruth also has this fetish for cup cakes. Everywhere you look there is a cupcake of some description, pictures, crockery, ornaments, Candles, in fact anything that you could make a cupcake out of. Even in our room there was a plate of artificial cup cakes that looked good enough to eat.

We have a real pleasant evening, great fun talking about David’s love for old British programs like Basil Brush, On the Buses, Please Sir and Are you being served?

We enlighten Ruth to the intricacies of the shopping point game (Sorry David!).

Then it was off to bed, great night and great company

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Photos

I'm Hungry
Looking hungrily at the crowd!

Parentie Lizard
Basking in the sunshine

Russell
The Electus Parrot who likes to terrorise unsuspecting females

Red Kangaroo
Look at my beautiful tail

Caroline Strokes a Wombat
This is from our Naughty Wombat Experience

Wombat
Closest living relative is the Koala.

Explosion
A can of coke explodes in our fridge.

Monty and Goldie
Monty is a huge crocodile and is often seen in the Crocoseum, one of Steve Irwins favourite crocodiles.