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Published: February 19th 2012
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We decided that since we didn’t yet have anywhere to live in Melbourne, that we would turn this to our advantage and hire a camper van to live in for a few days. We checked out of the hotel and left the luggage that we didn’t need for a few days at the hotel, to give us some more space in the van, and we then caught the tram over to St Kilda where we were picking up our Jucy wagon.
After signing some paperwork and a quick run through of how to convert the wagon into a bed for the nights, we were on our way to Ramsay St! It was only a 40minute drive from St Kilda to Ramsay St. It’s just an ordinary street in a suburb in Melbourne really, apart from the unlucky security guard who has the job of sitting outside the Robinsons house all day – and moving away each time another tourist wants a photo! We got the obligatory photos of the Bishops and Robinsons Houses and then it was on to Coles to stock up the van with some food and drink for the next couple of days.
We headed south
out of Melbourne around Port Phillip to San Remo, where we crossed over the bridge to Phillip Island. It was late afternoon when we arrived on the Island so we made a quick stop at the tourist centre to buy tickets for the Penguin Parade later in the evening and then we headed over to The Nobbies on the far side of the Island. The Nobbies are 2 Rock formations in the ocean where you can sometimes see sealions. Unfortunately there were no sealions while we were there, but it was a picturesque setting even without the sealions so we followed the boardwalk along the cliffs.
It was then time to find where we were going to sleep for the night – you pay a penalty if you’re caught parked in a camper anywhere but a campsite overnight, but there were plenty to choose from on the drive from The Nobbies to Cowes on the North side of the Island. We chose the Anchorage Park just outside of Cowes and paid our fees whilst the reception was still open before continuing our drive on to Cowes. Here we parked up and bought Fish n Chips from the local takeaway,
took some wine from our fridge in the camper and ate our dinner on the hill overlooking the beach – along with a whole swarm of very brave seagulls!
We headed over to the Penguin Parade at about 7pm to make sure we got a good view. The penguin parade is set up with a long fenced board walk leading from the car park to 3 small sets of stadium seating on the beach looking out to the ocean. We didn’t realise quite how exposed the seating was going to be with the wind picking up in the evening and so didn’t really have the best clothing for waiting for the Penguins for 2 hours. However we did have the forethought to smuggle a flask of wine down to the beach which went some way to keeping us warm. Whilst waiting for the Penguins to appear we saw a sealion playing in the waves who was doing his part to keep the crowds entertained.
The penguins come in from a day’s feeding in the Ocean in little ‘rafts’, groups of about 10 little penguins. We saw the first ones appear just before 9pm as they waddled out of
the water and waited for all their friends to be ready on the shoreline before waddling as fast as they could (which wasn’t all that fast really) to the back of the beach and the shrubbery where they felt safer. Apparently their main predator are birds of prey which why they wait til dusk to run across the exposed beach. From then on we saw several little groups of penguins waddle out of the water and race up the beach – a couple of penguins were too slow and often left behind in the shoreline waiting for another group to turn up so that they could join them in their race across the beach.
The penguins then make their way through the shrubbery up to their burrows, which can be 1 or 2km inland. The boardwalk follows the paths that the penguins take from the beach to their burrows, so on the walk back to the car park you could walk next to the penguins which were only a metre or so away from you! It was amazing to see them so close, and many of them weren’t bothered at all that they were surrounded by people!
At
about 11pm we drove our Jucy wagon to the campsite and converted the back into our bed for the night – surprisingly cosy! We settled down with a DVD for our first night in the wagon.
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