Phillip Island Weekend Trip

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April 1st 2008

Published: April 1st 2008

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cindyatmonash

Our set of Wheels!

Our trusty vehicle

Well it looks like I haven't been keeping up my end of the bargain in posting messages very often 😞 Things have definitely been busy in the last few weeks, but as we are just returning from Easter/Mid Semester/Fall Break (whatever you want to call it!), I thought I'd recap a few of the things I've been up to in and around Melbourne.

Over the weekend of March 15th, a few of my friends and I hired a car and traveled to Phillip Island. Located in Western Point Bay, it's famous for its Penguin Parade, in which the public has the opportunity to watch clusters of penguins coming in from the ocean late in the evening.

We began our day with a trip to the Koala Conservation Centre. We had the opportunity to walk throughout the park and even through the tree tops and observe koalas in their natural habitat. It was so much fun to search throughout the park until we found koalas moving between trees, feeding on the eucalyptus leaves on the trees, and even taking their very frequent naptimes. They are so cute...but so lazy!! One of the guides even said that koalas move around very

Group Shot

The group at Phillip Island

minimally and spend most of their time sleeping or eating eucalyptus. Quite the easy lifestyle!

Following the Conservation Centre, we traveled to a well known beach on the island, Surf Beach. The water, as it is in all of Australia, was SOO cold! However, we had the chance to walk on the several rock formations out to the water and saw a fantastic view! Because of the rocks and the water, the wind was rather strong, but the weather was perfect to see such a lovely beach!

We spent a few hours in the afternoon at the island's Natural Wildlife Park. This was so cool for me, because this was my first encounter with those fuzzy, furry creatures that are your typical Australian animals: the kangaroo, wallaby, tasmanian devil, the DINGO, and a whole host of really cool others. We were each given a bag of animal feed and we traveled around the park feeding the geese, the 'roos, and the cute wallabies. I steered clear of the emus and the dingoes---they didn't look too friendly 😊

In the evening, we visited a place called the Nobbies, close to where the penguin parade was taking place. The

Fun Fact

Did you know?

Nobbies are giant rock formations in the water that create the perfect landscape! Out further into the water, we could see a place called Seal Rocks, which is exactly how it is called: where more than 16,000 seals can be found during the year. We saw a few of them sunbathing on the rocks, but because of the time of year, we did not get to travel out to the rocks to see them.

The Penguin Parade was so exciting! We arrived around 7pm and waited in bleacher-type seating, along with many other onlookers. At around 8:15pm, we saw the first group of penguins....they were so small and so cute!! There were about 10 or so that were traveling together and it was so fun to see them move in unison. The birds that were resting on the beach sand were trying to create a barrier for the penguins to cross, and it was very funny to see the penguins move closer and closer to the beach. However, as soon as a bird or two would move closer, the penguins would get scared and run back into the water!! Such a humourous site to see! We watched more than

Wait a minute?

Which one is the *REAL* koala?!

150 penguins make their way from the water to their habitat in the hills behind the bleachers, watching for over 1.5 hours!

I had a wonderful time seeing all of the wildlife in Phillip Island and also the beautiful landscapes all around us! The pictures are so beautiful, but it is definitely worth taking a visit!

-Cindy 😊

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