We left the house about 9.30 am and drove for around an hour and a half to the edge of the Great Divide which is a row of mountains separating the coastal area from the flat central area. We drove through a pretty town called Healesville to the said Healesville Wildlife Sanctuary. It was a boiling hot day with another azure blue sky with ne’er a cloud in sight. These vibrant and ruthlessly cloudless skies just keep a comin !
We entered the sanctuary, taking a moment with the map of the site to see what we wanted to visit first. Steven was determined to see the wombats, which are his favourite Australian mammal, and after a couple of anxious moments of peeling our eyes, I could so see why this was the case. 16 year old Florence came trotting over to us and totally won my heart ! A little bigger than a badger but with brown silky hair like a dog and large sleepy eyes and a nose which twitched with the air of a brown Winnie the Pooh ! It was the most endearing little thing I have seen in a long time. Sadly the main roadkill in these parts is often the brown wombat. I wanted to take her home.....
The delectable Florence !
We dragged ourselves away from Florence to see the Koalas. They were largely sleeping although some wriggles and back scratching did happen whilst we stood quietly by. They sleep for 22 out of 24 hours of the day due to the soporific and low nutritional content of the eucalyptus leaf diet, basically, so Steven tells me, the diet is so fibrous it takes that long to digest or they may be slightly drugged by the chemical toxins in the leaf........a new sleeping aid perhaps. They are bigger than I thought and tubby and round with thick fur, hanging in the cross of two branches telling the watcher, I am asleep ‘do not disturb ‘. Apparently they smell pleasantly of cough drops due to the diet of eucalyptus leaves, although I didn’t get close enough for my nose to catch that perfume ! When the spray of water was playing over their dry fur however they moved and enjoyed the cool, allowing it to hit their stomach, behind and head. Clearly the shower was a hit ! It was a magical, quite breathtaking sight, and to be so close to these entirely unique and almost ‘fictional’ to the Pom, animals.
‘When is my shower happening boss ?’
Life is tough when you are enjoying yourself .....
We moved on to the flight arena where the magnificent birds of prey flew around us and showed their immense strength and power, but sadly you will have to wait for pictures of the largest eagle in Australia- the Wedge Tailed Eagle, as I needed to move into some serious shade and use my camera fan, thus opening up the phone, turning on the camera, putting off the fan and shooting photos was, as they say at NASA.....’not an option’ ! Steven got some excellent action shots which he will send to me sometime !
We moved on to the hedgehog of Australia, the Echidna. It is not related at all to the hedgehog as it has a pouch, and that being so is a marsupial, but to the untutored eye is is mighty similar. It is much larger and with a long snout and we were very close to it’s slow snufflings and roamings around the tree stumps on the ground. They were as cute as it comes, but the spikes were to be avoided as they give a very painful prick !
Echidna on its daily snuffle for food !
Around us all the time were the Ibis birds, helping themselves to picnics, rubbish or anything which was vaguely edible ! For such a large and elegant bird it’s nickname of Bin Chicken seems somewhat incongruous! They were absolutely everywhere, at every turn, or simply padding along beside us with long model like legs and clean white feathers hoping for a scooby snack !
Bin Chicken by name and Bin Chicken by nature !
The boys very much enjoyed the carvings and climbing rocks during the visit !
We were all pretty pooped by the time we had seen most of the wildlife and badly in need of a sit down, a coffee, some lunch and a rest. The temperature was soaring so we opted for a quick ice cream and coffee then a cool air conditioned drive home !
More wildlife happened for dinner......how wonderful these local Australian Tiger Prawns tasted, naked with a little sauce - a perfect end to a perfect day.
Yum......
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