Kangaroo Island

Thursday, Feb 13-Monday, Feb 17

Few people outside of Australia have heard of Kangaroo Island.

We found that few Australians have visited KI (as the natives refer to it). 

 

It is about 90 miles long and 40 miles wide. and 25 miles off the coast of Adelaide.

It is about 4500 sq kilometers and 4,500 residents. and 450.ooo sheep! 

It was, at one time, part of the greater land mass of Australia and broke off....

because of its pristine nature, it has been a great place for animals to flourish.  thus,

there is a greater density of  kangaroos, wallabies, koalas and goannas then any other location

and increased the probability that we would get to see them....or so we hoped.

We also heard that it has beautiful beaches, great food and wine and beautiful vegetation..

The weather was supposed to be cooler on this, the third largest island in Australia.

Given my high expectations for KI and my desire to see native animals, we allocated  4 days for

our visit here.

We stayed at K I Seaside Inn which is across from the KI Yacht Club. 

This was an old motel style hotel which turned out to have a great chef and a wierd manager. But the place was adequate for our stay. 

KI yacht club on the first day of some sunshine!

We booked two tours of the island with quite a good tour company that takes only small groups.

The 2  tours were supposed to be different in nature.  The only complaint I would have is that they weren't different enough in content although they covered two different parts of the island. Otherwise, the  guides were gracious, knowledgeable and kind people.  The meals organized by their chef and completed by the guides "al fresco" were fabulous.  And they both worked hard to find the animals we wanted to see and to get the sun to shine,,.

Oh yes...the weather was quite different here...in the 70s and drizzling the two days we were on tour.

The good news is that the following two days were lovely.  

So a bit about the history...

You heard about Flinders discovering South Australia in earlier blogs.  He actually landed first on Kangaroo Island (around 1802) and named it!!  His crew had been at sea for a long time and the boat was a bit leaky so they were starving and worried. When they landed on the island, they saw the kangaroos and the kangaroos had never seen huuman beings before and just stood there watching the people. they did not run.  So they were easy targets for hungry sailors.  After this, Flinders named the island.....you guessed it, Kangaroo Island.  

He came ashore first in what is now called Kingscote, where we stayed for our visit.  

Meanwhile Flinders, who was British, saw a ship with a French flag...now back in Europe, these two countries were at war with each other.  However, they had a "passport" system which gave them 

permission to visit each other's possessions while at sea.  Further, these explorers were "scientists" not soldiers.  They checked in with each other and found their papers were in order and co-existed peacefully.  Because Flinders boat was in bad condition, he did not circumnavigate the  island and instead headed for the mainland where he could get repairs.  Boudin, the Frenchman did.  So the south part of the island has French names; the north British!  

Meanwhile, the Americans were also here in the early 1800s...hunting seals...

They were in an area now called American River. There is a beginning of a replica of a ship  they built there caused the Independence. The first vessel built on KI.

Our first-day guide was Trevor who lives in American River and told us of his move to this area from the mainland, and the construction of his home. We were waiting for 4 other passengers who were delayed in arriving at KI so we were stalling...Trevor took us to his home to see the beautiful estuary that they see from their home.

View of American River estuary from home of our guide

When we found out that the other guests weren't going to land for a while,we went on with what was now a private tour.  One of our goals was to see "remarkable rocks" as well as to see animals.

They really were remarkable.

Leslie and Jack in front of remarkable rocks

Then we went to Admiralty Arch...and the New Zealand fur seals.

Admiralty Arch

What makes those wild looking stalactite- type structures

Are actually calcified, dead roots of trees.

  New Zealand fur seals 

From there we went to lunch near the visitors center of Flinders Chase Park.

Bird watching us dine....so beautiful...almost like a sculpture

So after lunch we went in hunt of Koalas, kangaroos and echinidas.

We did see a koala asleep way up in a tree, but couldn't see his face...

Then...we found a cutie....

Elusive koala holding on to a gum tree

Close to a wallaby

Creative mailboxes

And some "Roos"...we took a few steps and stopped. When they ignored us we took a few more...till we grabbed this shot before they took off.....

Day two in KI

Dale was our guide today and we had one other couple to pick up (we benfitted from cancellations again).  we picked up Audrey and Ken (from washingtton DC) at Stanrauer...a bed and breakfast that was a large ranch in the owners' family for 3 generations.  This is where I tried to book...but it was filled before I had a chance.  

We went directly to Seal Bay (where Dale also works (most people here have several part time jobs) and had a great "tour" of the Australian Sea Lions.  Dale explained that fur seals (like the New Zealand ones we saw yesterday) have a full fur coat and can handle more of the cold.  On the other hand, sea lions like the Aussie ones have one strand of hair out of each follicle and so do not naturally stay as warm.

 

 We went on down to the beach and saw the sea lions along the way as they had come up to bask in the sun (not much out today) and to snuggle up together. 

No comments on similarities to the blogging couple, please

 We had strict instructions not to interact with the sea lions as they are trying to keep them as natural as possible.  So I was scolded when I tried to talk to them in my So. Calif Sea Lion dialect (which was quite different than Aussie).

However, a baby seal came over to visit us...we had to stay very still and hold our hands up...as our fingers look like seafood!

 what a thrill....Dale told us this happens 1/500 tours (maybe)...

We also got to see a baby nursing.  

the mom looked quite exhausted:  they mate, get pregnant for 18 months, give birth and within a week are pregnant again! No wonder she is exhausted.  

then, she leaves her pups and goes to see for several days to eat, come back and nurse some more.

Seal bay is on the south coast and after our visit we headed North to a farm where we had lunch

and then on to the north shore to see another beautiful coast line.

We looked for koalas and echidnas as our co-visitors had not seen a koala and we hadn't seen the echidnas.  Those are something between an ant-eater and a porcupine.  we actually saw one in the road but he eluded us when we stopped to try to look more closely.  He was the only live one we saw. This is the face we loved....

Australian sea lion

Day three on KI Sunday

Day 3 was a big annual horse race day that unfortunately was rained out...the ground was too soggy...the festivities continued, however.

We decided to visit art galleries and the Dudley Penninsula.

(See on map below far right parcel of land)

Penneshaw is the major town here (well, 1200 people) and is where the ferry arrives from the mainland along with cruise ships.

It is only 12 km from the mainland at this point.

Sculpture of Echinida in a gallery window...so that's what they look like....

Echidnas eat termites. So they look for the termite mounds and stick their paws and noses in to find dinner. 

We also heard about the echidna "train:" a train of ten males follows a female, circle around her scratching the ground till the dominant one gets her....sometimes after fights in the train. 

We visited a number of galleries, art studios and two wineries. Got to know "Indiana James" a great artist in found objects and his wife a hat designer ( and yes, Carol, I got a hat for the garden party)....

We also visited one of the 4 lighthouses on KI. Because of the proximity to the mainland and small Islands around, there were many shipwrecks around KI (50?).

 The Cape Willoughby lighthouse was built in 1852.

Cape Willoughby was the first lighthouse to be erected in South Australia, and lights the Backstairs Passage between Kangaroo Island and the mainland.

Day Four on Ki

On our last day, we decided to fill in a few blanks.

Mostly, it had to do with seeing birds and a few spots like Vivonne Bay

and Emu Bay.

At the recommendation of Indiana James, we went to the Raptor Rescue Center and saw the birds there.  Spectacular!

Nanking kestrel 

Boobook owl who can turn neck 270 degrees

Hobbit Falcon

Barn owl nibbling on a mouse

Male sea eagle

Cookabura blue wing

Wedge tail Eagle

 Then on to  Emu bay with a stop in Parndana for lunch and to gas up. A bit about Parndana:

After WW II, there were two needs:  to put veterans to work and to produce food.  So the government created a program on KI for "Soldier settlers."  174 veterans, who were married and had children were given large parcels of land to farm on KI.  all of the families settled in some shared make shift shelters in Parndana while everyone cleared the shared land.  (Despite the lack of privacy, a lot of babies were born 9 months later).  After all the land was cleared, each soldier drew a lot for the parcel he would receive.  The group grew into a very tight community through this process.  when we had lunch, we asked about those settlers and their descendents.  there are a couple of elderly couples who are still alive (late 80s and early 90s now) and living on their farms.  Most of the younger folks left because; farming is very hard here and not very lucrative.  we stopped at the local tractor shop to buy some gas as there are only a few gas pumps on the island! 

Then we went on to Emu Bay. we didnt see any Emus, but we did see Pelicans

    

And with our visit with the pelicans completed, we headed to the airport to fly to Adelaide, spend the night near the airport and on to Queensland.