Phillip Island Nature Park

On arriving in Melbourne I was disappointed, I had just spent 8 weeks travelling round Asia where apart from Vietnam the weather was B E A utiful. To arrive in Melbourne and be met by grey skies, wind and rain was a little bit upsetting, then to see that the price of everything is double and sometimes triple to the price of London. Well I'm sure I …

Truly the most amazing day - which is a hard title to win on this trip but this one definitely gets it. We took the Bunyip Tours 1 Day Phillip Island Penguin Parade Ultimate Tour which took us south of Melbourne to Phillip Island for the following fabulousness:

After an amazing morning spent with the Red Pandas at Mogo Zoo it was time to jump back in the campervan and continue on the last few days of our drive to Melbourne. An old Aussie chap we'd met at the vineyard had told us that we should definitely stop at Eden on our way and check out the Whaling Museum so we figured as it was en-route why not?

On our way through the airport at Auckland we decided to have a farewell drink of the local beer and wine then boarded the plane for our 3 and a half hour flight, we arrived in Melbourne at 9pm and got the shuttle bus straight over to the hostel.

Melbourne is Australia's second largest city and is the most European of all of them, with …

Key in ignition. Car into 'D' (stands for 'Drive' apparently). And turn key...
Shummdddddddddidddddddd grrrrrrrrrrr pffffft.
Try again...
pfffft.
and again...
pfffft.

Damnit. We've been given a duffer. The car is refusing to start. Panic begins and Kate starts berating Budget. "They've given us a **** car,we've got to …

Aujourd'hui nous sommes allés sur une visite guidée pour aller voir des animaux sauvages. Nous sommes allés avec Australian Luxury Tours. Le nom de not guide etait Bruce et il était très gentil et nous a beaucoup appris sur les animaux. Le début de la journee a commencer a 2 heures, parce que les pingouins sur l'île de Phillips ne sort pas de l'eau …

... i have to admit, but hey, free is free right?) to check out a surf beach where a competition was actually going on, and to a nature park! I thought it was really cool since i hvaen;t had a chance yet to see any of the "aussie" animals. We got to pet a ...

... the Island,  very pleased to be near the sea. After we had some lunch we went to the Koala Reserve.  This is a nature park set up to assure that the koalas remain on the Island.  The locals are very concerned about conservation and the ...

... We bought some chocolates in the gift shop and headed out to the car. We arrived at Maru Wildlife park next. This is a small nature park which is family run. We were able to see a lot of native animals up close and Anthony was lovely enough to pay for a ...

... a few photos of the fantastic trees that line the main street.  We then drove to the other corner of the island to the nature park, where there were a few more tourists about. It offered a nice walk along boardwalks blanketed by a nice green soft ...