Kangaroo Island Day 2

I was apparently so tired yesterday I forgot to mention that I went sandboarding on the white dunes on KI known as Little Sahara. So, I did that, also.

Onto day two of Kangaroo Island!

We got to sleep in a little bit, not leaving until 8:30. Our first stop was a patch of trees that the koalas liked, and we saw one with her joey. How sleepy.


After the exciting koalas, we went on to Admiral's Arch. It was very, very windy and we were afraid of blowing over into the ocean. Thankfully, this did not happen. What happened instead was that we saw the arch and a huge colony of New Zealand Fur Seals. Can you see them in the next two pictures? They are very dark and tend to look a lot like the rocks. They are cute, though; we saw them playing in the waves.

After Admiral's Arch we went on to the part I was most looking forward to: the Remarkable Rocks. They were, in fact, quite remarkable! I am now wishing I had different pictures up, but alas, I do not :( I can't add the pictures I like better, either, because now I am at a hostel and can't connect my computer up to the internet, so you will just have to live with these and see the rest when I come home. Harry Potter (er, Daniel Ratcliffe) recently filmed a movie on KI, which strongly features the Remarkable Rocks. So now if you see the movie, you can say, hey, I know of that place! Also: green jacket with oversized white t-shirt is always a good fashion choice.

The weather cleared up just as we left the rocks, just in time for our hike! We saw lots of kangaroos and sand goannas, which tried to kill you by digging many shallow holes right in the middle of the path, little buggers. The hike ran parallel to a river, and we stopped on the bank many times to look for a platypus, but alas, no such luck. They are apparently very, very shy. We did see platypus bubbles: air that is released from the fur as they are diving. That sentence is not grammatically correct, but I am too upset about not seeing a platypus to care.

We spent about an hour on the beach before hiking back out. Once again, no swimming because people are actually quite regularly eaten by sharks around the island. Sucks. After the hike we went back to the visitor centre to make lunch, and then quickly looked at a paleontological dig-in-progress that was uncovering giant marsupials similar to wombats except the size of cars. It was pretty neat. Then we drove all the way back across the island, caught the ferry, and headed back to Adelaide.

I had a fantastic night with my friends Soxi and Cindy, and Soxi gave me a small book with great photos of Australian wildlife because she is amazing. She and Cindy then drove me to the airport and came with me to my gate to say goodbye. It was very sad leaving Adelaide for good; I still feel like I'm just on a short vacation and then I'll be going back. At least I will see them again soon: they are planning a trip around the States for three months beginning in June!

So after a two hour flight I am now here in Hobart, Tasmania. I am quite far south; the sun juuust went away and it is 10 at night. I saw Hobart from the plane and sort of immediately knew I would love it. It is surrounded on one side by forested mountains and on the other by a river. It is small and quiet and hilly and green and full of old red brick and Victorian buildings. I cannot tell if I love it so much because it reminds me of Ponsonby, the neighbourhood I stayed in in Auckland which I adored, but that doesn't matter. I didn't get here until about 5, so I went out for a slice of pizza and then saw a dumb Ben Stiller movie. I have the whole day tomorrow to explore Hobart, which shouldn't take long because it's kind of small. I plan on going to the Cadbury Chocolate factory, where they take you on a guided tour and give you lots of free samples and then you end up in a bargain store and become fat. I will try my best not to fall into a chocolate river.