Monday 15 April Australia Zoo

The weekend flew catching up with Camomile, trips ashore for shopping and mandatory visits to chandlers but today we were true tourists when we visited Steve Irwin's Australia Zoo...featuring Australian animals. David's been disappointed not to have seen a kangaroo – we've been here for four and a half months and not one kangaroo, some wallabies in Pittwater, but no kangaroos.

sleuthing otter

snoozing koala

Cute kitty

grey roo meets pink human

Graham the croc

Look! he's awake!

A zoo bus picked us up in the centre of Mooloolaba at 9.20am and we were in the park and in position for the first handler talk of the day, the 10.00am otter feed, beautiful Asian short clawed otters and then it was go, go, go for the rest of the day. The main theme and premise of the zoo is conservation and education as most zoos are. I think the difference here is the numerous hands on animal encounters available to visitors, education of the native fauna and raising awareness of endangered species from other countries.

There are koala stations throughout the zoo with sleepy little creatures tucked amongst the eucalyptus and lots of opportunities to touch. I was surprised how soft there fur is. Cute little things. David finally saw, and stroked, grey and red kangaroos, which were roaming free in their enclosures. Obviously all the animals are used to human interaction and are like pets. The kangaroos have very soft fur too. There were crocodiles which Steve had rescued from northern Queensland where they had been getting too close to humans and were in danger of being harmed before they harmed. There were wombats, echidnas, dingoes, emus, cassowaries, Tasmanian Devils and a snake house with all the deadly snakes of Australia represented – we thought it was worth paying attention in case we should ever encounter any in the real wild.

Our personal highlight wasn't a native species, but an endangered one, the Asian tiger. There are a brother and sister pair which were bred in captivity which came to Steve's zoo as cubs and reared with humans. In the afternoon talk the handlers were in with them and showing their training and the animals enjoying the attention.

By the time we got on the return coach at 4 o'clock I think we'd seem all the animals the only thing we didn't have time to do was to visit the on site hospital. We'd stroked koalas, wombats, lizards, sat in the dirt with kangaroos, handled a small alligator, met a barking owl and had a thoroughly wonderful day.