16 March 2009

Today we boarded our bus from Rainbow Beach for Noosa which only took about 3 hours. We arrived midday and caught a free shuttle bus to our hostel. The hostel was very nice and chilled with each couple of rooms having their own living room and kitchen. After checking in and dropping our bags we headed out to explore the area around the hostel. We were just around the corner from a lovely strech of beach and as it was such a lovely day we decided to relax on the beach for a while. Later in the evening we caught the bus to the town centre and went to the cinema to see Confessions of a Shopaholic. The film was really good but unfortunately gave us the shopping bug which we had been trying hard to resist. Whilst we had been in the cinema a terrential downpour had begun but we lucky managed to call a taxi and rush back to hostel before we got too wet. When we arrived back at our hostel we decided to get an early night before our day at the zoo tomorrow.

17 March 2009

We caught a shuttle from our hostel at 8.00am and then hopped on to a free bus to Australia Zoo. It took just over an hour to reach the Zoo from Noosa. Our first stop was to see the tazmanian devils which we were told were becoming increasingly endangered in australia. We also stopped by the Koala enclosure despite the fact that we had already been to the Koala sanctuary on Magnetic Island. They were really cute and sleepy and hanging around in little groups clinging to the branches. Later on we went to 'The Crocoseum' to catch the Wild Animal show, the highlight if which was the Crocodile show. The trainers were trying to explain how to avoid being attacked by a croc in Australia by basically showing you what not to do. This involved them dangling meat over the side of the croc pool and stamping very loudly at the waters edge to get the crocs attention! The show was pretty impressive though and also showed videos with the Irwin family talking about the importance of conserving australias wildlife.

There was also a section of the zoo that showed photos and newspapers cutting of Steve Irwin as a kind of memorial to him but the focus was definately on celebrating his memory. You could even get pictures with Steve Irwin and your favourite animal super imposed in the background.

His signature catchphrase 'Crikey' also featured heavily on all the videos and publicity around the zoo. Later in the day we decided to try and get some pictures with the Kangaroos who had their own enclosure where they could bounce around freely. We bought some Kangaroo feed and managed to entice them close enough to take some good pictures. The best part of the day was when we saw a tiny joey pop out of its mother pouch really close by. It was so cute and kept on dissapearing back in the pouch and then popping its head out again! After the excitement of the Kangaroo feeding and taking hundreds of photos we boarded the bus back to the hostel. The journey wasn't that straightforward however as the bus broke down just outside Noosa and we had to wait for a lift from a freindly local bus driver. When we eventually arrived back at the hostel we watched a few episodes of our new favourite programme 'Bondi Rescue' and then headed to bed.