I think Oliver has already blogged “Crikey! The price” about this place. It was always going to be on the itinerary because both Angus and Tiger have always had a bit of a thing about Steve Irwin having seen him on the TV and both written biographies of him for projects at school. Angus even shares his birthday with him. We nearly turned back when we saw the £120 price tag but decided to try to forget this and enjoy the experience. Since his death the zoo has clearly become a kind of a shrine to Steve Irwin with cardboard cut outs of him everywhere and big signs saying “Crikey” all over the place. There is a whole wall with photos of him throughout his life and messages from loads of fans about how much they admire him and so on. Annoyingly we got there too late to see the full Croc show that is held in the “Crocoseum” ( a massive open air stadium each morning) however we did sit in the baking heat watching a couple of crocs get fed in the afternoon so we did not feel too cheated. The zoo was very hands on and the kids got to hand feed kangaroos and elephants (so did I) and pat a koala. We got really close to the koalas generally under the supervision of a keeper and we saw a mum and baby which was unbearable cute. Oliver took a very good photo which is in our section on Australia Zoo. It is a well deigned place, well looked after with very healthy and lively animals. We saw gambolling otters, a lady feeding the echidnas up close, wombats bimbling about, there were Eastern Water Dragons just wandering loose about the place – in fact a large one of these greeted us as we got through the gate which made us all jump. The thing that scared us the most though was seeing the actual size of the funnel web and trap door spiders that we had walked past the nests of, in the rainforest a day or so before. Oliver went a bit white. All in all it was a good place but so it should be for that kind of money!
Jo