Day 3 - We know the date is May 14, but may have jet lag

And that is because we got all organized for our tour in the bush to see koala bears, kangaroos and other indigenous wildlife and forgot to take the pair of binoculars that Tom and Margie Carter were kind enough to give us for this trip.  We will have other chances, but this was a miss.  Good thing that our tour guide, Martin Maderthaner, of Echidna Walkabout, had extra "binos".

We were joined on this excursion by Nathan and Zacahry, who came from Los Angeles, by way of Ohio and Wisconsin, and Ann, a young woman from the northeastern region of France who was finishing a nine month leave.  Nathan and Zachary came to Australia last Friday and spent the first few days in Sydney.  They highly recommended the climb of the Sydney Bridge just before sunset.  May have to consider that.  Ann had taken the Trans-Siberian Railway trip through Russia to Mongolia.  She had been to Japan, Cambodia, Vietnam, Malaysia, New Zealnd, and Australia.  Martin is a South African who met his wife there.  His wife is from Melbourne.  They spent the first six years of their marriage in South Africa, and relocated to Melbourne.  Martin returns to South Africa three months out of the year to lead safaris.  And we thought we were world travelers.  Well, not really, but almost every day we are reminded how small our world has been.

Well, off we went to the bush, without binos, to You Yangs Park, only 45  minutes west of Melbourne.  It is amazing to see what we did that close to a metropolitan area that exceeds 4.5 million.  The You Yangs Park is an area important to the Wauthaurong Tribe, the local Aboriginal people, who support the area.  You Yangs Park has a number of Koalas, Wallabys and some kangarooos.  The tour has an advance guide go out in the morning and mark places were the koalas are.  While a koala may move as far as 150 yards in a day, they often are in one tree a day.  So the first koala we saw was a female, Worinyaloke, about 50 feet up in a Blue Gum Eucalyptus tree.  And she, I assume with the rest of the koalas out there, is the only animal I know of whose excrement doesn't stink.  She was relatively active for a koala and when we found her she was grooming and pooping.  So Martin goes over and picks up her poop pellet - with is bare hands - sticks it up to his nose and says how nice it smells.  Koalas eat the leaves from the eucalyptus trees they inhabit, and we had to admit, the poop didn't smell bad.  Smelled like eucalyptus.  We just didn't want to think about it much, though.

We saw another female and then got to see Victor.  Say hello to Victor.

You can't see it in this picture, but the males have a little more color than the females, predominantly a brown patch on a male's chest.

We refer to the koalas by name because the people who maintain the reserve can identify the koalas by their noses and the markings on them.  Pretty cool.  After seeing a Wallaby, who looked like a shorter, stockier kangaroo, but who are loners.  Kangaroos travel in packs  We helped for a few minutes and cleared some boneseed weeds from one of the areas that is damaging the koalas' habitat.  It's not like kudzu, but is flourishing and keeps the koalas from climbing the trees.

We had a picnic lunch and had some Billy tea.  That is not a reference to the ingredients, black tea and blue gum eucalyptus leaves, but the billy, the can that the tea is made in.  The tea was good.  And it lead to Rene wondering aloud if Billy Beer, the beer that was merchandised when, Billy's brother, Jimmy, was President, had anything to do with Billy tea.  And then when I reminded her that in fact his name was Billy....  More evidence of jet lag.

After that chuckle, we drove off to Serendip Open Range Sanctuary, to see some Emus, and 'roos.  Found about two dozen kangaroos.  Here is a picture of five of them.

They were pretty relaxed seeing us there.  Even though they are on a reserve with fences, the fences are only five feet tall and the kangaroos just jump over them and go wherever they hell they want.  The fences are for the Emus, who apparently have no sense and will walk out in front of a car as much as anythng.

We saw parrots, cockatoos, a Tawny Frogmouth (like an owl, and nocturnal, so it was unusual to see them during the day, Black Swans, cranes, Magpies, and Magpie Geese, the Austarlian Buster (Rene called it an Australian Bastard), hawks, and generally, the Australia countryside.  I'd have pictures if we could figure out how to get Rene's pictures.  The blog is still a work in progress.  Fun day out walking.  And managed to avoid stepping in the kanagaroo and Emu poop that was all over the place.  Martin wasn't picking up any of that stuff, but regailed us with a story about how, in his much younger days, he and the other guides in Africa would have to pick up pellets from whatever the hell they were tracking out there, and get drunk and have contests to see who could spit the pellets the farthest.

Despite Martin's seeming fascination with poop, I got his card and want to get a group together and have him lead us on a safari.  Martin loves what he does, was very informative and pleasant.  And we hope to see him some day again on another continent.  I will check to see if I need to pack a poop scooper.

Okay.  The branding and the door?  That is the door to hihou, a Japanese themed bar with the feel of an American speakeasy, only that you walk to this door with no sign, ring the doorbell, and you are greeted by the host or hostess who asks you the secret question, "Do you have a reservation?".  And if you are Scot and Rene Seabaugh, you smartly answer, "No".  Really cool bar.  Great referral of the whisky.  Will try to add that one to the collection.  Check them out on Yelp and visit the next time you are in the east end of Melbourne's CBD.

On to Appollo Bay tomorrow and the first time I will drive in a different country.  120 miles of winding road.  This ought to be good.

Cheers!