Saturday was a lazy, lazy day. Visit the chickens, water the gardens, read, and watch the little birds have their weekly bath in the bird bath. The weather was windy and uninviting, so we took the hint and just chilled out.
It's Splendid Wren, bath day.
All males, sharing the bath tub.
Sunday, we chucked all our gear in the Forester, and took off at granny speed (we don't want to go too fast, and miss too much), towards Kingscote. Our plan was to head to Flinders Chase National Park, via a couple of other recommended sights. We were going to need some supplies, and Kingscote is the biggest and last real shop on the island. It is a nice spot, and as it was a beautiful, clear day, the bay looked amazing. Being Sunday, most of the shops were closed, but the Foodland was not. We found ourselves on the jetty, watching a couple of sea lions, and enjoying the views. We took a walk around the town centre, bought our food and drinks, then headed off towards Stokes Bay.
The lovely view across the bay towards Red Banks.
Kangaroo Island Carnabies.
Looking back from the jetty towards the town. Spot the sea lion.
Some strange round thing at the end of the jetty. We spotted the sea lion out here swimming.
Time for another lay in the sun after his dip.
Again, it was a dirt road, that wound around the highest point on the island, Mt McDonnell, at 258m above sea level. On the way, we came across Georges Castle, which is a property, that some person with a great sense of adventure and fun, has built a facade around, to make it look like a castle. It was cool. You are welcome to wander through, and explore, so we did. It even had sword rooms.
Georges Castle. Let's have a closer look.
He even has his own band of Viking Warriors.
Lovely gardens inside the castle walls.
Turrets with their own sword rooms.
Secret undergrowth passages to the turrets.
Still lots of farm land, but some small pockets of conservation land. This really would have been the most amazing island before farming. By mid afternoon, we had arrived at Stokes Bay, a tiny little bay with a cafe, and a secret beach. It wasn't that good a beach, but we parked and decided to take more of a look. There was a small camping area behind the cafe, a free BBQ in a shelter with picnic tables on the beach, and signs leading through some gaps in the cliff, for another beach. Hmmm, let's investigate. Through the secret passage we went, ducking and weaving our way, before bursting out onto a gorgeous, white sandy bay, with lots of people, rock pools, and beautiful, blue, clear water. Very nice! We took a stroll along the beach and back, and decided we'd camp the night here. It was $10, very good, and they had clean, flushing toilets, but no showers. No worries! So we set up, cooked dinner on the barbecue, and enjoyed the evening down at the beach.
Heading down from Mt McDonnell to Stokes Bay.
Looking for the secret beach.
I can hear voices through here, Will, come on.
Wow, what a nice surprise.
Rugged and beautiful.
It really was very spectacular.
Ouch, bloody stupid knees.
Nonuts and Beckie, looking after our camp site. What's for dinner guys?
Twin luxury boats moored for the night in the sheltered bay.
Our dinner view. Very nice.
There was lots of kangaroos and little wallabies, plenty of wrens and other birds too. In the morning, we ate breakfast, made coffees, and just relaxed under the trees. It didn't take us long to pack up, and mid morning, we headed off "down south" for the national park. As we were passing by Parndana, one of the three towns/settlements, we stopped for a look. We decided to indulge in a pie and cool drink, when we stocked up on milk. Awesome pie, second to the Normanville one. Very close.
Spotted our second Echidna, he was much more shy.
And tried to hide in the trees. So cute.
Carrying on, we finally reached the national park, and the scenery was much nicer. Lots of lovely thick natural woodlands, and tall trees. Only disappointment was the Bluegum plantations. Lovely tall lush trees, that they have no market for, as there is no way to get the wood off the island yet. Once they do manage to harvest them, the soil is no good for anything else. Dilemma! But, not dwelling on that, we made our way into the Visitors centre, where we booked The Postmans Cottage, a heritage hut, for two nights. This would give us plenty of time to explore, so we started off by heading to The Remarkable Rocks, which were quite remarkable. It was blowing a gale, and luckily we still had some ballast to keep us securely on the ground. Amongst the bus loads of loud tourists, we managed to enjoy the views and interesting rock formations.
Way out on the point are the rock formations.
Even from here they look pretty cool.
Oh god, a bus load. Time to carry on guys, quick smart!
Hold on to the sign Will, strong winds are here today.
Pretty amazing rocks,
My artsie, fartsie, shot.
Hiding from the bus load, and waiting for some peace, before exploring some more.
Will's artsie, fartsie shot.
How does that happen? Remarkable indeed.
Back at the Forester, we made some afternoon tea, watched the Splendid Wrens hopping around the bushes. They are so bright blue, you cannot miss them. Next stop, Admirals Arch. Another great spot, full of sea lions, New Zealand Fur seals, and rugged coast. We spent so much time spotting the seals, laying in the cracks, on the ledges, and swimming in the sea. There were lots of fights for territory, going on, with the ladies due in from feeding to have pups and breed again. Eventually, we thought we had better find what we had actually come to see, and walk down to the Arch. It was quite spectacular, but still over shadowed by the seals. They are so fun to watch. The wind was howling, and it was cold down under the Arch, so we hurried back up, and finally headed to our little hut.
Another cool lighthouse.
With no fingers or toes, how do they climb up to those ledges?
How many seals can you see on the rocks? They are so good at hiding.
Finally, the Admirals Arch. The walkway, and viewing platforms were great.
So much fun watching these guys. Climbing up was amazing, to get down, was just plain funny. They just flop and face plant. Ouch!
A really beautiful spot, and we would have stayed even longer, but for the wind.
It was a cool little hut, that was built by the May family, in the late 1800's as his family out grew their homestead. Later it was used to house the postman, who came once a fortnight. You can also stay in the Mays cottage, it has more rooms. But this was perfect for us. We made dinner, enjoyed a couple of glasses of wine, and watched the kangaroos around us. A busy day, with lots of sights.
Our little hut, with the bathroom next to it.
Nonuts and Beckie like it. I think they are planning a big night?
Monday saw us going in search of some koalas and platypus. There are many walks and hikes in this park, so we took on three, that formed a loop, right from our cottage, through the Black Swamp, to Platypus pool, and back. A total of ten kilometres, but mostly flat easy walking. Straight away, we spotted a couple of grey balls, swaying with the tree branches. They had picked the flimsiest branches, but didn't look concerned, just asleep.
Our first Koalas. So cute.
We crossed the empty lagoon, spotting some Cape Barren Geese, then along the trail to the Platypus pools. Lots of changes in bush, lots of flowers, and everything is prickly. So many gorgeous birds flitting here and there, and finally we reached the pools where there are supposed to be up to 200 platypus. Surely we can spot one. I know the best times are dawn and dusk, but surely one of them wants to come out mid day? Nope! Nothing! We spent about 45mins at two different pools, just sitting quietly, watching for ripples or bubbles, but saw nothing but cute little wrens. Oh well, never mind, it was very relaxing and pleasant.
The trail had sections of walkway to protect the area.
It looks like these geese are eating the kangaroo poo, but I'm sure they're not.
This is our trail, and we're happy the sun has come out, and the rain past.
Flowers everywhere, all colours and sizes.
No platypus, but some of these Red Breasted Wrens. They were so quick.
The only one we had a hope of seeing.
Continuing our walk, we came into some woodland areas, spotting a small wallaby in amongst it all, and eventually popping back out onto the lagoon area. We finished our walk following the heritage trail, getting really close to some young Cape Barren Geese, spotting another couple of Koalas, and a very tough goanna. Just as we arrived back at the cottage, we noticed a large grey ball of fluff, up in the massive tree right in front of our cottage. How super, what an amazing day of Aussie animals. Plenty of kangaroos, busy eating next to our cottage, wallabies, koalas and birds galore. Awesome day, fantastic area of this island.
Hello little guy, carry on.
These were young, and not at all scared of us. They had a very quiet little peep sound.
This guy could play Blinky Bill, for sure, check out those ears.
This guy was not fussed about the fact we nearly trod on him.
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