Australia Zoo

Jerome writes:

Having being given a voucher for Christmas for admission to Australia Zoo, we spent two days there and got to see what a wonderful job has been done to create a sanctuary for many of the worlds endangered animals. It was so well set up, and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. We learned so much and we marvelled at all the different animals God has created.

There were lots of opportunities to get hands-on with the animals, we got to feed the elephants (I got some snot on my hand!) The Crocoseum crocodile show was educational and intriguing as the big crocs jumped for their food - that was Grace's highlight. The tiger show was Dad's and my favourite, they were really so like big pussy cats. I learned that there are about 3000 tigers left in the wild and everyday about 1-5 tigers are killed for their skin, teeth and other things. It is said that at this rate, by 2020, there will no tigers left in the wild. They had a play time and would splash in the water right in the front of us (behind the glass window) and it was quite amazing to see these big animals so active and fun.

Having learnt in Character First, that the Otter shows Joyfulness, we could really understand why! We watched these two cute otters duck and dive and run here and there with lots of energy as they were fed and as the keeper talked about them. They really did seem to be intelligent, busy, happy animals - Mum liked the otters the best.

We got to pat a koala, have a photo with a beautiful blue and gold macaw as well as pat lizards and a snake. Molly and Sophia enjoyed the pony ride, since they were the only ones allowed to do it (we were all too big!) We all marvelled at the HUGE Reticulated Python, about 7m in length and it was really fat as well.

Josie said she loved the memorabilia display. It was a tribute to Steve, showing his journey in croc catching, then when he met Terri and got married and then all the work in did in raising the awareness of his passion - saving wildlife. As sad as it was that he so tragically died, his legacy lives on in what the Zoo does and what it stands for and all the staff at the zoo carry his passion.


After our days at the zoo, we spent the weekend at Toowoomba. We went to church there and met some family of a friend int Perth. It was nice to have a contact and talk about home! Leaving Toowoomba on Monday, we drove south through NSW and are now in Albury - covering 1200km in four days, it was nice to see the crops in the farming districts and the local courntry towns that really reminded me (Kathryn) of our country areas in WA. Albury is cold, 4 this morning, max 12 and tipped to be 1 tomorrow morning. Welcome to the cold!!

PS It was fun to visit "The Dish", just north of Parkes. It was the 64m diameter radio telescope dish that is operated by CSIRO and was used to beam images of the very first man on the moon - as in the movie "The Dish" although there are alot of inaccuracies in that movie too - ie no one has played cricket in the Dish, there was no power failure and the Prime Minister didn't visit - shows you can't believe everything you see. Great education as we watched some astronomy movies in 3D and did some great science!