Day 76: Phillip Island, Australia (March 24, 2011)

Today's day tour went to Phillip Island, home of the Little Penguins (that's really what they called, being the smallest of the 17 penguin species). These little guys are about 10 - 12 inches tall, and are the most reliably viewed animals in the wild. Every evening just after the sun sets, hundreds or thousands of the Little Penguins come up out of the ocean where they've been fishing for a few days, and make their way up paths to their nests on shore. They appear in small groups, just popping out of the surf, like fat, hairy and miniature Aphrodites. Then they waddle up the beach until they make it home, where they hang out for a few days before going back in the ocean for more fishing.

Today's visit was at the start of molting season, where the penguins shed their old feathers and grow new ones before winter (remember the seasons are reversed in the southern hemisphere).  Since the molting takes 21 days, the penguins have to overfeed because they won't be able to hunt again for 3 weeks.  So several of the penguins were very fat when they returned to land.  The fat ones would waddle about 10 steps, then would fall forward onto their bellies and just lie there for a minute or two before continuing towards their nests. 

There was one crazy penguin who was running in the opposite direction of everyone else, like he lost his buddies and was going back to look for them.  He was very excited and kept flapping his wings and getting in the faces of the other penguins.  I splurged on a private guided tour so I could ask questions and get the best views of the penguins.  My guide said she'd never seen such strange behavior in a penguin.  She even radio'd the other guides to ask if penguins might get mental illnesses and the consensus was yes, probably.  So I saw a mad penguin on the loose.

No one is allowed to take photos of the penguins during their nighttime return home, but earlier in the day, we went to a penguin hangout and managed to spot a few hiding out under a boardwalk:

This hillside area right next to the coast is the windiest place I've ever been in my life. It's hard to photograph the wind (which is sort of "duh" but also too bad because the wind can be cool), but maybe you can see by my hair how hard the wind blew:

It later took me 30 minutes to comb the snarls out my hair.

Seeing the Tiny Penguins waddle up the beach to their homes was the highlight of the day. The rest of the day was fine, but it was kind of a weird tour. Like, whoever put it together didn't know what else to include, so we got a hodgepodge of local things:

A winery, which was good, but not unique to Australia:

A chocolate shop, which gave out tons of free chocolate (well, free for people who pay to take the tour) and which features several pieces of chocolate "art" like this mosaic of local gal Dame Edna, made up of 12,000 truffles:

And the Koala Conservation Center, which at least went along with the theme of seeing native Australian wildlife:

See the baby?

Their big bottoms let them sit comfortably in the trees without falling out.

We also stopped for lunch and dinner at two real podunk towns between Melbourne and Phillip Island. Australia continued its lousy track record for food at both stops.

I got back to the hotel late, to discover that Maartje was in the room right next door. Yay! So she and I chatted for a bit, and compared our last few days in Australia.