Australia: North Stradbroke Island
Upon first landing on North Stradbroke Island, our tour guides told us to be on the lookout for wild kangaroos and koalas as the island has plenty to offer. This immediately piqued my interest and had me on high alert, desperately wanting to see two of my favorite animals in the wild. Our tour group then crammed into the back of two vans and set off for the island’s Brown Lake.
When I was told of the lake’s name, I assumed the water would just be a dark, muddy color that no one would want to enter. But upon pulling up to the lake I realized how wrong I was. The water was beautifully clear with a brown tint to it from tea trees lining the lake. The temperature was surprisingly warm and had a very inviting feel to it, getting me to walk in to around knee deep despite me not having my bathing suit on yet. There were plenty of picnic tables and barbeques around the water to make a nice family activity out of. Our tour guides put on a pot of tea and shared some local bread with us to try that was comparable to cornbread (thus pretty tasty). After we finished up, our tour was ready to set off to the beach.
Coming from New York, I’m used to relatively thin beaches that are walking only. So when our van pulled onto this massive sandy beach with cars driving all around, I was puzzled to say the least. Yet, no one was in the water. When I exited the van, I realized why. The wind was whipping about, and with it not being a warm day, the air was quite chilly. Additionally, the wind caused massive waves that looked violent and dangerous to be swimming in. This was kind of a bummer as I had just put on my bathing suit and one of the reasons I had booked the tour was to enjoy a new beach. Instead, I bundled up in my hoodie, took some pictures and was waiting for the tour to move onto the next destination. I was not the only one doing this as basically everybody took a few pictures and then went back to the vans to stay warm. Eventually we set off for our final quick stops before ending the day with a barbeque at a nearby park.
On our way to the park, the best moments of the day happened. We were driving along when the tour guide slammed on the brakes and pointed up into the trees and said there was a koala sleeping. He pulled over and we all scrammed out of the car trying to get a glimpse of the animal. Not sure in hindsight why we were all in such a rush considering the koala was asleep and they are famously pretty slow moving animals. But thankfully we got out and saw an adorable koala sleeping up atop this tree. Even with the wind moving the branches about frantically, the koala was deep asleep. After everyone got plenty of photos, we got back in the car and went back on our way. But then, just minutes later, the driver did a similar slam on the brakes, and yelled that there was a koala on the side of the road beside us. We all looked out the window and yes, there was a koala just chilling out and observing the world. It was very cute, but we were told to stay in the car as we’re not supposed to get too close to a wild koala for safety precautions. Due to oncoming traffic, we had to move on from the koala and set off to our meal.
The lunch was rather uneventful, with some pretty tasty sausage and refreshing salad. We then had to wait for our boat back to the mainland, but while waiting we saw our final animal of the day. A couple hundred feet away from us, standing on a soccer field were two smallish wild kangaroos. I hadn’t seen one in the wild at that point, so I was very excited since it's so much better to see one out in nature than in a zoo. Everyone on line grabbed their phones and started taking as many photos as possible (myself included) before we had to get back on our ferry. That was a lovely departing gift from North Stradbroke Island.
