Kangaroo Island

I'm not quite sure how to go about this. Kangaroo Island was beautiful and I am sincerely happy I took a trip this past weekend. 

I spoke with Germans the past three days and therefore don't feel like I was connected with my writing voice the entire time I was there. I was generally communicating with different words than normal. So I plan to just post a lot of pictures.

Day 1:

The first adventure involved a ferry ride to the Island. 

Here is my first view of the island:

And where we pulled up to:

Our first stop was at a eucalyptus distillery. I bought some tea tree oil that has been wonderful on my mosquito bites. It is good for all kinds of things.

Then we went to a marron (freshwater crawfish) breeding farm. We went on a tour, tried some marron, and then had a wine tasting. All incredibly interesting.

Stokes Bay:

Rather, me with some rocks at Stokes Bay.

This is where we stayed the first night... very Australian:

For dinner I ate kangaroo while I watched kangaroos hop around.

After we were settled, we went out to look for penguins. I don’t have any pictures because you cannot shine white light at them and it was dark. But you should take my word that they were adorable.

Day 2:

We went sandboarding at the dunes. When I say “we”, I mean the boys went sandboarding. But we all walked to the top. It was so windy it was not worth it. Just imagine what it feels like when you are at the beach, the wind blows, and sand pelts you and it kind of hurts.. but times ten. Not good. I also had sand in my eyes, ears, nose, pants, shirt, underwear and hair for the remainder of the day.  As did everyone else. 

We went on a tour of a cave, Kelly Hill Cave to be exact. I don’t have pictures of this but I am hoping to steal some from another traveler. It was incredible.

Vivonne Bay:

Flinder’s National Park, hike to Pennington Bay:

How we got to Pennington Bay (yes, through that hole):

Pennington Bay:

These pictures do NOT do the place justice. At all. It was by far the most beautiful place I've ever seen.

We went on a koala walk (at Hanson Bay) and found this little guy:

Seal Bay:

It is mating season and I actually have a video of two males fighting for a group of females. There were so many, and they were quite active. Also, those are the bones of a dead whale that washed up on shore some 30 years ago.

Day 3:

Remarkable Rocks:

Admirals Arch:

View from top of a huge climb:

And this is how we traveled:
 

Interesting facts about kangaroos (my tour guide was incredibly knowledgeable):

-Kangaroos operate in a family of three: mother, “teenager”, baby
-While the teenager is still in the pouch, the mother becomes pregnant immediately
-If the weather is not good or there is not enough food, the mother can actually put the embryo on hold until further notice (they are the only animal on earth that can do this.. crazy, right?)
-When a kangaroo is born, it will fall to the ground and the mother will put it in her pouch and it will crawl up and suck on her teat until it is big enough, has grown hair, it's eyes have opened, etc. Then it will kick the teenager out of the pouch.
-The mother kangaroo has four nipples and can actually make different kinds of milk, for instance, she makes a thicker milk for the baby because it needs more nutrients and a waterier milk for the teenager because it needs more liquid in general

Interesting facts about koalas:

-Koalas exclusively eat eucalyptus leaves which are one percent fat and seven percent nutrients (and poisonous), that is why they sleep so much (they aren't getting any energy from their food)
-Baby koalas fall out of their mothers skinless and without eyes or ears (the size of a fingernail), the mother then picks the baby up and puts it in her pouch where the baby crawls up and sucks on it’s mothers teat until it is much bigger, then it crawls onto their mother’s back
-Because eucalyptus leaves are poisonous, baby koalas must eat their mothers poop for the first few months they are alive so they develop the bacteria which allows for eating the leaves