australia summary

so we headed over to australia to visit my aunt and uncle in melbourne, with the idea that we would then travel all over the land of oz going on zany adventures and looking at huge rocks in the middle of the desert.  however, this did not happen.  due to the exchange rate not being so favorable, the jacked up rugby world cup prices in new zealand, and the general pricy-ness of australia, we decided to ditch said plans and go to south east asia instead.  yup, that's how we roll.

but i couldn't just skip to tales of malaysian adventure without telling you about our fabulous but brief adventures in the land down under.

the bolshevik finally realized his dream of being a professional didgeridoo player and i made friends with a very sociable, and very tall, kangaroo .... just kidding.  well, i guess it's actually not quite that far from the truth ...

tasmanian devils fighting over
a wallaby leg

i think one of my favorite australia activities was the penguin parade, which sadly we were not allowed to take pictures of.  but pretty much, you go to this island where they have lots o' penguins and you sit on these little bleachers and wait for all the penguins to come in from the ocean.  these particular penguins are very small so it's super adorable to watch these foot-tall penguins come over the sand dunes and then waddle over to their nests.  and as it was mating season, we got the rare opportunity to watch two penguins getting it on.  yup, happened right in front of us.  the male penguin flaps his flippers surprisingly fast.  that's what she said?

then the bolshevik and i headed over to tasmania for a couple of days where we frolicked with various wildlife.  i've realized that outside of the u.s. they run fast and loose with the safety rules and will allow tourists to do all sorts of questionably dangerous things.  for example, walk into a big field of kangaroos and feed them without any supervision.  so there i was happily feeding a bunch of little kangaroos when a very large kangaroo snuck up on me from behind and started eating out of my hand from over my shoulder.


we stayed in a little beachy town called bicheno (pronounced "bisheno" not "bitchin'-o") and did a walk along the shore to see a blowhole.  there were many inappropriate comments inspired by the blowhole that i will not repeat here.  but trust me, we covered the gamut of blowhole jokes on our walk.

so that's pretty much a week in australia.  while i'm sad that we won't get to explore the outback or go to the great barrier reef, i think we made the right decision to give up on oceania and venture over to asia.  so next post: awesome malaysian adventures!

a koala and her joey ...
c'mon, you can't have a post
about australia without a koala