Melbourne – part 3
As sunset approached, we left the animals behind and headed to the south of the island, passing some great scenery and coastline. After again asking a local Jap for a pic, we were headed off to the day’s finale!
The Penguin Parade is a local wildlife phenomenon, where after a full day of fishing out at sea, Fairy Penguins, also know as Little Penguins (the reason why!)head home to their burrows in the hills.
Now, when you think of penguins, you think cold, snow and blizzards, but these little blighters live in Oz! When I say little, I mean little! They are the smallest species of penguin and grow to about 11” but with the way they walk they stand about 8” tall and weigh as much as a UK bag of sugar, 1Kg.!!!! They’re bloody tiny.
About 1500 people sat and waited on specially constructed seating on the beach for the sun to set. Spotlights dotted the coastline so we could see them arrive and about 20 minutes and the Sun had gone, they started arriving.
Only two at first, suddenly appearing on the line of surf. You could barely make them out against the white of the breaking water. First looking left then looking right and as if crossing a road, they waddled their way across the beach towards the hills. Then there was another fifteen, another ten, twenty appeared further up the beach, all doing the Green Cross-Code. Look left, look right then look left again……run for it lads…..waddles waddle waddle…..
There was a specially built boardwalk thru penguin territory, so we headed up the hill ourselves and watched as the little fairies walked side by side with us searching out their own burrow. Calling and flapping their tiny wings/flippers. Groups of ten would arrive and walk the walk watched by us. One would suddenly break off from the group and you’d see his arse disappear down a hole! The groups would count down this way 10, 9 8….Bloody amazing to see and you can get really close! I was gob smacked and you know that don’t happen to me very often!
The only drawback is that absolutely no pictures are allowed. Apparently 1500 hundred people taking pictures with flashes scares the little buggers and occasionally one would drop dead right on the spot from fright! So the pics you see of the actual birds are from the WWW, so you can see the size of these things…
After the spectacle had finished we headed off home to Melbourne arriving at around 11pm. Took this last photo and went to bed.
And that, as they say, was Melbourne.
|