Kids say funny things. Myself? No exception. One day, when I was just a little girl, I was riding in the car with my Grandma and family and proclaimed, “GRANDmaw! I saw a kangarOO!!!” This of course, was not possible as we traversed the long Texas highway. Although I’m still not sure what provoked me to say that, nonetheless, the statement has been a long-running inside joke in my family. After that day, I received stuffed kangaroos of all sizes for birthday presents, and to this day, my Grandma still attaches kangaroo stickers to my birthday card envelopes.
Naturally, coming to Australia, I had one primary objective: to actually spot a real, live kangaroo….in the wild! After Sydney, Craig and I picked our next camping spot at a national park close to the beach: Crowdy Bay National Park.
Sunrise over the beach at Crowdy Bay National Park
The park literature said your campsite “was sure to be supervised by a resident kangaroo.” As we turned off the main highway onto the long, long, gravel road out to the site, I had high hopes of seeing kangaroos hopping around in the forests on either side. About 15 km later and no roo sightings made, we arrived at the campsite, accurately named “Crowdy Bay,” by the way. We paid our camp fees and asked the attendant why there were so many people there. He said there was a group function and then directed us to a smaller, less crowded site also by the beach. He also said there would be some wallabies hanging around the smaller campground. We thanked him, got back in the car, and decided to at least take a couple pictures of that beach before heading to the next one. As we drove through the mass of campers, we pulled into a parking spot and low behold…..kangaroos!!! How anti-climatic is was…searching and searching for some, then effortlessly pulling into a campground and bam! Kangaroos of all sizes chillin’ with the campers and trying to mooch off their stock of food. We spotted at least eight just from the little walk we took to and from the beach.
The amazing part of it all was the fact that the locals didn’t act surprised, intrigued, or interested in the roos at all. It was just another day in “OZ,” as they call it. There were even more of them at the next campsite which is where I was able to get very close as they munched away on their dinner of green grass. We watched them until dark and again the next morning when they all came out to eat again. We even witnessed a roo play-fight:
Next Stop: Toowoomba
1 comment:
THIS IS AWESOME. Need an awesome checkmark.
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