Crocs and Meercats and Otters, Oh My!

Haley Cohen Photos and Factbox Included

The boy is covered in meerkats. The furry critters sniff in his t-shirt sleeves, claw at his cargo pockets, and burrow in between his legs. They clamber up his arms and onto his head, rifling through his hair hoping to find a mealworm they might have missed.

Many people would be horrified to get frisked by a mob of hungry meerkats but 16-year old John Goodman actually paid for the experience as part of Mogo Zoo’s “Keeper for a Day” program.

Located in the historic gold mining village of Mogo, about 10 km south of Bateman’s Bay and 200 km south of Sydney, Mogo Zoo is a small privately owned zoo focused on preserving endangered and exotic species. It is also the only zoo in Australia other than the National Zoo in Canberra to possess white lions. Mogo Zoo recently attracted attention when an escaped white lioness had to be shot, but has since bounced back and continues to be a fantastic place to see snow leopards, cotton-top tamarins, red pandas, and other rare species.

For $550, Mogo Zoo allows animal-lovers 16 and older to interact and care for these animals, doing exactly as the real keepers do.

“We don’t sugarcoat the experience,” says official Mogo Zookeeper Lisa Payne. “Day keepers are expected to pick up poop just like the rest of us. Of course we’ll never force poo on anyone, but the Keeper for a Day program is not just a glorified petting-fest.”

A day deeper feeding some of Mogo's resident giraffes

As operation feces suggests, the Keeper for a Day experience is anything but sanitized and the itinerary reflects an experience that is raw and authentic and just a tad dangerous.

While for safety reasons, “day keepers” are not allowed in the pens of Mogo’s more threatening animals, they are allowed much closer than a normal zoo patron. Often, the day keepers can even feed the white lions and crocodiles an afternoon snack of raw chicken necks through their chain link enclosures.

Tamer tasks include cleaning and feeding the meerkats and red pandas, accompanying the official keepers while they give public talks about the Bengal tigers, sea otters and meercats and preparing treats for the primates. Day keepers also get to pet and feed servals, a rare breed of small African cat, and raking out the straw in the animals’ pens to ready them for sleep.

“As an added bonus you get to play marbles as you rake,” jokes Payne.

Hopefully after washing their hands, the day keepers are also treated to morning tea and lunch with the official keepers – a rare opportunity to ask experienced professionals questions about the animals and life as a keeper.

Despite the authenticity of the program, Payne reports that no one has ever been physically injured while fulfilling their duties as day keeper.

“While we strive to make the experience as genuine as possible, we also ensure that everything the day keepers are involved in is perfectly safe. But we get some emotional pain, which we can’t really prevent. The other day we had a grown man crying because he didn’t want to leave when his shift as day keeper was over.”

Sally Padey, Mogo's owner gets up cuddly with a white lion

This anecdote is amusing but also stands as a testament to how extraordinary the Keeper for a Day experience really is. Other Zoos such as Taronga in Sydney and the National Zoo in Canberra offer similar programs, but Mogo’s small size and extensive collection of endangered species allows for an especially intimate experience.

“Whereas the bigger city Zoos might offer similar programs, they are much less personal. We rarely have more than one day keeper per day and we let the keepers do much more than they do at the bigger, more commercial zoos.”

However, for those who don’t feel up to “playing marbles” as Keeper for a Day, Mogo offers two alternative programs: the Serval Experience, where two guests can pet and feed the Servals for half an hour ($200) and the Meercat Experience that allows one patron to play with the feisty creatures for fifteen to twenty minutes ($80). In both cases cameras are allowed and encouraged.

“We want people to be able to show their friends and brag about their experience,” Payne explains.

John’s mother seems to have taken that recommendation to heart as she wildly snaps photos of him blanketed in meerkats.

Official Mogo Zoo keeper Cindy McGillivray suddenly interrupts the meerkat talk she’s delivering to the public and orders “Keep your fingers IN, John!” There is a slight twinge of panic in her voice.

“Meerkats are harmless but sometimes they’ll mistake a finger for a worm…” she explains to the audience, all the while keeping a close eye on Cameron and his hands. “They are animals after all. Sometimes even a keeper gets bit.”

Keeper for a Day Program Essentials: Cost: $550 Only available for those aged 16 or older Day lasts from 8:30am-5pm Lunch and Tea included

Address: Mogo Zoo 222 Tomakin Road, Mogo NSW 2536, Australia Telephone: 02-4474 4930 Fax: 02-4474 4855 Email: info@mogozoo.com.au Website: www.mogozoo.com.au

How to get there: From the North (Batemans Bay) Follow the Princes Highway 10km south from Batemans Bay (approximately 10 minutes) until you reach Mogo and follow the signs turning left into Tomakin Road. From the South (Moruya) Follow the Princes Highway 15km north from Moruya (approximately 15 minutes) until you reach Mogo and follow the signs turning right into Tomakin Road.

Types of Animals at the Zoo: Mogo Zoo has over 200 specimens of more than 39 rare species. Highlights not mentioned in the article include Burmese pythons, Sumatran Tigers, plains zebras, fallow deer, pygmy marmosets and Brazilian tapirs.

Other attractions in Mogo: Mogo boasts many quaint cafes, arts and crafts studios and old fashioned lolly shops. It is also a center for the Aboriginal population in the area.

If you Cairns stand the heat, get out of the kitchen

A quick thought on Melbourne that hadn’t fully formed the last time I posted – one of the reasons it appealed to me so much is that it felt very close to its convict past. The bounty of dark alleyways – perfect for felons on the run –made me feel like a bit of a fugitive myself. Melbourne also boasts many more preserved buildings than Sydney which gives it more of a historical aura. My opinion also could have been skewed by the fact that Nina, Julia and I were almost arrested by a police officer who looked like a gentrified version of Magwitch. We had hubristically thought we could beat the system and decided not to buy return tickets for our tram ride back from Fitzroy. Our arrogance was not entirely unfounded since of all of the trams I had ridden up to that last one, no one had ever come on to check tickets. In any case, of course right before we were supposed to get off a troop of officers boarded the tram and started inspecting tickets. It looked like what I picture a train stickups in the Wild West would look, except that the “bad guys” were really the good guys and we were the bad guys, but at the time that’s not how it seemed. In any case, after we handed them our expired, concession tickets from our previous ride (by the way, in Melbourne you have to be under age 11 to qualify for Concession ticket. Woops.) Officer Magwitch threatened us with a hefty fine but after much groveling let us off with a warning and ordered us to buy full fare tickets which we obediently did.

Anyway, lets move from Melbourne’s convict past and the Dickensian nature of their police force and onto the present.

Tuesday through Wednesday of last week were pretty unremarkable. Went to class, worked on pieced, work-shopped pieces – not much time to explore since Thursday night we were back to the airport and off to Cairns. Thursday afternoon was more notable since we got to meet with Anthony Dennis, the editor of the Australian branch of Travel and Leisure. Before touring us around the Fairfax office (Fairfax being Australia’s 2^nd largest publishing house), he talked about the workings of Australian Travel and Leisure and what he looks for in travel pieces (apparently the format is super important…) It was definitely interesting to talk to Anthony and see the T+L office, but most of the travel writing that goes into their magazine doesn’t really speak to me. It is filled with mostly service pieces on pricey resorts and restaurants with a few longer features that are also usually based on glitzy destinations. While I love flipping through the magazine for its stunning photographs, if I ever get involved in travel journalism I want whatever I write to have more substance. Its slightly disheartening that I have stumbled on very few publications other than National Geographic and the New Yorker that publish the type of travel writing I’m interested in. I would also love to write a travel memoir, but all 3 of those options are ambitious to say the least.

Guess, I should start by practicing…

Might as well begin with the action which started early Friday morning unless you count listening to my compadre Brendan snore all night as action. We were picked up bright and early by the “Jungle Tour” van which conveyed us to s

everal scenic lookouts along the coast. Queensland’s terrain is markedly different from that of NSW and Victoria. Whereas the only Palm Trees that I’ve seen in NSW were obviously planted, Queensland boasts a ton of natural palms that dot the beaches and roadsides. It is also much lusher; even the mountains are carpeted in green.

Queensland Terrain

Next it was onto the Mossman Rainforest Center where I finally got to hold a Koala! The furry little fellahs were so cute I had to seriously restrain myself from stuffing it under my shirt and making a run for it. But then I thought of my run-in with the terrifying police officer in Melbourne and thought better of it. Instead, I held Bailey (that was his name, another sign that we were meant to be: Bailey + Haley = eternal happiness) for the stringently timed 10 seconds – just enough time to get a few photos snapped – before begrudgingly handing him over to the handler.

INSERT KOALA + ME PIC

A quick musing: While observing some Koalas up in their treehouses I came to the conclusion that in a past life my Dad was a Koala. The physical resemblance is uncanny (especially the fluffy hair, eyebrows and sizable nose...) and both of them are perpetually in alternate state of minds. Of course, Koala’s have an excuse –they’re constantly stoned on the toxins from the eucalyptus leaves they ingest. Hopefully my Dad has a different excuse.

Fazsha

Koala

But I digress, back on topic.

After meticulously purel-ing my hands and arms (Weird Fact: Koalas often carry Chlamydia. Strange right? I don’t know enough about the disease to know if you can catch it asexually, but I was also not keen to find out and accordingly drowned myself in gallons of purel) we moved on to a swampy, croc-infested river where we went swimming with pieces of bloody steak taped around our limbs and torsos. I jest, in actuality we jumped on a huge paddleboat and cruised up and down the river looking for crocs. I would have been perfectly happy seeing any old croc, so stumbling upon Fat Albert, a 300 Kilo monster of a crocodile was a special, if unnecessary, bonus like when a vending machine accidentally dispenses 2 bags of Lays instead of 1

AHH, FAT ALBERT!

When we’d gotten our fill of pointing and laughing at blubbery Albert, we jumped back on the van and drove to Cape Tribulation, a beautiful preserved rainforest where we wandered around aimlessly for about 20 minutes before our guide informed us we had to get a move on back to Cairns.

Cape Tribulation

While the landscape was stunning and I might’ve committed suicide if I went back to the states without having held a Koala first, Friday’s “jungle adventure” was a bit meandering and unadventurous for my taste. I thought we were going to get to do some heavy trekking in the rainforest which definitely didn’t happen. In fact we didn’t really do anything.

After our long day of lazing around on the van we were surprisingly tuckered out and didn’t get up to much besides strolling around the Cairns Night Market. It was much like the Queen Victoria Market – hawking mostly australiana and uggs – but I also stumbled upon some odder selections such as Emu and Crocodile Jerkeys, Facial Cream labeled “Placenta Silk” whose main ingredient was, you guessed it, placenta (someone should let Michael McCoughnagghey know, im sure he’d be interested) and lastly Salmon Flavored, Koala shaped pasta.

Methinks it tries to do too much.

7/11 – SCUBA

Thankfully, yesterday’s inaction was countered by today’s excitement. The sun was hardly up when we woke up and rushed to Cairns Marina where we boarded the “Passions of Paradise” Catamaran – our transport to the Great Barrier Reef.

It took about 2 and a half hours to slog out to Michelman’s Cay, supposedly one of the most pristine and colorful diving spots on the reef and the whole time I was like a little kid on a road trip:

Me: Are we there yet?

Crew Member: No.

Me 2 minutes later: Are we there yet?

Crew Member: No.

Me 2 minutes after that: Are we there yet?

Crew Member: BUGGER OFF.

Right before we finally were there, the instructors gave a briefing on how to Scuba Dive which definitely lived up to its name. Having taken a Scuba Diving Class in February I was shocked at how little they explained to us. Since I still haven’t done my open water certification I was on an introductory dive meant for people with no diving background and I guess their reasoning was the less they taught us the less there was to screw up. As opposed to the dive class where we learned all about our computers, how to calculate an appropriate ascent rate, and mastered inflating and deflating our BCs, the “Passions” lecture could be boiled down into two simple rules: 1) Keep Breathing. 2) Don’t touch anything.

After I was all geared-up I asked one of the instructors to confirm that the computer calculates your ideal ascent rate and he said: “Don’t be silly, it measures smiles and I can see that you have been very smiley today.” While my inner voice was screaming: “No it doesn’t! It tells me how slow to ascend so I don’t implode you liar!”, I smiled and looked down at my computer and said : “Oh yep, now I’m at 8 billion and 1 for the day.”

This Disney does Grimm Brothers take on Scuba Diving heightened my nervousness since I did know how much could potentially go wrong while diving. But any anxiousness I felt was trumped by excitement. Diving in the pool was one of the coolest sensations I had ever felt so the thought of adding marine life (and the Great Barrier Reef!) to the equation made me want to explode.

Instead of exploding, I opted to jump into the water directly into a school of batfish keen on the food the Passions crew feeds them. After quickly running through how to clear our respirators and masks, we started our descent to the ocean floor.

First stop on our sub-aqueous adventure was a giant clam that I ever-so-cleverly named Happy. Our instructor Rob demonstrated how if you pressed on the clam’s flesh, its mammoth shell would snap closed. This might sound like a recipe for disaster but the clam’s tissue walls are so soft and thick that the shell can’t close completely and instead of excruciating pain, the sensation is almost like getting a hand massage from a very clammy pair of hands. (har har)

After we got our fill of the clam, we swam on and settled in front of a patch of anemone. At first I thought Rob had led us there only to see the see grass sway with the currents – a beautiful sight for sure – but then I saw a flash of orange and realized WE’D FOUND NEMO!

Nemoooo

I watched enthralled as he tentatively flitted in and out of the oscillating field of dreadlocks he calls home (or maybe not, I’m not sure how “home” translates to fish-ish).

Rob had to drag me involuntarily from my perch in front of Nemo but I’m glad that he did because immediately upon turning around we were faced with the most dramatic turtle I’ve ever seen. When I say the turtle was dramatic I don’t mean to imply he got down on one knee with a skull in his left hand and delivered a soliloquy from Hamlet, though that would have been awesome. What I mean is that all of his features were exaggerated. Not only was he as bigger than a tire on a monster truck but the colors and textures of his skin and shell were more vivid and defined than any picture could ever do justice. He seemed to know he was striking and be keen to show it off because he was anything but shy. Several times he swam straight at my camera, posing as deftly as Tyra’s chicks on America’s Next Top Model. He was even content to eat sea grass straight from my hand.

Mugging for the Camera

Blue Steel

Before I knew it, our time down under was up and it was time to relinquish our artificial gills and start breathing real O2 again. Thankfully I wasn’t forced to stay above water for long. After slamming down a delicious lunch it was back in my wetsuit for round 2.

Quick Gross Sidenote: I don’t recommend “slamming” down 3 servings of lunch right before diving which is exactly what I did. Apparently vomiting into your respirator is totally fine, and luckily I never had to find out whether the rumor was truthful but I definitely thought it was a possibility right before I jumped back in for my second dive.

The second dive, which we took off of the Outer Reef, was markedly different from the first. The water was considerably deeper and the reef was even more diverse. My favorite varities of coral were the type that looks like a witches spindly, misshapen fingers and the kind that looks like a miniature maze carved into a smooth rock face. The marine life was also unlike what we saw in the 1^st dive. In addition to a few new species of fish, I got to hold a feather star (a creature that looks like a cross between an octopus and starfish, covered in grass), poke at Christmas tree worms (little spikey creatures who live in holes in rocks which they vanish into as soon as you touch them) (see video) and soak up the homeliness that is a Groper fish.

Feather Star

Yes, groper fish. At first I thought I had misunderstood Rob’s heavy Australian accent, but as soon as he did the underwater sign for Groper sighting (Directions: Reach arms forward, pretend to cop a feel) it became very clear that I had not. Thankfully, I did not fall prey to PerveMcPerveFish’s ribald antics and made it safely back to the Catamaran, where I collapsed into a bench, glowing like a lantern fish (which unfortunately I didn’t get to see) for the entire ride back to Cairns.

Spindly Reef

Maze Like Reef

In closing, it is safe to say I am absolutely hooked (sorry…) on scuba diving and want to continue to dive as much as I possibly can. It is totally surreal – to the point that I sometimes felt as though I was swimming in an IMAX movie instead of reality. I’m a little worried that no dives will ever match up (such is the curse of having my first dive at the Great Barrier Reef) but somehow I think I will always find it just exhilarating.

7/12/09 –

“If the Rocks don’t get you, the crocs certainly will,” our river guide Tim so comfortingly informed us as we floated closer and closer to our first level 4 rapid. “Just don’t fall out, then we have no problems, ya?”

Today Johana, Brendan, Julia and I white water rafted down a 14km (croc-infested) stretch of the Tully river. One of the guides spotted a croc along our stretch of river this morning, and the rocks jutted out of the swift river like gravestones but somehow rafting down the Tully felt very safe. That’s not to say we didn’t get jostled around, thrown from the boat, and soaked to the bone but somehow I (probably stupidly) trusted that nature was not against me today.

Perhaps my comfort was also due to the fact that we were in control of very little. As we were about to enter a rapid, and even on the calm flat bits of the river, we were constantly following Tim’s instructions like little monkey slaves. “Down!” Tim would shout and we would jump obediently into a low crouch in the middle of the boat. “Left!” he yelled and we jumped to the left. “Overboard!’ and we mindlessly jumped overboard to swim with Lyle and co.

In addition to acting as drill sargent, Tim also enlightened us about the river and surrounding rainforest. One especially notable tidbit is that he rainforest contains a species of plant that can cure any disease known to man including the “hangover.” Hmmm…

In addition to nifty “facts” Tim also taught us the names of all the rapids which I’ve attached below:

Alarm clock

2-15: can take two or 15 minutes to get down

double waterfall

staircase

castle rock

foreplay

wet and moisty

lunch spot

doors of deception

corkscrew

midnight rock

pipeline

lava flows

rock garden

disappearing falls

heli pad

double “d” cup

divine rapid

jabba the hut

flip Wilson

sharks tooth

zig zag

mine field

take out

little rapid

big rapid

look out rapid

junction road

sweeper rapid

In this case, I feel as though the pictures and videos describe the day better than I can in words so here is a photo/video montage.

X-treme

Halfway down I decided to become one with the boat

Yipe!

If you turn your computer to the left this video makes much more sense.

Clim(b)actic Things

I'm extremely angry right now because blogger just ate my entire post that took me longer to write than i'd like to admit. I knew I thought of blogs as brown, blobby glutinous creatures for a reason (see post 1). I'm going to try to remember most of what I wrote but it was much probably much more detailed before.

I just got back a little while ago from climbing the Sydney Harbour Bridge, which will probably be one of the more surreal experiences I'll ever have in my life. I went in with very high expectations and by the end, they were not only met but exceeded tenfold.

Pumping up Pre-Climb

At first I was a little worried that I was going to be disappointed. For one, right as we were about to leave the Bridge Climb Office where we'd endured an hour of tedious preparations - including a breathalizer test (which made me wonder who the heck would be stupid enough to try to climb an 100 meter bridge drunk and confirmed the rumor that Australia is a "land of functioning alcoholics"), info session, gear fitting, and portion where we practiced walking up and down stairs (because none of us had ever done that before...)- we were alerted that rain was eminent. Having checked the weather diligently for days and picked sunday specifically for its good forecast, i was devastated. Second, all of the pre-climb drilling bored me so much that when i finally did clip my harness onto the real bridge (as opposed to the practice staircase in the office) I was not as exhilarated as I hoped I would be.


Don't get me wrong, the views of the Opera House were stunning but it just wasn't the earth shaking, epiphanic experience I had in mind.

Then I reached the top of the bridge, and after turning around to face the city, realized that every direction I looked was experiencing a very distinct type of weather. On one side of the bridge North Sydney was enjoying some golden late-afternoon sunlight, while Sydney Business District on the other side of the Bridge was quickly becoming enveloped by a jet black, mushroom-shaped storm cloud. To the west towards the Anzac bridge the sky was an inky purple with orange streaks, while to the east towards the opera house, it was perfectly blue and cloudless. Suddenly, a rainbow column appeared just to the east of the city as if an aboriginal god had launched a rainbow spear from the heavens and it had landed with its point pointing straight down into the city. Not only was it perfectly erect, but the rainbow was also the most vivid i've ever seen - with the R perfectly distinct from the O which was totally separate from the Y-G-BIV.





Watching the storm approach from our perch 100 meters off the ground, and away from the city was extremely cinematic. Especially because the sky above our heads was perfectly clear and blue - it felt as though there were two completely separate worlds: ours, which was dry and happy and the city's, which was tempestuous and dangerous. In my mind, it seemed like the two worlds could never collide. And then a giant rain blob fell on my head and shattered my illusions. As the storm cloud encased us I realized that we were no longer mere spectators, and were very much a part of the show.



Unfortunately I wasn't allowed to bring up my own camera and there were only so many times i felt comfortable demanding Joe, our trusty guide, to snap photos of the spectacle before feeling like my mother who takes pictures of every occasion (and non-occasion) imaginable when traveling. By now she probably has a good bazillion photos of me and my brothers begrudgingly standing in front of a street cat that she thought was cute, or more embarrassingly forcedly petting someone's pet dog she also thought was cute. Maybe some day I'll thank her for photo-documenting every pizza I ate in Italy, or the cornflake shaped like Texas that I found in my bowl of cereal in Mexico but I'm not ready to be at her level quite yet.

But i digress, essentially what i meant to say was that these pictures in no way do justice to the wonder of what Dan, Nina and I saw today but hopefully my descriptions helped a little.

Though by the end I was glad to get down and out of the rain, the weather we experienced earlier in the climb made it one incredible experiences I've ever had, and probably will ever have.

To quickly recap the rest of the weekend:

Saturday morning I made a quick jaunt to Paddington Markets where I found a pop-up pinnochio doll for one of my best friends who collects them (creepy, i know) and also eyed these sweet onesies but suppressed my urge to purchase one as I already own one onesie, and one onesie is one onesie too many. Try saying that 10 times fast.

Onesies!

Saturday night I joined up with Nina and Julia and her friend Tenny and head to Wine Odyssey, a wine restaurant on the Rocks that offers "flights" that consist of 3 glasses of wine paired perfectly with with small portions of food. Having always been the girl drinking Merlot with Fish and Sauvignon Blanc with Steak (and also the girl who spelled Sauvignon, "Savion" before looking it up on wikipedia...) I was excited to see how a good pairing is supposed to taste. I ordered the Sparkling Wine flight, mainly because the sparkling shiraz was paired with kangaroo which i figured I had to try before leaving Australia. Turns out its delicious but doesn't taste very different from beef.

Unfortunately, being sort of scatterbrained and having the tendency to bolt my food and drink, i think the experience was a little lost of me. What you were supposed to do was take a teensy bite of food and then a eensy swig of wine and swish them both around in your mouth. For the first couple of bites i was successful but as time went on I caught myself wolfing down a bite of kangaroo or king prawn and thinking "Yum! This is delicious! nom nom nom... Oh shit! The Wine!"

Needless to say, i emerged from Wine Odyssey no more educated on what a good pairing should taste like but truth be told I'm not devastated about it. I've always felt like wine gurus come off as a little affected. Maybe I'm just bitter because my taste buds can't taste the difference between a bitter high-tannin wine, and a lower-tannin one (are high tannin and low tannin even wine terms?). But I can assure you, that even if I do become more wine savvy one day (and i hope i will) you will never catch me talking about the "fierceness of the bouquet or pretending to be able to taste the soil the grapes were grown in. And i will probably never learn how to spell Sauvignon without looking it up.

Team Awesome at Wine Odyssey

Nina sad about eating the 'roo

After partaking in the wine and food wedding, it was on to another novel drinking spot - the Minus 5 Ice Bar on the other side of Circular Quay. There, we donned heavy jackets, ugg boots, and gloves and spent exactly 30 minutes in a bar made entirely out of ice where we drank cocktails in glasses made entirely out of ice (which I guess would be called ices, not glasses. har, har). It was hilarious how lame the entire experience was. The bar was lauded in my guidebook as as being one of the coolest (pun intended) in the city, so we were very surprised to find that we were 4 of 10 people total. I guess after the Victoria Barracks fiasco I should have learned that Lonely Planet is not the most credible, but oh well...

Despite the novelty of drinking drinks on the rocks, in a bar completely made of rocks, in the rocks neighborhood of Sydney the ice lounge itself seemed very much an afterthought. The management didn't even bother to cover the windows that allowed Ice bar patrons to see storage rooms filled with empty bottles and into another bar next door that cruelly had a movie screen of a fireplace (remember its -14 degrees C, or about 6 degrees F in the ice bar). We joked that it was though the owners of the associated, thawed bar downstairs were like "hmm...we have this extra room upstairs...lets fill it with ice and watch through the window and laugh as silly tourists pay money to be uncomfortable for 30 minutes! Ha! What a splendid idea!"

Chillin' in the Ice Bar

Polar Bear giving an eager Nina the cold snout

I still have one weekend left to explore Sydney as well as the mornings and evenings before and after classes. That being said I should probably address the sizable amount of work I have to get done before the end of the program, but if I'm savvy and productive I think i can squeeze everything in that i want to. This trip is flying by!

Farewell to the Platypus

This morning we shoved off from our motel bright and early in order to catch all of the animal feedings at Mogo Zoo. We made the 10:30 feeding of the Sumatran Tigers by the skin of our fangs before moving on to the 10:45 feeding of the Otters, the 11 o'clock feeding of the Meercats and 11:30 feeding of the stunning White Lions (not to be confused with Albino Lions). 

While the Tigers were absolutely breathtaking (I think they're the most beautiful big cat by far) watching the White Lions was the most interesting. Instead of the normal raw meat fare usually fed to Zoo animals, the keeper fed these felines eggs to demonstrate how gentle they can be. It was quite remarkable to see such a huge animal (probably 200kgs at the lightest) delicately crack open eggs with their teeth, taking care not to eat any of the shell, and suck out the contents. It was also really fascinating to hear about how difficult it is to breed White Lions on account of there being so few left (and they can't go breeding family members for obvious reasons). One tactic breeders are trying is to breed white lions with tigers (LIGERS!) to produce cubs with the recessive gene (oy oy oy I'm having deja vu to Ms. Niles' 9th grade Bio class. Not something i have fond memories of) that they subsequently mate with another white lion resulting in a 25% chance of delivering a White Lion. 

Other than the Lions, my favorite animal by far was the uber distinguished Emperor Tamarin monkey so named for its uncanny resemblance to pretty much any Medieval Chinese Emperor.

 

Emperor Tamarin

Empress Tamarin

 I was also really intrigued by the fact that the Zoo was maintained totally on private donations - quite a feat for such an extensive collection in such a random location. In terms of possibly story topics - I am tempted to write an article about the zoo's Keeper for a Day program where guests who pay the hefty $550 price tag are invited to shadow Zookeepers for a full day of feeding, caring for, and playing with the animals. 

After a quick, unremarkable lunch stop in the town of Mogo, we made the long haul back to Sydney - stopping at a McDonalds en route where I concluded once and for all that the notion of cold coffee over ice exists only in America. I can make this deduction based on the fact that in almost every other place that I've travelled to recently (Croatia, Ghana, Nepal, England) Iced Coffee = Coffee with a big ol' scoop of ice cream plopped in. This non-american version is certainly delicious, but I'm guessing not really part of a wholesome breakfast. 

Arriving back at Unilodge we said a tearful goodbye to Jenny (our lovely driver, otherwise known as Sharon's BFFAEAEAEA) and the HMS Platypus. May she ever be in our hearts.

Having settled down back in Sydney I started thinking about the main take-way points from the trip. Here is what i came up with:

1) The journey around the South Eastern Coast completely deconstructed the image (or stereotype) that I had previously associated with Australia. Yes, a lot of Australia consists of Red Rock Desert - but there is also rolling farmland and many snowcapped mountains covered in Pine trees rather than bush. 

2) My favorite towns were the working towns - namely Eden. Because most of the town was involved in one of two industries - logging or fishing - the town had a much more distinct personality and I felt I was able to understand it better than the others.

3) Similarly, my favorite towns had interesting and haunting histories. Again Eden was the best example of this with its whaling background as well as the lore about the Killer Whales. 

4) This might be pretty obvious by now but Eden was by far my favorite town

5) Inhabitants in small town Australia are at a loss for why foreigners would ever want to visit. I base this hypothesis on the number of  "What the hell are you Yanks doing here?" (not in an accusatory or hostile way but purely out of curiosity and disbelief that anyone could find their home interesting)

6) Hard as i tried, I just don't like pies.

7) I HATE mazes.

8) I love road trips and think i want to do a similar type of road trip focused on small towns in another place (preferably english speaking which limits me to America, England, and Ireland). If i did it through America which is the most likely because i don't trust myself to drive on the "wrong" side of the road and not end up as road kill, I would LOVE to tour some of the bizarre attractions our country has to offer (ie. the World's Largest Twine Ball in Darwin Minnesota, the Toy Robots Museum in Adamstown, PA etc. etc.) and write about how they came to be.

9) I find cemeteries boring and don't recognize their historical import. Sorry Sharon!

I know there's more but seeing as my clothes smell worse than wet Emperor Tamarins, I should probably go do laundry. 

WARNING! MASSIVELY OVERWEIGHT POST! READ AT OWN RISK!

I apologize in advance for the tome but I haven’t had internet since we left Sydney last week so I’ve just been typing up a document on my computer to post when I got internet aka NOW. So here goes and I wont hold it against you if you can’t make it through the whole thing.

Also, the internet seems to be shoddy here so I'm going to post the text without picture and try to go back and insert them later tonight but if it doesn't work please excuse the prompts and check back for pictures when i get back to Sydney June 21st.

June 9th
The morning started with a bang when Sharon dropped her thermos (which was to hold our hot water for tea breaks, an almost hourly event in Australia) and it shattered on the sidewalk in front of the Unilodge. Choosing not to cry over spilt water, we instead convinced her that it was an apt way to Christian our van which we named the H.M.S. Platypus, partially in homage to Darwin, and partially to the coolest animal EVER. We the travel writing clan decided it was a fitting name since like the Platypus we are “too good to be true.”

Our Faithful Steed

First the H.M.S. Platypus took us to the house where D.H. Lawrence used to live and penned his novel Kangaroo, set in, you guessed it, Australia. After briefly pausing for photos and biscuits (but sadly no tea…) we forged onwards to Rainbow Pie Shop and Lolly Shop annex in Ulladulla where we sampled a variety of pies including Beef and Mushroom (delish), Beef and Burgundy (less delish) and Thai Chicken (not recommended). We were lucky enough to meet Daryl, the owner and head chef at Rainbow and just from talking to him for a few minutes I could imagine him in his kitchen, excitedly creating a new Pie recipe. “Onions? YEAH! ONIONS! Peas? Hmmm…no. What about if I smash ‘em? YEAH! SMASHED PEAS! Beef? obviously beef. YEAH BEEF! Gloppy gravy stuff? YEAH! GLOPPY GRAVY STUFF!!! Seeing how frothy(see surf glossary) Daryl, and most Australians, are about their Pies it saddens me to say that I was not overawed. I guess I’m just not much of a mushy peas kinda gal.

Meat Pie with "The Works": Mashed Potatoes, Gravy and Mushy Peas (oh my!)

I was, however, intrigued by the Lolly Shop in the back. It looked uncannily similar to the candy shop in the opening scene of Willy Wonka. Glass Jars with metal caps jutting off at an angle filled with every sugary confection possible. There were jawbreakers and orange jaffers (chocolate covered orange balls), rainbow sour belts and gummy coke bottles the size of real soda bottles. I was hoping there was some romantic story about how the Lolly shop came to be; that Daryl had loved candy since popping out of the womb and his first word had been “non-pareil”. Unfortunately, however, the truth was not so sweet. Daryl claims the candy shop was simply a sound economic investment. Previously he was using the space as a stock warehouse but after reading Greg Norman’s book was inspired to find an alternative use for it. Ipso facto, Rainbow Lolly Shop was born.

LOLLIES

After gorging ourselves on gummy raspberries and caramels we bade goodbye to the Rainbow complex and headed to Pebbly beach, a beach in Mongo national park. As we walked down to the beach I noticed some curious movement and after a few hazy seconds realized we were staring at a colony of wild kangaroos. It was only then that I fully realized where I was.

Roo on Pebbly Beach

Kangaroos think I'm weird...

Like Platypi, Kangaroos are pretty unlikely looking. I tried to figure out what they resembled but caught myself saying well they look like “part horse, part fox and part….kangaroo. oh wait…” This particular clan was especially docile and even let us scratch their back before they boing-ed away to find a new patch of grass to victimize. Also, in one of the most horrifying scenes I’ve seen all trip (besides the “shark fin” and a man throwing out a perfectly good pack of Arnott’s cookies) we also witnessed two Kangaroos mating. I don’t wish to relive it so I’ll just provide a picture that says it all.

GAH!

After being robbed of our innocence, we silently retreated back to the Platypus where we finished up the last leg of our trip to Braidwood. Our accommodation here is incredible. It’s a huge, stone house that as I mentioned used to be a flour mill so the mill stones are still intact. Besides the fact that its frigid (its unheated and the temperatures have plummeted into the 30s/40s) it is one of the cooler places I’ve ever slept. Speaking of which…my bed (which is heated) calls…


June 10th
After a hearty breakfast in the Millhouse, we sought out stories on Braidwoods main street. I was intrigued by a aluminum trailer marked “Braidwood Driver Reviver and Mobile Kitchen” parked on the corner of the main road, but unfortunately the “reviver” was not in and I will never know why he or she chose such a desolate location to hawk burgers and other road fare.

Next I talked with an avuncular Saddler named Don White about how he got into producing tack (he began as a boot apprentice and then got into rodeos which eventually caused him to cross paths with a sadder), how much his saddles cost (starting at AUS$3,000) and how he manages his business alone (he periodically turns away customers. Making just enough saddles to pay the bills). The most interesting tidbit he shared was that his store had previously been the schoolhouse which was located 2 blocks away. Confused? I was too. Noticing my perplexed expression, Don explained that bought the schoolhouse for $1000 and had the entire 2 building complex lifted onto a flatbed truck and moved to its current home. Not sure there was enough tension for a good story but he was very friendly nonetheless.

DON WHITE SADLERY

As I made my way further up the street I was surprised to find that most businesses were closed. This included 2 stores specializing in oil-lamps, a vintage store, and a store purveying only wooden signs. Additionally, the “Braidwood Times’” sole reporter/editor/manager was at home ill and the police station was deserted when I first stopped in. After confirming that it wasn’t a weekend and brainstorming potential national holidays (Queens day? Nope, Queens Day was last week. July 4th? Nope. And that’s American…Kangaroo day? Doesn’t exist…), I popped into the Visitors Center to see if “Chris” the volunteer on duty might be able to explain. “We don’t get many shoppers coming through here on weekdays…Or at all really…” Not to be discouraged, I sat down and had a coffee and toast (Australians are surprisingly skilled espresso makers and bread bakers, skills which they obviously didn’t inherit from their English predecessors) and flipped over a copy of the local paper.

This picture pretty much sums up the essence of Braidwood. Friendly, but lifeless.

I was struck by the police blotter part of which read: “Friday and Saturday nights saw major issues in Braidwood and Bundendore with fireworks. Not those pretty blue, red and green numbers where everyone oohs and ahhs, but with those infernal “bungers” that bread dead morons insist on throwing from cars, placing in any receptacle their beady little eyes can find. Yeah I know, it makes a big noise. If that’s what it takes to give someone their jollies, well it would appear there ain’t much between the ears, is there? Some idiot thought it would be hilarious to but a couple of bungers in the post boz outside the Post Office. Minor damage to some mail. I just hope the damaged mail belonged to the moron who did it and his dole isn’t paid this fortnight.” Such a firey (pun-intended) sense of humor! I must meet this “Richard Pearce: Braidwood Senior Constable”, I thought and tried the police station again. Richard was unable to talk to me as he was attending to “classified business” but pointed me to Casie, other police officer in town. That’s right. There are only 2 police officers. Guess the incidents with pyrotechnics are infrequent enough that more are unnecessary. Casie told me how sometimes her or Richard will drive up to 4 hours to answer a call (their area of charge is 1200 km) and how the main difference between working in Braidwood and working at an urban station was that people will periodically come to her with “hypothetical questions”. She’s gotten “Could I get in legal trouble if I run away?” and “What should my “friend” do if she’s pregnant?”

An article on the Braidwood police would also be really interesting because Braidwood is part of Kelly country which means that it probably saw quite a lot of crime in the 19th century. To go from being an outlaw stronghold to a town so quiet there are only 2 police is something quite remarkable I think.

After exploring town we headed to the Braidwood cemetery where we got a personal tour from Kat who introduced us as “our medium to the underworld”. I found the actual tour pretty dry but her outfit was incredible so I’ve included a picture here.

Kat our "medium" to the otherworld and her sweet get-up

June 11th
The majority of today was spent driving so there’s not much to report except for how pastoral and beautiful the Australian countryside is. Cows and sheep graze around clusters of craggy boulders that jut up from green hillsides. Cockatoos hang upside down on telephone poles and bunya pines, periodically making a noise that is hard to characterize as anything other than a scream. The presence of Parrots and Cockatoos in the wild makes me feel as though I’m enjoying the effects of a mass breakout from the local pet store.

Australian Countryside

After hours of driving we finally stopped for lunch in a village called Gundagai where we ate at the uber quaint Niagara Café. Looking around at the retro counter stools and old-school milkshake blending machines, I felt like I should’ve been dressed in a poodle-skirt with a name like Shirley or Wanda or Dotty. Framed photos of famous race horses affiliated with the town hung next to myriad clippings from the local newspaper reporting on John Curtins’ (Australian Prime Minister in the 40s) visit to the eatery. Based on the massive banner hung on the back wall that read “50th Anniversary of P.M. John Curtins’ visit 1942-1992” this remained the most exciting thing to happen at the Niagara for over half a century. They even had his used dishes displayed in a glass case, the residue from his ketchup still regally clinging to his plate.

No big deal? BIG DEAL! BIG DEAL!

After bidding adieu to the Curtins maniacs, we finally arrived at Milawa around 7pm and after a quick dinner at the local pub, fell asleep in our again heated beds (score!). This whole electric blanket thing needs to become more popular in the states.

June 12th
After we feasted on the multiple loaves of bread leftover from the famed Dojo Bakery in Braidwood we headed to Beechworth, one of the most important towns in the Kelly Gang saga. There we took a walking tour from a bloke named Michael with an enviable beard who looked a lot like Ned himself.

Ned? Is that you?

He showed us the very cell where Ned was held before his hanging and the courthouse where he was tried before showing us an extremely creepy film about the history of Beechworth complete with ghost voices, time warps and eerie music.
We lunched at the “award winning” (everything seems to be award winning in these towns. Makes you wonder what awards they’re boasting of…) Beechworth Bakery where I tried an Anzac Biscuit, a crumbly brown-sugary coconut cookie recognized as one of the most Australian of Australian Treats along with Pies and Lamington Cake.

After rolling ourselves out of the bakery we visited the Beechworth Honey Flagship store where we sat through a buzz-worthy video series on bees and sampled exotic honeys from “Creamy Honey” (yum) to Ginger, Macadamia, Black Peppercorn Honey (yikes!). Then it was on to the gourmet Cheese, Mustard and Olive shops back in Milawa where the sampling continued. Among the more delicious nibblies I tried were a goat’s milk Parmesan cheese, balsamic mustard, milawa cheese stuffed kalamata olives, and tomato onion chutney.

I wanted to try to ask some of the employees of the shops how Milawa, a town of 260 people came to become such a gourmet center but none of them seemed to have a good answer other than that the first Australian vineyard was founded there in the late 19th century. If I don’t stumble on any other stories I may call some of the stores once returning home to Sydney to try to dig a little more.

Finally, we visited the Brown Brother’s Winery, which as I mentioned previously was the first vineyard established in Australia. After sampling tens of delicious sparklings, whites, roses, reds and “fortifieds” (a euphemism for distgustingly saccharine nastiness otherwise known as desert wines). I emerged determined to continue my tannic education back in the states.

To cap off the night we played a Ned Kelly board game which definitely brought out the outlaws in all of us.

Pure Intensity

June 13th
We kicked off this morning by visiting “Power’s Lookout” a scenic platform built where Harry Powers, the Yoda to Ned Kelly’s Luke Skywalker, used to lookout for gold carriages to rob or to make sure no coppers (police) were after him. We dutifully checked for both gold carriages and coppers as well but were sadly disappointed.

View from Power's Lookout

Then came more disappointment. Having driven an hour out of our way to see the Sidney Nolan tapestry depicting Ned Kelly’s last stand at the Benalla art gallery, we were informed that it had been rolled up and put away for the year. I found this particularly strange considering the tapestry is extremely famous in Australia and from what I gathered the town of Benalla doesn’t have much else going for it.

Disappointed Travel Writers

But having no other choice, we swept the mystery of the rug, under the rug and moved on to the Benalla Museum where we saw the Green Sash that Ned Kelly received for saving a young boy from drowning. It was sen-sash-ional. Sorry. Small town hokeyness brings it out in me.

Next it was off to “Ned Kelly’s Last Stand” the animatronics stage the 2nd most magical place on earth, next to Disney land. I don’t feel bad about giving it 2nd place to Disney because the owner/manager would undoubtedly agree. I can assume this based on the fact that after the show, the audience is led through his bedroom because he spent so much money on building the puppet house that he couldn’t afford a separate house. Tinkerbell and Aladin snow globes cover every square inch of shelf space, gigantic plush Poohs cover the bed, and a veritable mob Pinnochio puppets hang from the ceiling. In addition to a passion for Disney, the owner seems to have an inclination for cross-dressing, as evidenced by a sasquatch-sized pair of silver heels at the foot of his bed and the sizable sun hat on his dresser. But wait, it gets weirder. After the show was over, he was also so kind to show us his “Perve Hole”, a peep hole he cut so that he could check out audience members with the “best knockers” undetected. “Just keeping it fun,” he proclaimed unapologetically.

Crazy Loon and his "Perve hole" that was literally labelled "Perve hole" on the other side

Crazy Loon's Room

Crazy Loon's Room #2

Next to the owner (who for now we’ll call Crazy Loon, since I don’t know his real name), the show was rather unremarkable but that is only because Crazy Loon was likely the kookiest person I’ve ever encountered. Apparently the set and effects cost a whopping $7 million to build (no wonder he didn’t have money for a house!) and the sophistication is apparent at every turn. From the rats scampering across the mantle in the pub, to the dog subtly relieving himself in the corner, to a model of Ned’s disembodied head that gives a convincing monologue at the end it is obvious that the whole endeavor is highly orchestrated. Crazy Loon explained his inspiration: “I went to Disney Land in 1980 and fell in love. Then I thought, ‘Disney’s not the only one with a dream.’”

In any case, I’m hoping to call back and interview Crazy Loon so I can write a profile on him. Characters like him come once in a lifetime.

June 14th
After bidding the delectable wine and cheese of Milawa adieu, it was on to…more wine? It was hardly 10 am and we were off to do another wine tasting. I think Australia’s former prime minister said it best when he called Australia a “land of functioning alcoholics.” This statement was reinforced by our after lunch activity: a beer tasting at a local microbrewery. Not being a big beer gal myself(while a normal persons reaction to a beer sample might be "oo that's rather hoppy" or "needs more barley" while mine would be "yuk, ick, bleh"), I took a sip of each of the brewery’s 6 flavors and passed them off to Cal, one of the program coordinators who skillfully downed both his and my tumblers as if they were Gatorade and he’d just worked out for 5 hours. Seeing that I didn’t really like beer they comp-ed my tasting which prompted me to buy a cookie out of guilt. The cookie was delicious but immediately after I ordered it I realized how infantile it must have seemed for a 20 year old college student to be refusing alcohol and instead opting for a cookie.

From there it was on to the Wandiligong maze – a humongous hedge maze about 10 minutes from Bright. I had been looking forward to the maze for ages and tore through the entrance like a racehorse through the starting gates at the Kentucky Derby but quickly realized something surprising: I HATE MAZES. Being someone who loves puzzles (I’m certifiably obsessed with crosswords), games, quirkiness, and a little bit of healthy competition I was expecting a maze to be right up my alley. Not so. I found myself totally frustrated by the twists and turns, dead ends and cheat doors that we were prohibited from taking. Then I just got bored. You can only walk in so many circles with nothing but monotonous green hedge for scenery before you get fed up and just want to find the exit. After combining forces, Brendan and I managed to complete our tasks (we were to take pictures of ourselves on both towers and in front of both of the maze’s two rose bushes) and find the exit. (see video of Brendan and I finding the last rose bush)

[Technical Note: VIDEO TO COME IN SYDNEY! SORRY!]


Only one small problem: we were separated from the exit by 1 row of bushes. Desperate to be out of the cursed thing we got down on our bellies and shimmied through the hedge marines style (hey, it wasn’t a cheat door, and therefore I wasn’t cheating). The feeling upon exit was less a feeling of gratification at having defeated the maze and more one of overwhelming relief to be done and never have to do another maze ever again so help me god. However the afternoon at the maze did have one redeeming quality: Brendan and I won the race to the exit and were rewarded with Wandiligong maze postcards and magnets. I can now die happy.

As much as I enjoyed sampling ales and even more merlots, I was a bit frustrated by how void our day was from a travel writing perspective. I suppose the microbrewery could make a satisfactory feature and all of the places we went could make decent reviews, I’m not that interested in review writing. For one it seems like a cheap way out of thinking of an angle, and for two: what do I know? (especially when it comes to beer. Cookies, i’ve got. Beer, barely. Or should I say barley. Oh no…) In any case tomorrow probably wont be much better story-wise considering the itinerary has us driving ALL DAY except for a morning tea break and a lunch break. Although we are visiting that cuckoo clock shop I mentioned earlier and if the owner is as cuckoo as his clocks it might make for an interesting profile.

If as of right now I don’t find any more stories that spark my interest I guess I would technically be fine with these:
1) The Very Few, the Proud, the Braidwood Police (Braidwood Police article, tentative title)
2) Profile on Crazy loon
3) Historical Profile on Milawa and exploration into how it came to be a gourmet center (need more of an angle…)
4) Piece on how Whales have always formed the basis of Eden’s industry: First when whalers used to hunt them and now as tourist attractions.
5) Profile on Micheal Beattie, our tour guide for the Ned Kelly walking tour in Beechworth. Ironically he was a dead ringer for ol’ Ned.


I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.

June 15th
Most of today was spent driving but at least the driving was semi-interesting. In the morning we passed over Mt. Hotham, one of Australia’s most popular ski mountains. Even though I knew there obviously had to be snow to ski I was nevertheless surprised to see it. When I imagine Australia, even now, I picture kangaroos bounding across a red sunburned desert and exotic fish a la Nemo and Dory chilling with stoner turtles named Crush among vivid corals. Snow capped mountains, not so much. In any case I didn’t have long to be perplexed by the presence of snow in Australia because it disappeared immediately upon our descent from the mountain.

Confusion at finding snow in Australia

This sign seems pretty unnecessary...

The only other notable occurrence today was a visit to the Cuckoo Clock Shop in Omeo which I have to admit was a little disappointing. The store was not on top of a formidable crag as I’d imagined, nor was the shop itself as I’d envisioned. There was no creepy old man who limped around muttering to himself while his one room shop erupted in cuckoos. Instead there was a sweet old lady who looked like she could’ve been named Dotty who led us eagerly around her sun-filled, wood paneled store engaging us in discussion about baked goods and Obama. Even more upsetting was the fact that Dotty (or whatever her name was) did not even like cuckoo clocks. Her daughter and her had opened the store 15 years ago purely for economic reasons thinking there might be a niche market for such an obscure product.

Cuckoo for Cuckoo Clocks

What is it with people who own specialty stores (like Daryl at Rainbow Pies) having thoroughly unromantic and logical reasons for them. I’m hoping to stumble on someone with more passion for their product soon. Maybe a store owner obsessed with Platypi that sells nothing but Platypi memorabilia? Or maybe I should just open shop…


We finally got into Eden at around 7:30 after about 10 hours of driving and had a fantastic seafood dinner at the local “Fishermen’s Club” where it was apparent the fishermen were awed to see new faces. In any case, I’m really excited for this town which is very clearly a working-class fishing port. There’s even a sign above the kitchen counter in our motel unit that says “please do not gut or scale fish in unit!” Damn it! Now what am I going to do in Eden?

Off to watch “Killers in Eden” a movie on the Orcas, Baleen Whales, and whaling industry in Eden. Later Gators. I’ll try to post once more before we leave Eden 3 days from now but no promises because the internet’s not free.