Day 1

I had to be at the Adelaide Central Bus Station at 6:15 am, so I got up at 5:30 am. Luckily the lady from reception had picked the right bed for me so nobody tried sharing it 😉

At the bus station I checked-in and got my bus+ferry ticket, then had to wait for the bus a little. It was a 2 hours drive from Adelaide to Cape Jervis. On the way the driver told us some things about the region we were passing through. Of course we saw more kangaroos here and there.

At the ferry terminal I took my luggage from the bus and put it in the luggage van, then went onto the ferry. I had a little breakfast and spent moste the time on the top deck in the wind + sun.

About 45 minutes later we arrived at Penneshaw on Kangaroo Island. I took my bags from the luggage van and went to the buses, where somebody asked for my name and told me which bus I was on. It was a small middle-aged group, where I was the younger exception. There was a couple from Sweden, a couple from Germany, a couple from Western Australia, 3 people from Italy, one woman from Switzerland and one guy from the Netherlands.

And this was our itinerary for the first day:

Emu Ridge Eucalyptus Oil Distillery
We got a tour by the owner who told us what they’re doing and how they do it, afterwards we could try some of their products.
Vivonne Bay Bistro
We got a 2 course lunch here.
Australian Birds of Prey
A bird show where I had a barn owl sitting on my leg for a bit and I could even pet it 🙂 .
Seal Bay Conservation Park
We got a tour directly onto the beach, 10 meters from where the endangered Australian sea lions where hanging out. They spend 3 days hunting and feeding, then 3 days resting on the beach. This was my personal highlight of the day!
Parndana Wildlife Park
Another wildlife park where I could feed kangaroos, pet koalas and watch wombats. It’s getting old. But this park had a few nice extras:
1) They had cassowaries! I had heard the stories when I was at Mission Beach on the East Coast but never saw any. Very impressive birds, the only ones that can kill humans.
2) They had a baby wallabie in a pouch that we could hold and pet, so cute!!! The babies of kangaroos and wallabies are called joeys.
Island Pure Sheep Dairy
Here we were shown how they produce sheep dairy and the different products from that and could taste several cheeses and yogurts, very yummy 🙂

Then we were brought to our different accomodations for the night. I was the only one to stay at the Kangaroo Island Central Backpackers. And that was quite a story!
When I arrived I found a sign with my naming saying that I was in room 2 and that I should call Bob on a number written there to check in. So I did that. He told me he was away at the moment, but I should go to the cabin in the garden and ask a guy called Chris to let me into my room. Okay, sounds easy.
So I went into the garden, knocked at the cabin and something opened the door. This something was a big, very fat and apparently drunken person, wearing a dirty singlet and missing several front teeth. He didn’t know or remember that their was a spare key in his cabin, but he was surprinsingly friendly. He went into the hostel with me and found somebody who was also staying in my room and had a key. Yay! Chris insisted on telling me where the bathrooms are and so on before he finally disappeared back into his cabinet. What an experience!

A while later Bob arrived, who introduced himself as Daniel. WTF? Anyway, I didn’t bother asking. He also explained me where everything was, which I already knew. When I asked for a key he told me the following:
This day and the day before there was a big horse race taking place, so the island was buzzing with party people. In my hostel they had checked out that morning but not returned their keys, so their wasn’t any for me.

Great, so I had to leave the room open, rely on my room mates, call in Bob aka Daniel or ask big fat Chris. Hmm…

I decided to lock my bags and leave the room open.

Then I went to dinner, which was included with my 2 day package. My dinner was at a hotel nearby, I got vouchers for a 2 course dinner and a continental breakfast the next morning. So I had a lovely roasted duck breast for main and cheesecake for dessert, all by myself. I felt lost, being a single backpacker in a hotel full of horse racing people in their suits and dresses wearing their hats and fascinators.

After several short nights in a row I used this night to catch up on sleep and slept for a whole 10 hours, yay!

Day 2

I got up at 7:30 am, got ready and started my big continental breakfast at the hotel around 8. At 8:45 the bus driver picked me and the swedish couple up at the hotel. After collecting the rest we stopped at my hostel so I could get my luggage out of my room. And then it happened! The room was locked with my luggage inside, and no one of my roommates was anywhere near.

I really didn’t want to encounter big fat Chris again, so I called Bob, or Daniel, or whatever he was called. He said he would be there in a minute. Well, it turned out to be 10 minutes, and I had my tourgroup waiting outside. Great! Anyway, when BobDanielWhatever finally arrived I quickly got my bags and left.
Luckily this short delay was no problem for the day’s itinerary and the group took it easy. They were all really nice people!

This day’s itinerary:

Clifford’s Honey Farm
At this place we got a delicious non-alcoholic honey drink first and then learned all about their bees, where shown how they produce the honey and what else they produce from it. Then we could try different honeys and buy their products.
Kelly Hill Caves
This was my personal highlight of the day. We were taken underground by a Parks Interpretive Officer to view the cave system and limestone formations. Down their it had a nice 15-16 degrees. I took lots of amazing photos with my camera+tripod 🙂 .
Kangaroo Island Wilderness Retreat
Here we had a nice 2 course lunch. By now I knew the other people in my group fairly well. Especially the couple from WA was really nice. Funny enough the man had exactly the same aussie accent as my last boss and was quite similar in other aspects, too.
Flinders Chase National Park
We drove through this with one stop at a lookout to the next thing on the list.
Remarkable Rocks
These are a cluster of granite boulders, sculptured by the weather and perched on a granite dome rising steeply from the ocean. And you can walk right onto them 🙂 very nice.
Cape du Couedic Lighthouse
We parked here and then walked to the next thing on the list.
Admirals Arch
It is a big naturally grown limestone arch with heaps of New Zealand Fur Seals (common and not endangered) around.
Pelican Feeding
We watched a man putting on a bit of a show while feeding a big group of pelicans. Quite impressive, really!

After this we stopped at a fisn&chips shop for a some dinner before we drove back to Penneshaw to catch the ferry. On the way we dropped the dutch guy at the airport and the woman from Switzerland at her hotel, she was flying out the next day.
At the ferry terminal we said goodbye and commenced our journey back to Cape Jervis where we arrived around 8:15 pm. About 2 hours later we arrived back in the centre of Adelaide. I said goodbye to the couples from my group and made my way back to the YHA. I really liked the couple from WA, so nice and typically aussie!
This time my check-in went flawless, it was the same lady from 2 nights ago and she remembered me 🙂 at 11 pm I went to sleep.

You made it through that awful lot of text? Congratulations! You are now being rewarded with almost a 100 photos 🙂

From 2012-02-19+1 Kangaroo Island. Posted by Philipp Hübner on 2/19/2012 (85 items)