Kangaroo Island

I know it's been a few weeks since my last post, but like I said my time has mostly been spent watching movie musicals, drinking wine, and discussing Harry Potter. I have managed to squeeze some tourist activities in though. I spent a day visiting a few museums and art galleries, where I saw some giant whale skeletons and learned about the history of migration in Australia. We went wine tasting in the Barossa Valley and discovered the wonder of Pink Mink Champagne. It is pink and doesn't taste very good until you have had a few glasses, but the bottle is pink and has a picture of a woman who looks like Barbie on it. This weekend Maximus, Myst, and I drove to Victor Harbor which is a little town on the beach that has a granite island you can walk around. There have been many visits to various malls and movie theatres (to see Stardust which was great and Rogue which was not so great but is Australian and has some very nice scenery shots of Kakadu National Park before it becomes a stupid killer crocodile movie), and one eventful evening spent at IKEA picking out furniture for our future homes. I also accompanied Myst and her mother to a wedding expo where I sat through an hour long bridal wear and lingerie fashion show. Thrilling stuff.
This week I decided it was time to start being a backpacker again so I left Myst and Maximus for a 3 day tour of Kangaroo Island. The island was recently named the 7th best island in the world (and 1st in Asia/Pacific)by National Geographic magazine. The islands were rated accoring to beauty and stuff to do there but also on their ecotourism practices. Monday morning I was picked up at the train station by my dreadlocked guide before heading to the Mclaren Vale wine region for some more wine tastings (I think I will be an expert on wine before I leave this country) and a picnic lunch. We then drove to the water and unloaded all of our stuff onto a fishing boat that would take us to the island. The boat ride took about an hour and was extremely wet, but we did have dolphins jumping beside us for part of it so I didn;t mind so much. When we got to the island and loaded all of our stuff into another van and then headed off to explore. Our guide had heard about a beach he wanted to check out so we drove around until the road ended and decided to walk in the direction of the supposed beach. We had to carefully hike through a path overrun with prickling nettles and kangaroo poop. We gave up on finding the beach a half an hour in and headed back to the van. On our drive to the campsite we saw the first of many kangaroos, wallabies, koalas, possums, and goannas (crazy looking giant lizards) that inhabit the island. They weren't as annoying at the Rottnest island quokkas, but they were still everywhere.
We spent the night in an eco hut by the beach sleeping in swags. The campsite had one of the coolest bathrooms I have ever seen. The two toilets and two showers were both in big round rain water collecting barrels and a solar powered radio played in the background. The showers did not have ceilings so you could wash under the sky while singing along to the radio. The next day we explored the island more, visiting a few (amazing!) beaches, a eucalyptus oil distillery, and seal bay. At seal bay there were a few hundred giant sea lions hanging out on the beach. The pups were chasing seagulls while the males were getting ready for mating season by fighting over the females and occasionally running towards my group. We would have to quickly move away and watch the sea lion plop down on the spot of sand we had just been standing on. Next up we drove to a place called Little Sahara to try sand boarding. I didn't bring my camera with me on this part because I was warne dit would get full of sand and possibly break, but it was basically a large area of sand dunes surrounded by trees. Sand boarding is kind of like sledding down sand dunes and is loads of fun until you have to climb back up the giant sand dune you just zoomed down. It was hard work! We then set up camp at another cabin and after dinner drove to a bay to see some little penguins that only come out at night. Thet don't get any taller than a wine bottle and are super cute.
The next day involved more beaches, including Stokes Bay which was voted 3rd best beach in Australia where I went swimming in the Southern Ocean. I now only have the Arctic ocean left and I will have swum in all the world's oceans. The water was pretty cold and had some pretty strong rips so I didn't stay in too long. We then drove to see the creatively named "Remarkable Rocks" which are a bunch of giant, weather sculpted boulders precariously perched on a cliff overlooking the ocean. After lots of pictures we drove to the even more remarkable Admiral's Arch which was a stone archway over the sea that is home to a colony of surprisingly agile fur seals. It was then time to drive back to the fishing boat for another wet ride back to the mainland and onwards to Adelaide.
I have only a few days left with Myst and Maximus before I continue my travels and this makes me very sad. We are off to the grocery store to do some shopping for our Thanksgiving feast I will be attempting to prepare tomorrow. I'll let you know how it turns out.