Queensland

One of my favourite stops on our trip so far was the Billabong Sanctuary in Townsville.  It’s a unique zoo experience, full of Aussie animals with scheduled talks and hands-on sessions throughout the day.  When we arrived we headed straight for the cassowaries where the ranger talk had already started.  There are two cassowaries and we were lucky to be able to feed them grapes! Cassowaries are the third largest bird in the world, behind the ostrich and emu.  They … Read More

In recent headlines a new study has revealed that over half of all sea turtles have ingested plastic.  Before we went to the turtle hospital they gave a talk about sea turtles.  They said that the turtles (and other marine life) have been able to eat anything they find in the oceans for thousands of centuries.  The sea turtles, of course, don’t realise anything has changed and so when they see some brightly coloured object floating in the water they … Read More

Part one is here.  Upstairs at the aquarium there is a hands-on area.   There’s also a playground.  We had a browse around while we waited for the talk to start.  Surprisingly, I don’t actually have pictures of the kids touching the various sea creatures we were allowed to interact with.  I was too busy enjoying the experience and monitoring a two-year-old.  Sometimes you just have to step back from the camera.  We watched the man climb into the tank and … Read More

We’ve skipped visiting aquariums until Townsville since we’d heard that this was a good one.  The Reef HQ Great Barrier Reef Aquarium is the world’s largest living coral reef aquarium.  There’s a lot to see with talks scheduled throughout the day.  We were able to attend several of the talks and learn about all these fascinating sea creatures.  Of course, when you see an old diving helmet begging to be worn you must try it on… So much to see … Read More

The Strand in Townsville boasts a waterpark at one end and a seawater lagoon at the other.  We visited the waterpark first (no pictures) and the kids loved it because it had one of those huge buckets that dump freezing cold lovely refreshing water on you every couple of minutes.  We also made a visit to the Rock Pool, an enclosed lagoon of ocean water that is filtered continually.  This means you can swim in the salty ocean water without … Read More

Driving into Townsville you can’t help but notice Castle Hill.  It’s an iconic granite monolith that’s apparently just metres short of being classified as a mountain.  We drove to the top for a view of Townsville from above.  I’ve realised that although I have heaps of pictures of the view, I don’t have any pictures of Castle Hill itself.  You can see pictures of it here.  That means I also don’t have pictures of The Saint painted on the side … Read More