Sat 4th February – After saying goodbye to Katrina in the morning I met my tour guide and the rest of my group. There were 10 of us in total. No one spoke for the first part of the drive from Adelaide to the ferry terminal at Cape Jervis. However, on the ferry we started chatting and when we got to Kangaroo Island I was appointed DJ by the tour guide, and was in charge of music for the whole weekend :)
Our first stop was Prospect Hill which was 500 steps up to the highest point in Kangaroo Island. The explorer Matthew Flinders originally came to the island thinking it was part of mainland Australia and it was only when he went up to the top of Prospect Hill he realised he was on a much smaller island. We had lunch at Vivonne Bay which is a nice beach. Before we ate we went kayaking along Harriet River which was a lot of fun! After lunch we went to look at our accommodation which was a gorgeous cottage in Hanson Bay in the middle of a wildlife sanctuary. The wildlife sanctuary had a walking path where we could spot koalas sleeping in the eucalyptus trees above.
The only other place I’ve seen wild koalas was in Magnetic Island and I’d only seen 2 there so this was incredible. After the walk we went to our overnight accommodation which was a huge cottage. It had a big lounge area as well as a big games room with the largest snooker table I’ve ever seen!
We took a drive to Flinders Chase National Park and saw so many wallabies and echidnas on the road along the way!
Flinders Chase National Park is where the Remarkable Rocks are, which are large rocks that for some odd reason can balance themselves on 3 small points on the ground.
It’s hard to explain but they are remarkable because it is surprising how much weight of the rocks is supported on not much ground surface. The tour guide pointed out a lot of funny shaped rocks and we spent time taking stupid touristy photos! Afterwards we went to Admirals Arch which is home to a large number of New Zealand fur seals. Unfortunately my camera decided to run out of battery whilst we were here! I took a few photos but I wished I could have taken more as there were sooooo many seals! There were steps and a walkway to lead us into the arch where hundreds of seals were swimming or lying on the rocks. It was an awesome sight. In the evening we sat around a campfire to eat dinner and we had the option to sleep in swags outside or in bunk beds inside the cottage. As it was raining naturally I chose to sleep indoors! 3 members of the group decided to sleep outside for the experience but all of them eventually came inside as the swags had leaked and they were very wet!
Sun 5th February – This morning we were woken up to the smell of pancakes cooked by our tour guide! We were off to a late start anyway but due to the rain in the morning our original plan of going sand boarding before 9am was put back a couple of hours. It meant we had time to chill in the morning and we went to Seal Bay for a guided walk to see Australian sea lions.
There were hundreds on the beach and as it is a protected area, access to the beach is only allowed with one of the guides working at Seal Bay which is good. Afterwards we went sand boarding in Little Sahara. It was my third time sand boarding, and I am still too scared to go fast! As it had been raining the sand was slippery so after one go I’d had enough and me and another girl rushed back to the van to warm up! In the afternoon we went to Stokes Bay which was a lovely beach but due to it being windy and cold not many of us were up for snorkelling as planned. So we took a short walk and then when it started raining we rushed for shelter in the café! Before heading back to the ferry we stopped at Duck’s Lagoon to spot more koalas and Pennington Bay Lookout which was very cold and windy. We got back to Adelaide around 8pm and I was glad that my hostel had kept my key ready in a jar by the door and my bags were already in my room with my bed made! I definitely recommend Hostel 109 for Adelaide they had great service! In the evening a few of us met up for drinks and had a really good time. I didn’t expect to have so much fun on a 2 day tour and to get to know so many cool people in such a short space of time. We were lucky to have such a good group that got on so well, and Kangaroo Island itself was so abundant with wildlife it was amazing. At one point we had to stop driving as there were too many on the roads!
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