Kennett River

Feeding cockatoos.

A yellow crested cockatoo.

Australian King Parrots (male on my head and female on my arm).

Crimson Rosella.

An agile kangaroo.

Koala sleeping in the tree.

I found one awake! 

A scallop fishing ship, just returned from Tasmania fully loaded.

Saturday, October 8^th.

Today I decided to go to an area of the Great Ocean Road that I heard was good for spotting koalas. The area is called Kennett River. There is a campground there and a cafe. The cafe sells, among other things, bird seed for feeding the birds. I spent a very enjoyable hour feeding yellow crested cockatoos, crimson rosellas and Australian king parrots. The rosellas are the smallest and would give way if a king parrot flew over. The king parrots were fairly large but would happily land on your arm or head. The cockatoos would not land on you, probably because of their size. The female and male king parrots look quite different and the male is mostly red, while the female is mostly green. I gave some of my seed to a young German couple and together we had a few laughs and got some good photos.

I walked through the camp and up the dirt road hill and saw a number of koalas in the eucalyptus trees, but they were all sleeping and inactive. It was hard to get photos as they were cuddled up in a ball. However, when I gave up finding an awake one and walked back through the camp, I found a koala walking along a fence post!

After I left there I decided to follow the Great Ocean Road further west. It is a beautiful winding road along the coast and offers plenty of vistas of the beaches and cliffs. Apollo Bay is one of the prime tourist spots along the route. I stopped there to check out the town a bit but also found a little road that took me to the the port. There is docking space for local and tourist boats as well as a small dock area for a couple of fishing boats. I was photographing one when I noticed that they were unloading their catch. I went closer to see what it was and found out it was scallops. Boxes and boxes of scallops in their shells. I talked to one of the fishermen and found out they were just returning from a four day fishing trip to Tasmania.

From there I took took the inland route back to the highway over rolling hills and through beautiful forests, and made my way home.