NINE HOURS AT PHILLIP ISLAND

Penguin Montage

Exactly 16:30, I immediately got off the bus that brought to the Penguin Parade at Phillip Island, about 140 kilometers from Melbourne. Shivering due to strong winds and low temperatures in the fall do not make mood helped to cool. Running fast, I immediately bought a ticket and entered the indoor area with some form of side walls towering windows from floor to ceiling, offering views of the outside. Impatient feels sitting beside him while awaiting the arrival of my favorite animals.

Yes, my main goal this time in Victoria was met with little penguin colony of Australia’s largest! Interestingly, different when it comes to the zoo when the animals are not allowed to roam free and have to live behind bars, at Phillip Island, penguins come every afternoon to Summerland Beach after “fishing” – or rather foraging – to return to the nest, and they are free to roam the island without directly adjacent to humans.

Around 17:30, this ranger led me to the tower Sky Box to watch the penguin parade. When not buy VIP tickets, available at the seashore viewing platform that looks like a seat in a football stadium with a long bench and terraced rows. Only, when the autumn when I came, the wind blowing hard and I think I would be freezing before this comes penguin colony. The choice fell on the VIP Tourdi where a maximum of ten visitors over the age of 16 years can watch the penguins of the tower with the aid of binoculars and a ranger who kindly tell interesting facts about animals are cute and adorable.

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Waiting Little Penguin

More than 4,000 of the 32,000 little penguins (Eudyptula minor) who live in the waters around Phillip Island has a hole around Summerland Beach. Penguin is endemic to Australia and the smallest type of their species with a height of only 33 centimeters, this tiny penguins leave their burrows one hour before sunrise and swim up to 100 kilometers away before returning.

By evening, the adult penguins will bring food for the baby penguin who must remain in the tiny burrows. If something happens to their parents while looking for food in the sea, this small penguin can not eat. In addition, only 50 percent of the penguins that can survive for a year since birth. At the age of two to three years, the penguins will get a couple and then give birth.

Around 18:00, one ranger handed the binoculars pointing to one side of the beach. “Here they come!” He cried. I immediately directed the binoculars in the direction he was pointing. It appears some penguins – about six to seven tails – arise sank amid the waves. Shortly thereafter, the penguin arrived at the beach and go hand in hand towards the mainland burrows where they are located. Two tails of them look awkward and roll that instantly makes me chuckle amused. Some others also had stopped and left behind due to observing the atmosphere around. Each interval of two to five minutes, there is always a bunch of penguins that come closer to the shore. Feels at home looking at the behavior of this funny penguin.

After about half an hour stay in the tower and observe the penguins from a distance, I immediately went along with a number of other visitors to the area around the hole. This is an opportunity to see penguins up close – up to a distance of half a meter, just adjacent to the fence – which is being returned to the nest each. Some visitors seemed to remind each other when there is a stubborn issue a camera to take pictures or noisy when approaching their penguins.

How to run a penguin simultaneously in one group as being in a traffic jam is indeed a penguin way to warm up to each other. In addition, this penguin is also snore, both marking the territorial area, looking for their children, or attract the opposite sex. I laughed again when he saw a number of penguin mating roll and overlapping in the grass, while others fight over a female penguin noises while snoring, puffed, and spread wings. Indeed, compared to other penguin species, little penguins breed throughout the year and has the shortest breeding cycle lasts about 50 days.

Sourdough

When someone mentions that the penguin is sourdough Phillip Island, perhaps I immediately believed it. But this penguin parade of new sounds echo in the 1920s, when it began to busy people visit to Phillip Island for the sake of watching the penguin colony is abuzz return to the mainland. In addition, although named Phillip Island, the inventor of the island is also not Arthur Phillip, the first governor of New South Wales, and he also never settled in Phillip Island.

The first inhabitants of the tiny island’s 10,000 hectares is Bunurong tribe that settled around Western Port, a large bay in southern Victoria. History of the population stretched to tens of thousands of years ago when the mainland Melbourne stretching to the sea. They are not permanent residents, but more often visit this place in the summer to hunt shellfish, fish, marsupials, and muttonbird. Although the population had declined drastically after the first contact with European sailors in 1798, until now, the descendants of the tribe Bunurong remain in the region Melbourne and take an active role in maintaining and protecting their culture and heritage. They are also likely to encourage everyone to maintain and care for the land inhabited together as human love and respect each other.

NINE HOURS AT PHILLIP ISLAND

05 Panny’s Amzing World of Chocolates

Like Willy Wonka

Come all the way from Melbourne – about 90 to 120 minutes drive – with a trip agenda that is solid, I do not just watch the penguins, but also visit a number of interesting places that are at Phillip Island. From the morning, before heading to the Penguin Parade, I stopped to Phillip Island Chocolate Factory.

This place is not the usual chocolate factory where visitors can see the process of making chocolate as well as bringing home the sweet snack for souvenirs. Here, visitors can try for themselves the process of making chocolate from cocoa beans to brown stem with props mini, driving the model trains through a miniature village made of chocolate, activate zoetrope (a device that produces the illusion of motion due to the fast movement on static objects) of chocolate penguin shaped so as if alive, to test the ability of the sense of taste and smell to identify the materials used to make chocolate, to envisage the setting in the middle of the “waterfall” is formed of 400 kilograms of chocolate. Satisfied explore chocolate factory which is also known as Pannys Amazing World of Chocolate, I spend the remaining dollars to buy a variety of premium chocolates available here, then move on to the next destination.

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Eyes hoax

Even before stepping foot into a Maze’N Things, I was stunned for a moment staring at a giant purple taps featuring an illusion as if floating in the air and ejects thousands of liters of water that flooded the house underneath. A Maze’N Things on the one visitors can enjoy an optical illusion, a maze, and puzzles to entertain children and adults even for hours.

After paying the ticket, one of the staff called Geoff who accompanied me explore a Maze’N Things handed a box of chocolates. “Come on, it’s free,” he said pleasantly. I also put his hand into the box to take the chocolate, but then almost cried out in surprise when he found that I take are cockroaches! – Even though it is only in the form of replicas. Still shocked by the behavior of the staff nosy, I refuse when he asked me holding a glass bulb that uses plasma as a light source. I watched as one of the visitors to trust the words of Geoff stating that anyone who touches the ball is going to look different. Perhaps visitors are reminded of the metal balls that can make the hair stand up, so he did not hesitate to touch his hand to the ball. But nothing happened other than the light inside the ball that respond to the touch of the visitors. He then asked curious to Geoff, “How do I look like?”, Answered, “You look stupid standing there!” Cash me laugh out loud.

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Apparently a unique experience, weird, and interesting in this place starting from small things, so shocking, or minimal make visitors amused, surprised, amazed and fascinated. Here, I can take pictures with a head that seemed as if cut off and presented at the dinner table, standing upright at a 45 degree angle, enlarge and reduce the body at will, dismantle simple tricks used by magicians illusions, lost in a maze biggest Australia along 2.1 kilometers, as well as test your adrenaline by sliding in the vertical slide in the highest room in the southern hemisphere.