For the last 9 months we have relied on public transport, our little legs and bicycles to see the world. For the first time, we have a hire car, and intend to make full use of it.

Our first destination is Phillip Island, a small island just off the coast of Victoria. The island seems to be fully geared to catering for every desire a tourist may have: crazy golf, carting, Go Ape, vineyards etc. However, the island also has beautiful, unspoilt beaches and lots of wildlife.

We spent most of the day exploring these beaches, and also managed to squeeze in a visit to the sea-life centre, which incidentally do a very good cream tea…

Once dusk fell though, the real attraction began. Phillip Island is home to a large number of Little Penguins. Every evening, some of these tiny blue and white birds return from a fishing expedition and waddle up the beach to return to their nests and feed their young. As the sun starts to set the birds meet up just off the shore and form rafts. They then wait until complete darkness, in order to avoid predators, before coming ashore. Once they get onto the beach they wait for a group to form before crossing the beach to the safety of their nests.

We waited for almost two hours for them to start coming ashore, and when they finally arrived we realised just how tiny they are! At only about 3o cm they are the smallest type of penguin in the world. They are so funny when they come ashore, as they keep making false starts at crossing the beach. They often start to walk and then think better of it and head back into the sea. They then have to wash back on the shore and re-form their group before they can start again.

Eventually several small groups started making their way up the beach and to their nests. We then walked along a boardwalk to see them on dry land.

This would have been an amazing experience, except that it was the peak time of year and there were 2000 other people also watching this natural spectacle, which somewhat spoiled the occasion. It was still pretty good though! We weren’t allowed to take photographs, as the flash hurts the birds sensitive eyes, so I have taken this penguin image from google. I did manage to sneak a couple of photos of the beach before they arrived though.