Sunday, May 06, 2007

Aussie wildlife...

I know the northern hemisphere types among you are hanging out for some kangaroos. We hopped up the road (heh) to Walyunga National Park, which is only 15 minutes away, on Saturday. As usual (I've been there many times), it was nearly empty. The extent of the walk trails here are about what you'd find at a local nature preserve in a U.S. city — it's not similar to a U.S. national park in that respect, though I think there is a lot of land set aside as wilderness. Maybe it's more comparable to a piece of Nature Conservancy land. Much less built-up, too. We took an hour-long, very slow stroll (at the pace my 86-year-old MIL could manage) in the late afternoon (hence the grainy photo quality).

Anyway, it's a reliable place to find nice Australian birds, like these pink-and-grey galahs:

and a good place to find roos. If you flip your hair from side to side at them, they flip their ears back at you, and they let you get quite close!



Here is a young joey still nursing from the pouch, even though he's up and hopping around now:Still a mama's boy. Awww.

7 comments:

Jen said...

So cute, Valerie! Thanks for sharing your trip with us!

Johanna said...

aw great stuff. Kangaroos are great.

Ps it was the boy. It's all very confusing!

April said...

I wonder if you could spin kangaroo fur? Of course you'd need to knit a sweater with a pouch.

Hahaha, I'm SO funny this morning.

Christine said...

Very cute! Glad to see you are having fun. I will have to put "shaking my hair at kangaroos" on the '1,000 Things To Do Before I Die' list.

Anonymous said...

What great photos! Momma and baby are adorable :)
And, from the previous post, your sweater is beautiful! The buttons you picked are lovely.

Aime

Earin Marybird said...

I've always thought a pouch would be so useful. Think of all the yarn you could carry around. I love the birds of Australia, so colorful and fun. I know it's slow going but keep sending us your wonderful photographs!

Kelly said...

Kangaroos are fun, aren't they? Hopefully you'll see some koala bears and dingos. BTW, the Bristow is gorgeous. Perfect for an Australian fall I bet.