Philip's Island

At the Chocolate Factory

We booked a day tour for today of Phillip’s Island just outside of Melbourne, so our drive Katie (who was awesome) picked us up near our hostel. We lucked out the tour is usually around 20 people but we only had 7, so she could show us some extra unique things. We drove for a while until we reached a little seaside town for lunch right at the base of the bridge to cross onto Phillips Island. Our first stop was a chocolate factory where you could follow the chocolate process and sample plenty. Andreana and Eva are definitely two certified chocoholics so they were quite excited by for the stop and they were not disappointed either.

Benny the Koala

Our next stop was the Philip’s Island Koala sanctuary. There are 35 koala’s on the tree tops throughout the property, luckily Katie makes about 3-4 stops a week to the sanctuary so she knows just where to find almost every koala. On our way out, we did get the opportunity to see a mamma koala with her little Joey (baby koala) in her pouch. Because of all the adorableness at the sanctuary we were actually late for our next stop a wine and cheese tasting on a vineyard. I’m not a huge wino so I didn’t completely appreciate the wine tasting, but don’t worry, all the cheese was definitely gone by the time I left. Plus the views were amazing, you could see straight across the island, with water on each side, plus gorgeous views of the vineyard and the surrounding land.

Little Penguins hiding under the boardwalk

After the winery, we had some time to kill before sunset so we went to a seal watching spot on the tip of the island. We couldn’t actually see any seals, they were on a rock pretty far out, even though they did have live video cams of the island. Instead we walked throughout the board walks. Katie had the insider tip that if you look at certain spots under the boardwalks little penguins were hiding. ADORABLE! As the sun was setting we headed off to the penguin parade. Just after sun set, the little penguins (the size of a wine bottle) appear out of the surf and make there way to their burrows on land. According to Katie, some walk as far as ½ a mile to get home. That night around 400 penguins climbed the beach. On boardwalks, you could follow the little waddling penguins paths to their respective homes.

Wallabies throughout out the fields