Featherdale Wildlife Park (and American party)

So last night was our (North) American party (one of the secondees is Canadian, so had to be inclusive). Before the party, we wanted to buy some beer and red cups. Everyone sees these red cups in American college movies, so it is a HUGE stereotype that we drink out of them. And thinking back to college, yeah, I guess that's pretty spot on.

At the liquor store, saw this 1L of Smirnoff.


That's the "special" price?

I think I've already established that alcohol is expensive here, but dang.

 

Thankfully, we were able to find some red (brand name: Redd) cups at this store. We'll be able to have a "true" American party now. I looked around for the cheapest beer and found this.

 

$30 - It's a BIG deal!

I'll just get it out of the way. It's terrible beer. It says "Product of USA" on it. What the heck? I've NEVER seen or heard of this beer before. I'm guessing it's like their version of Fosters. In the States, we have this "Australian" beer called Fosters. It does not exist in Australia.

 

The party was a pretty good success. Taught the Aussies some American drinking games, like flip cup and king's cup. I think I might even had snuck in a "USA!" chant in there.

 

Rewinding a bit, around 11am, a secondee and I hopped on a 45-ish minute train to Blacktown. That's where Featherdale Wildlife Park is. Highly worth the visit.

 

It's smaller than the zoo, but you're right up close to the animals and they are MUCH more active. Even the koalas. The secondee took some sweet photos of us petting and feeding the animals with her camera, so I might post those later once I get copies from her.

 

Wallabies!

 



 

They are tamer in here, so we got to go right up and pet these cute things (I think I've decided wallabies are my favorite Australian animal).

 

Their fur kind of feels like a raccoon



Of course, the ultimate experience was to pet a koala (there were TONS of koalas at this park).

 

 

I didn't find them to be quite as soft as they look or you'd think. A little knotty. And oh my goodness. They have HUGE claws. All animals in Australia have huge claws.

 

 

If you look closely, in the bottom left of the koala there is a little ball of fur. That's a baby in the mom's pouch.  It was darker and they were in the back, so it was hard to snap a photo.

 

You know how we have cow tipping? I suppose here is a good spot to mention my idea of koala tipping. Maybe it's because I'm a terrible person, but if you see these guys just wedged between 2 branches, you'd want to just give them a little push, too.

 

Moving on. We even got to see and pet a dingo.

 

Diet: Babies

Cute little guys. Apparently pure bred dingos are pretty rare. Many have mixed with domestic dogs.

 

After the wildlife park, we picked up the booze (as mentioned above) and stopped at Max Brenner. It's a chocolate cafe. Ate an amazing waffle covered in chocolate.

 

This morning there is the Aroma Festival at The Rocks. I'll be hitting that up soon after some breakfast with some coworkers (going to have a "long black" coffee. Which I've now learned is the same (I think...?) as an Americano).