reptilepark

No, not real but a very realiastic statue that sat over the entrance to the park.

I've never been a great fan of reptiles. For some reason I never thought of snakes and lizards as cuddly and cute, but with the great reptile park here it seemed to be a necessary place to visit. They had several presentations that we were able to catch and enjoy as well as explore and see things on our own. These lizards were a part of our own exploring when we first entered the park. The Australian Reptile Park was established by the late Eric Worrell in 1958.

The above lizards had found themselves new parents. The babies later the same day found themselves lunch for their parents.

Yikes!!!!! One of the presentations we saw was the handler of snakes and reptiles where they, after talking and showing several reptiles, would walk the corral and let the viewing audience have the opportunity to pet or touch the various reptiles they presented. Fortunately I had my camera and was not pressured to touch the reptiles as they cruised by me. They even milked a poisonous snake while we watched. All this was a bit beyond my comfort level when it comes to snakes. I tolerate them nicely from behind a glass but these were a little too close. I found myself stepping back a bit to avoid unneeded suffering or premature death. Not that they were out to get me but I think it did lick it's lips when it went by and smile. Just look at that tongue maybe the forked tongue thing and my indian heritage were sending me messages to not trust the snake.

Gators and Crocs

Above was the American Alligator feeding frenzy. They carefully manuevered themselves to the feeding platform were they then dangled lunch for the gators. The huge gators would come up halfway out of the water to snag these treats... yummy... rodents! While I can't say that the treats looked like a good snack to me the gators would jump and lunge and enjoy their food as the many onlookers snapped pictures and the kids gasped in delight at the show we were seeing. To the left is Eric the crocodile, he had a private swim area and seemed to enjoy the sun basking in the warmth nonchalently as I took his picture. It didn't take me long to see that this was a good place to visit with a huge variety of things to see.

Along the trails we were able to see freerange kangaroos and the fauna and flora native to Australia. There were tortoise ponds and a wombat area. The platypus night garden was popular to see, the platypus would swim quickly back and forth with little effort.

There were free flight aviaries as well as a walk in owl flight. The Cassowaries were strange to me as I don't believe I had ever seen or heard of them before. I enjoyed the different exhibits and animals as I was really surprised how much I enjoyed this overall.

Nonreptiles

These represent a few of the animals indigenous to Australia at the park. The Tasmanian Devils put on quite a show as they ran fast circles in their area and fought amongst themselves. The Dingos were in a howling good mood as they kept communicating with the visitors who tried to mimic them and carry on conversation. I think the dingos were as entertained by the people as the people were by the dingos.