Australia Zoo
“Indecency, vulgarity, obscenity — these are strictly confined to man; he invented them. Among the higher animals there is no trace of them.”
— Mark Twain
Yep, this is Australia Zoo, the Queensland wildlife park made famous around the world by Steve Irwin, TV’s Crocodile Hunter. I was naïve enough to believe that Steve might personally be conducting the crocodile feeding demonstration that day. He wasn’t, but the show was incredibly entertaining nonetheless.
They were feeding a large male crocodile named Agro. For anyone who thinks crocodiles are slow-moving creatures, guess again! I had never seen anything that large move so quickly. Agro exploded out of the water and snapped down on the chicken the handler was dangling above him. WOW!
I didn’t enjoy the crocodile viewing quite as much as I had at the Billabong Sanctuary, mainly because there was so much fencing around the enclosures. It made photography difficult, and in some places the fencing obstructed the view of the crocodiles almost completely.
One of the birds at the zoo decided that I was particularly interesting. It followed me around and kept pecking at my toes until I finally had to run away from it. Nasty little bugger!
After having a few unpleasant encounters with snakes during my travels through Australia, I was quite happy to see a coastal taipan safely behind glass. The coastal taipan is one of the world’s most venomous snakes, and behind glass was exactly where I wanted it.
I was also surprised by how different Albert, the American alligator, looked compared with the Australian crocodiles I had encountered during the trip. He also seemed rather small after seeing some of those enormous Aussie crocs.
I left Australia Zoo with a bag full of souvenirs for friends and family back home. My six-year-old nephew was a huge Steve Irwin fan, and he went bananas when he received his Australia Zoo Croc Hunter baseball hat. A fridge magnet for the missus was also purchased.
The kangaroo in the gallery was particularly docile that day — although not quite as docile as the hundreds of unfortunate ones I had already seen along Australian roads. The kangaroo in the photograph is very much alive, I assure you. He’s only sleeping.
