Dolphins!

Today we are off to see dolphins in the wild!

Gray Line coach again picked us from our hotel at 7.30am and our journey to Port Stephens began at 8am. On our way to Port Stephens, we saw the Hawkesbury Ranges in the distance (no photo, too far) and crossed the Hawkesbury River which is famous for its oysters. A pity, no chance to taste them. :P

We stopped by at the Australian Reptile Park for a visit from 9.30-10.30am. We got to pat a baby alligator and a koala and we took photos with them. :) We couldn't feed the kangaroos as they were all lying around in their rest area rather than hopping around in the park. At least, emus were walking around the park. We saw a Galapagos tortoise (it is HUGE!), Tasmanian devil, cassowaries and snakes. The girls visited Spider World where they could see the 'milking' of Sydney funnel-web spiders of their incredibly toxic venom and many other spiders. I couldn't bear to stay long in the room because of my fear of spiders.







Candid photo of the girls at the giant croc entrance to the Lost World of Reptiles

By 10.45am, we were on our way to Port Stephens. We arrived at Port Stephens, Nelson Bay just after 12pm and we had until 1.10pm for lunch before we have to board our cruise boat for the dolphin watching. We had a simple lunch of sandwiches as I was worried about the girls being seasick and they might throw up if they had too much to eat for lunch. As we were walking at the marina towards our cruise boat, Moonshadow, my girls and I saw a lone (wild) penguin chasing after a school of fish! It was too swift to be caught on film. It was swimming really fast in and out among the boats at the marina and chasing after its lunch. The sight of the penguin brought smiles to our faces. :)

Port Stephens

The girls and Moonshadow in the background

The cruise boat departed at 1.30pm, going out towards the Tasman Sea. The girls and I stayed on the first deck so that we could easily access the sundeck in order to be closer to the action or dolphins lol. :) I was initially worried about the girls being seasick but they seemed fine. After about 40 minutes into the journey, we went out to the sundeck to wait for the dolphins. It was not easy to spot them because of the sun's reflection on the water and the wind was quite strong as well. I made sure the girls held on to the railings tightly. Suddenly, we heard the captain telling us that there was a dorsal fin appearing out of the sea not far ahead of our boat. Yippee, our first dolphin! It swam quite close to the deck where we were. But it was really fast, swimming in and out among the waves, very hard to catch on film because I don't have those big, powerful cameras lol. Soon, a second dolphin and a third dolphin appeared! Unfortunately, that was all the dolphins that appeared to us for the rest of the cruise. :(







By 3.30pm, we were back at the marina and departing for the next destination, Stockton Beach. One has to be here to see it to believe it. We couldn't hardly believe that we are still in Australia and not some desert country. The Stockton Bight Sand Dunes is amazing, which covers an area of over 2,500 hectares along the 32 kilometre long Stockton Beach. We didn't try the sandboarding as I really didn't fancy having sand in my clothes and in the girls' clothes. But the girls enjoyed themselves playing with the white sand and I was busy taking photos lol. There was a beautiful sunset as we left Stockton Beach. What a wonderful end to the day. :)







Our shadows on the sand




Sun setting behind the sand dune



Sunset at Stockton Beach

We embarked on a 2.5 hours journey back to Sydney, arriving only at 7.30pm. My behind was really sore from sitting without moving for so long lol.

Tomorrow, we are going shopping because Thursdays are late night shopping in Sydney. :)