Australia has such unique, incredible animals on the continent. We found an excellent animal sanctuary to visit outside of Townsville and it did not disappoint at all. We learned all about koalas, cassowaries, snakes, crocs, meerkats, emus, dingos (wild dogs), wombats, a variety of small to medium-sized birds, kangaroos, and lizards.

We saw many koalas (photos #1-4 below), they were quite interesting to learn about. Koalas have 2 thumbs so they are better climbers and they eat eucalyptus leaves which are actually toxic to other animals. The leaves have enough nutrients and liquid in them so it's all they ingest (no water nor other types of food/liquid). They also sleep nearly 20 hours a day so they are pretty lazy animals. A couple of the koalas were born in the sanctuary but the majority of them were brought to the sanctuary because of injury (typically being hit by a car).

The snakes were WILD! I (Ellie) have been very afraid of snakes my whole life and until the Billabong Sanctuary, we had not seen a snake in Australia. I expected to see them as we camped throughout the outback but we didn't. I was a little anxious and nervous to see the snakes but wanted the challenge. The first snake we saw was in a cage and gosh, snakes in a cage seem so eerie and spooky. The next few snakes that we saw were also in a cage and seeing them truly made each hair on my body stand up, it is odd to have a physical reaction to a fear. After we saw some snakes in cages, we were heading to the reptile talk where I knew I would be seeing some big snakes outside of a cage. Oddly enough, seeing the snake outside of the cage (being held) felt much more natural but I still did not want to hold it. There was a large python out (5th photo below) and that was just crazy to see and be 15ft from. During the reptile talk, we learned all about snakes, crocs, and lizards. While the reptile man gave his talk, he would hold each of the animals as he chatted about them. For the croc, he held a baby croc though. After the information session, we were offered to hold the reptiles. Both Austin and I held the lizard and croc but only Austin held the snake. I stood about 10ft away just observing and took a couple of photos. Austin mentioned that when the snake was slithering around his arms, he could feel the muscles and squeezing the snake would do to move and stabilize itself, quite fascinating. After Austin gave the snake back to the employee, I decided I would try to touch it (not hold it) to face a fear..so I did. Touching it was enough for one day and I felt proud of myself since it has been such a big fear throughout my 31 years of living.

Have you ever heard of a cassowary? I had not until coming to Australia. They are large birds and have been around for a long time; they even share some respiratory system similarities to dinosaurs, woah. Their feet resemble a dinosaur but they have sharp claws. Cassowaries mainly eat fruit and they do not chew the fruit, they swallow it whole. One of the sanctuary employees tossed the cassowary a whole tomato and the bird caught it in its' beak and then swallowed it whole, we watched the shape of the tomato slide all the way down the throat, it was crazy! Their digestive systems break down all of the fruit except the seeds so when the cassowaries poop, they poop out the seeds and it replants the fruit tree.

Koalas:

Snakes:

Cassowary:

Parrot:

Kangaroo:

Emu:

Meerkats:

Cockatoo: