TUESDAY 3 MARCH     HEALESVILLE

Another hot day.

I drove to the shops to get supplies for morning tea, from a bakery. It cost me $13.50, for special cakes as two of John’s former colleagues were coming to a late morning tea. They stayed a couple of hours. It was quite a sinfully indulgent spread – and there were leftovers, too! John caught up on all the news from his old school.

In the afternoon, we visited the nearby Healesville Sanctuary. We had been hearing the dingoes howling in the late afternoons, and it was years since either of us had been here. Cost $20.80 for entry.

The Healesville Sanctuary was set up in the 1930’s, through the work of Melbourne doctor, Sir Colin Mackenzie, to research and conserve Australian animals. Although the land was a grant from the State government, he put a lot of his own money into it. In the 1970’s, it became a branch of the Melbourne Zoo. It is now an extensive establishment, in natural bushland, with the Badger Creek meandering through.

It was great to wander the Sanctuary, just the two of us. It is so well done, and worth every cent of the admission. We particularly enjoyed all the bird displays – given our new interest in bird spotting. I was quite taken by the bush thick knee, or bush curlew, that was standing frozen in some grass, pretending we couldn’t see it. The display said that they were rare in the wild and we were most unlikely ever to see one outside of the Sanctuary.

Went to the raptor display, which showed several birds of prey in flight and gave interesting details about them. That was excellent.

The platypus display was the best, we thought. It was fascinating to watch this unique creature swimming about, hunting for food, surfacing for air. The glass wall of the display area allows a side-on view of a creek and under the water, so one can view the animals submerged. We watched that for ages. Also watched the dingoes for a while – beautiful creatures.

Back at camp, John replaced the tyres on my bike.

Tea was salads – still full after morning tea! But we squeezed in some of the sinful leftovers