Jan 12 - Kuranda

Packed up and left my bag with the front desk and walked to catch the bus to Kuranda rainforest park. Finally figured out that I was waiting at the wrong stop so I ran to where I was supposed to go and managed to get on the bus barely catching my breath. Note to self: Need to start getting into shape!
Walked along the "rainforest" trek and did a roundtrip back.
Crossed some elevated train tracks
Too bad there weren't any boat rides that day
Went into the Kuranda Koala Gardens and I got to hold a koala. They're actually pretty heavy! The one I carried weighed about 9 kg (or was it 9 lbs?) The keepers are quite respectful for the koalas I must say. One of them tried to transfer a koala onto the person in front of me and the koala wouldn't have it; She kept shivering. Tried again ... nope! Keeper then tried transferring her to another keeper and same thing. NOPE! She's done "working" for the day! They only "work" the koalas a really short while (like 30 mins) each day and they don't push the animal. I say that they don't push the animal but it could be that koalas can be quite vicious so it's better not provoke them.
This was near the entrance. No clue why there's an old plane there.
*pretend you're a tree*
Saw more wallabies and kangaroos. Tried to feed them but they must be stuffed because they kept moving away from people trying to feed them. There were some other animals like crocs (or were they alligators?) there.
This guy looks gorgeous
Can't remember what this is but looks like a possum
Here's a frog Here's comes a turtle. "Excuse moi froggie" Well, if you won't budge...
Amazing they don't fall off!
 
This one has the best sleeping pose in my books.
Afterwards, I wandered around the stalls to do some souvenir shopping. I came upon this stall selling kangaroo skin stuff. At one end of the table were these cut-outs and when you flip them, you can see printed on it spaces for "Name", "Address", "Country". Huh? What's this? Storekeeper comes up and tells me those are postcards. "Are you for real? Do they actually get sent?" He proves they do by asking me to check out some of the postcards he got from customers who mailed them back to him. Huh! I guess the mailman will send it. Okay, I'll get one and mail it to my nieces.

I keep moving along the table and see hanging on paper 2-D human bodies what look like bikinis and on another paper body underwear. I point to them, looked at the storekeeper and asked "For real?" Storekepper says "You'll be surprised! I thought my wife was crazy to want to sell that but I do sell 1 or 2 a week!" HUH! Oookkaaayyyy... Looked down on the table and saw in plastic wrapped packages 2 circular kangaroo skins pasted on a piece of paper. On it, it says "nipple warmers". I point to that and asked the storekeeper "FOR REAL??" That's apparently a gag gift thing. But wait! That's not all! I look further along the table and see these what I think are perfume snuff bottles but shaped suspiciously like "balls" with fur still on. Storekeeper proudly tells me those are made from kangaroo testicles. "Waste not want not" he says. They also have purses made from kangaroo balls but those have the fur removed so they just look like leather pouches.

I walked into the post office with my hand stretched out holding the postcard and the lady behind the counter said to me "Why are you bringing a piece of rodent skin to me?". *sigh*
After mailing off my postcard, I walked back towards the bus stop and saw this on a wall

Day 7/8: Melbourne/Adelaide