PENGUINS!!
You can see penguins in Australia! Did you know that?! I didn't until after I started planning my trip to Melbourne, Australia. The penguins that are native to Australia are called the Little Penguins. They can only be found in southern Australia or New Zealand. And yes, as their name gives it away, they are the smallest penguins in allllll the land and it is so easy to see them if you are visiting Melbourne! All you need is a sunset, a warm sweater, and patience (if you go in April like I did). I hope I'm able to convince you from this post that you MUST go see these Little Penguins when you go to Melbourne!
It’s a natural phenomenon, really. The penguins go out to sea before the sun rises and comes back once the sun sets. There are many places where you are able to see this happen! When we were in Melbourne, we decided to book a tour with Gray Line who took us to see the Little Penguins in Phillip Island.
Specifically, the tour we went on was called Phillip Island Penguin Parade Day Tour. You can either having a General Viewing, Premium Viewing, Underground Viewing. I was quite confused when I saw all these options at first, so I'll briefly explain them here for you.
Back to the details of the Gray Line tour -- Although the main attraction happens after the sun sets, the tour actually starts around 1pm as the drive is quite long. Along the way, there are a couple other stops relating to animals that you get to experience. First, they take you to a farm where they house a number of animals and you're given time to walk around and feed them (think all the kangaroos, goats, deer, birds, reptiles, etc)! Another stop was the Koala Conservation Centre, where we actually witnessed a koala bear move LOL it's a big deal because koalas typically sleep 20 hours a day!
And now for the main event!!! Arriving at Phillip Island Nature Park, our driver made sure we were very informed about the penguins and their living environment. So a bit more about these little cuties:
**Disclaimer: Photography was NOT allowed during the parade, as the Little Penguins are extremely sensitive to sudden light flashing. I believe they've completely banned it because of the people who don't know how to turn off their flash on the cameras lol. The photos I took (first two photos above + video below) were taken extremely carefully to ensure I did not emit any external light onto the penguin.**
These are little homes the Nature Park built for some of the penguins. However, their natural homes are those little hills you see further in the back in the patches of green. You can also see a number of 'bumps' in the at sunset picture, which are also their lil homes!
You can see penguins in Australia! Did you know that?! I didn't until after I started planning my trip to Melbourne, Australia. The penguins that are native to Australia are called the Little Penguins. They can only be found in southern Australia or New Zealand. And yes, as their name gives it away, they are the smallest penguins in allllll the land and it is so easy to see them if you are visiting Melbourne! All you need is a sunset, a warm sweater, and patience (if you go in April like I did). I hope I'm able to convince you from this post that you MUST go see these Little Penguins when you go to Melbourne!
It’s a natural phenomenon, really. The penguins go out to sea before the sun rises and comes back once the sun sets. There are many places where you are able to see this happen! When we were in Melbourne, we decided to book a tour with Gray Line who took us to see the Little Penguins in Phillip Island.
Specifically, the tour we went on was called Phillip Island Penguin Parade Day Tour. You can either having a General Viewing, Premium Viewing, Underground Viewing. I was quite confused when I saw all these options at first, so I'll briefly explain them here for you.
• General Viewing - You are located on an extremely large platform by the beach.
• Premium Viewing - You get to go into a special section where the # of people are limited and there is a direct path for which the penguins generally walk through in order to get to their homes. It's the closest you'll get to them & is the best option if you ask me! This is the option we chose.
• Underground Viewing - This is even more private, and you get to go inside an enclosed area that is below ground. Your eye level becomes ground and you will get to see the penguins waddle on by from their level!
Back to the details of the Gray Line tour -- Although the main attraction happens after the sun sets, the tour actually starts around 1pm as the drive is quite long. Along the way, there are a couple other stops relating to animals that you get to experience. First, they take you to a farm where they house a number of animals and you're given time to walk around and feed them (think all the kangaroos, goats, deer, birds, reptiles, etc)! Another stop was the Koala Conservation Centre, where we actually witnessed a koala bear move LOL it's a big deal because koalas typically sleep 20 hours a day!
And now for the main event!!! Arriving at Phillip Island Nature Park, our driver made sure we were very informed about the penguins and their living environment. So a bit more about these little cuties:
• As mentioned, they are the smallest of all penguins. They stand about 1 feet tall and weigh 1 kg.
• Little Penguins are the only penguins in the world that have blue and white feathers, vs black and white.
• Every night at sunset, the Little Penguins return back to shore after fishing. This is because they wait for their land predators to go to sleep first.
• There are a couple 'leaders' of the pack, where they will come out onto the beach to 'check' their surroundings. They can go in and out of the water to check over 10 times! Once they deem it to be okay, they'll waddle on out and the rest will follow.
• On Phillip Island, there is said to be about 32,000 Little Penguins (omg). However, there's no telling how many there are on a given day, as the penguins can go out into the sea for days. And of course, not all penguins go out. So if you're lucky, you'll be able to spot some penguins just chilling at their homes prior to the sun setting waiting for their partner to come home!
**Disclaimer: Photography was NOT allowed during the parade, as the Little Penguins are extremely sensitive to sudden light flashing. I believe they've completely banned it because of the people who don't know how to turn off their flash on the cameras lol. The photos I took (first two photos above + video below) were taken extremely carefully to ensure I did not emit any external light onto the penguin.**
These are little homes the Nature Park built for some of the penguins. However, their natural homes are those little hills you see further in the back in the patches of green. You can also see a number of 'bumps' in the at sunset picture, which are also their lil homes!
Above is a snippet of one of my Instagram stories I posted from my experience. You can watch it in my Australia highlight here. And that's that!! Honestly, this was one of the highlights of my entire trip to Australia!!! It's been a dream of mine to see these little penguins waddle home, as weird as that sounds. So happy we had great weather (it was supposed to thunderstorm that evening) and it was awesome to see groups and groups of Little Penguins come out of the water and walk right on by next to you! A big thank you to Gray Line for making this evening so easy - from the pick up from our hotel, to the smooth drive to Phillip Island, to the knowledge drop haha, and then dropping us back off at our hotel afterwards!
Another spot that is also popular to see the Little Penguins is at St. Kilda Beach (about a 15-20 minute car ride from Melbourne's downtown area). It's less regulated and a bit more chaotic, as people walk and climb rocks all around to see the penguins. There are also way less penguins than at Phillip Island, but if you're lucky, you might get a lot closer hehe. I got this photo below by basically crawling on the ground next to them and being hella quiet as I could tell these little ones just wanted to admire the sunset haha.
Cheers! xo
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- Travel Guide: Cairns, Australia [coming soon]
