Rottnest Island: Home of the Quokkas

On Monday morning we woke up early to catch the ferry to Rottnest Island, which is just off the coast of Freo (Fremantle). The boat ride was about an hour long, but that was because we had to stop at one more port to pick up another group of people. Once we were on open ocean it was only about a 25 minute ferry ride. The day looked a bit gloomy, but the sunshine looked like it wanted to break through. While we made our way down river and through the harbor, I kept seeing groups of birds sitting at the surface of the water, and where there are birds, there are usually fish. What do groups of fish mean... hungry dolphins! I tried and tried to catch a dolphin in its arch out of the water, but kept taking the picture too late, until finally, without even knowing it, I caught one at the peak of it's dive. These dolphins can be seen almost every day in the river and I usually get to see one or two on my way into the city on the bus, but had yet to catch a photo of one. I was very proud of myself. What was Nic doing while I was trying to catch my photos... well, Nic has had some bad experiences in the past with boats on the ocean. He was doing fine up until we hit open water, but I admit the boat was skipping pretty hard off the waves. He said he was just tired, but I'm pretty sure he was feeling a bit uneasy.

Once we arrived at Rottnest, the ferry service had a couple of bikes ready for us to use on our journey around the island. We headed for the visitor's center to pick up a couple of maps and then hit the scuba shop to pick up snorkel equipment. Luckily my bike had a place on the back to secure my snorkel gear to, but Nic had to tie his to his backpack, as you will see in later pictures. The sun still hadn't quite poked out but we were optimistic that we would have at least a little time in the sun to swim. We rode to the spot that the lady in the shop had told us was best for snorkeling, which was about 5 km (3 miles) up some pretty steep hills and fairly secluded from most of the other tourists. 3 miles on a bike may not sound too bad, but let me just say that these bikes were probably 15 years old, the gears hardly worked, chains slipped, and brakes squeaked just about the whole way. It was still a blast as both of us were seeing beautiful landscape and beaches along the way. This was our first quick stop, it used to be a Naval pier as the island was used as an enemy internment camp during WWI and WWII. There are still a few cannons and large gun installations across the island which were used to defend the port in Freo.

Now, you're probably wondering, what about the Quokkas that were mentioned in the title. Quokkas are small marsupials which can only be found on Rottnest Island. From stories that I had been told I assumed that the second I stepped off the boat these little guys would be swarming my feet. This was not the case however, and I was a bit disappointed, but our chance to catch a peek at these little guys would come soon enough.

Once we made it to the spot to snorkel, Parker's Point, we were very excited as the sun began to shine on our backs. We got suited up and got our snorkel gear on and hit the water water. Well... we inched into the water at least. The water was freezing cold because the warmer currents do not come in until mid-Spetember, which is just fine with me because warmer water means more creatures (i.e. sharks). Nic tiptoed further and further out, and I walked very slowly until finally I said forget it and dove in. Nic continued to inch his way in, he's a little bit more of a softy when it comes to cold water than I am :-) We finally got in deep enough water to look at what was under the water... rocks, sand, and plants... but no fish! I guess they come with the warmer water also. We did see a few small, dull looking fish, but nothing exciting enough to freeze for. Besides, I was getting a little paranoid in the open water and kept watching over my shoulder for a great white to be hunting me. So, we got out of the water, dried off, and packed up the snorkeling gear.

After rinsing off at changing at the bathrooms, we finally got to see our first quokka. He was crawling along the trail up ahead of us and he was SO CUTE! Nic had brought some snacks for the day in his back pack including banana chips and dried cranberries. I was so glad because this meant we could lure them to us with food. We are fairly sure that this was completely illegal, but who could resist those little guys? They came right up to us without a care in the world and later on we even got them to climb onto our laps and have a snack with us. As soon as Nic put away the snacks they were gone though... shows how much they cared about hanging out with us :-)