life down under

I have so much to post about, but will start at the beginning! After 15 hours on an airplane, we were so happy to arrive in Sydney. My aunt and uncle picked us up at the airport and took us downtown to the Opera House. It was a gorgeous sunny morning and a wonderful way to start our trip. I love the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge. They are such amazing landmarks of this great city.

The next day we went to Koala Park - a wildlife sanctuary - near my aunt and uncle's place. I have so many memories of visiting this place as a kid. It was so fun to take my own kids there and see it through their eyes. We saw wombats, dingos, lots of beautiful birds, kangaroos and koalas.

Everything was going well.... we were feeding the kangaroos crackers and just hanging out with them. There was a group of Chinese tourists in with us and one guy squatted down beside a kangaroo to have his photo taken. All of a sudden another roo came up and leaned back on his tail, and kicked the guy with both feet and knocked him into the fence. The poor guy jumped up, brushed the kangaroo poo off his designer pants and the whole group out them were out of the kangaroo pen in 2 seconds flat. We giggled about that for awhile. Then.... out of the corner of my eye, I saw that feisty little roo stand up and put his front paws on Bella's shoulders. Next thing I knew, he leaned back on his tail and started kicking her in the stomach! I lunged over, gave the roo a huge shove and picked up Bella. She was freaked out and crying. I immediately lifted up her shirt to check for damage and thankfully, they wasn't even a scratch. Those roos have HUGE front claws and have been known to use them to rip open a dog or an animal they are fighting with. It could have been really bad, but thankfully, it wasn't! Just a bit scary! I have to admit that after that happened, we got out of that roo enclosure pretty quickly too!!

The rest of our first week in Sydney was spent getting ready for my cousins wedding, and hanging out with other cousins that had arrived for the wedding. We spent a fun morning at Collaroy Beach in North Sydney, collecting shells, jumping in the dunes and enjoying the sunshine!

We are all having a great time so far!!