I visited Kangaroo Island

Index

Getting To Kangaroo Island

From November 18, 2013, to April 2014, I was traveling through the Pacific, and during that period I also visited Kangaroo Island. It is the third‑largest island belonging to Australia and is located in South Australia. I reached the island by taking a ferry after a shuttle‑bus ride from Adelaide Central Station. According to the Aussies, the shuttle ride to Cape Jervis is “short,” though it takes about two hours. The ferry crossing from Cape Jervis to Penneshaw on Kangaroo Island takes roughly 45 minutes.

Kangaroo Island

Kangaroo Island has two towns: Penneshaw and Kingscote. Around 4.400 people live on the island, which is known for its ecotourism, and my Wwoof placement was intended to contribute to that. I stayed in Penneshaw for about a week before starting my Wwoof experience. From there, I took the bus to Kingscote, the island’s capital. I transferred straight to my pickup at the bus station, so I didn’t actually see Kingscote itself. One of the lodge managers, along with three French Wwoofers, came to collect me when I arrived.

Penguins & Dolphins Penneshaw

In Penneshaw, I stayed in a small, friendly, and very clean hostel with a kitchen where I could cook my own meals. There were hardly any other guests, as the summer holiday season had not begun yet. From the hostel, it was only a short walk to the beach. I went there every day to do yoga on the beach and to greet the dolphins that swam very close to the shore. A sign on the beach warned visitors to watch out for penguins, so I asked where they were, hoping I would finally see penguins in the wild. It turned out they were in Antarctica at that time; they only visit this beach during the winter season.

National Park Near Penneshaw

Before beginning my third Wwoof adventure, I hiked a trail in the national park near Penneshaw. At the tourist information office, I asked what there was to do on Kangaroo Island and received a booklet describing short hikes near a national park. It turned out to be wonderful hikes, and I saw many wallabies, the smaller species of kangaroos. The hike was great, except for the final stretch, which led through a typically Australian, mosquito‑infested area. I ended up running out of the park toward the beach, chased by mosquitoes. I finally understood why in some parts of Australia people wear hats with nets. It was my only encounter with mosquitoes during my entire four‑month trip through Australia.

Wwoofing In A Lodge With Restaurant Near Sealbay

As I mentioned earlier, I was picked up in Kingscote by one of the managers of my third Wwoof placement, along with three other Wwoofers. The lodge and restaurant were run by an Australian Dutch couple who had managed several tourist accommodations and restaurants in Australia. In the kitchen, while doing prep work, I practiced perfecting my English with the female manager. She asked me to only speak Dutch to her husband so he could practice his Dutch, since he didn’t use it often in Australia. I had my own room in the hostel that served as the Wwoofers’ accommodation. It was me and the French group, who spoke only French, even though they had already been Wwoofing and working in Australia for a year. A few days a week, we all ate together: the managers, the three French Wwoofers, and me. On other days, I cooked my own meals or joined the French group. Later on, more Wwoofers arrived as the summer season approached.

Wwoofing In A Lodge With A Restaurant

My Wwoof placement on Kangaroo Island was my third Wwoof experience. I already wrote about my first placement in the blog ‘What makes a wwoof experience in the middle of nowhere so special!', which was a positive experience, and about my second placement, which never started in the blog ‘Being on the road for a month!'. This third Wwoof job involved helping run a lodge and its restaurant. Because my English was strong, I spent most of my time at the cash register. I loved taking food orders and starting the check in procedure for the guests. Even though most tourists in the preseason were Australian, it was fun to overhear visitors studying the menu on the wall and discussing their choices, and the prices, in all kinds of languages. After ordering at my antique cash register, their meals were delivered by one of the French Wwoofers. The register itself was very old‑fashioned and had been programmed by the female manager. After lunch service, I was free for the rest of the day. The other two French Wwoofers handled the cleaning of the lodges. I switched roles only once so that all three of them could gain kitchen experience. I wasn’t very good at making beds, they had to be perfect, so I was more than happy to stay where I was: very content behind the cash register.

The Wwoof Lodge Near Sealbay

Kangaroo Island is plagued by bushfires and hurricanes. I was lucky I didn't experience a bushfire in my whole travel through Australia. I hiked a trail true part of the Blue Mountains, which was recovering from a bush fire, not a pretty site. I already experienced a tropical storm / hurricane in the first category in the Northern Territories and could see the results of hurricanes in the garden around the lodge. The lodge was well booked for the summer holiday season, which is why I went looking in one of the sheds together with the female manager if there was something there that could be used in the restaurant, lodges or hostel. The whole Lodge consisted of the house of the managers' couple, the kitchen with restaurant, the hostel some sheds and lodges. In the garden there was a koala at the entrance of the path to the restaurant. Every morning I passed by to greet the koala, nice to see a koala that close. I never patted the koala or came too close. I also loved the morning sky at the lodge. I even took pictures of birds flying early in the morning in empty meadow. One of those pictures was used on the homepage of the lodge. 

Making Tourist Booklets

I took it upon me to create tourist information booklets for each lodge accommodation on the property. The managers collected flyers at one of the tourist information centers for nearly every activity available on Kangaroo Island, and these were included in the booklets. In the evenings, one of the French female Wwoofers and I spent our time on the balcony in front of the restaurant cutting, pasting, and organizing all the materials. By the time we finished, every accommodation had its own booklet filled with tourist information, a first for the lodge.

A Day At Seal Bay

I was asked where I wanted to go on my free day. Seal Bay seemed like the perfect choice, I could see sea lions, and the managers offered to drop me off and pick me up. The sea lions live in a national park. I chose the self‑guided boardwalk walk, which leads through the park and down to the beach, where sea lions were lying on the sand. Sea lions are an endangered species, and all stages of their life cycle can be observed from a safe distance on this beach. At certain points, I could step off the boardwalk onto the beach, where experienced guides explained more about the sea lions and their lives on this part of Kangaroo Island. It is true wildlife, even though the animals are monitored, visitors can get close, but never too close. There is an entrance fee which is mostly used to maintain the population sea lions and make it more eco-friendly.

The Neighbor

One evening, the neighbor joined the whole team for dinner. There was casual conversation, some news, and even mention of a vacancy at one of the lighthouses on Kangaroo Island. They asked whether I might be interested. It was a paid, or partly paid, position, and I was genuinely tempted. But taking the job would have meant leaving Australia to apply for the correct Visa permit, so in the end it wasn’t practical. Later, the managers told me that if I wanted a paid job in Australia, I could also look for work in tourism as a manager on the east coast. Their next gig would be on the east coast. I think that might have been a better way to travel through the east coast of Australia, because the east coast turned out to be very busy and extremely touristy. But I didn’t pursue it; instead, I continued my journey as a tourist through the rest of Australia. This Wwoof placement was a good experience, just like my first one, but I ultimately chose to spend the remainder of my trip travelling rather than working.

The Light House

Just before the start of the busy summer Christmas season, the owners wanted to take a short sightseeing trip. Three people could join, so two of the French Wwoofers, the managers, and I went to see the lighthouse with our own eyes. Our destination was Flinders Chase National Park, where we visited Admirals Arch, Remarkable Rocks, and the lighthouse. I could actually imagine myself running the Cape du Couedic Lighthouse, during the high‑water season when the surrounding area becomes inaccessible. On the way back, a hurricane caught up with us, and the rain became torrential. Visibility through the windshield was terrible. At one point, we were nearly hit by one of Kangaroo Island’s infamous kangaroos, known for jumping onto the road right in front of cars. It wasn’t my first encounter with a kangaroo leaping in front of a vehicle. I started calling them “Suicide Kangaroos”, because they seem determined to jump in front of cars, trucks, and anything else on highways, dirt roads, and even remote tracks. In 2016, after hiking the Camino Portugues and living in Arnhem, I gave my psychiatrist the poem Suicide Kangaroo, which I had written.