Join Jules and his family from Travelling Family Circus, ambassadors of the Real Life Classroom. They are sharing their adventures as they travel through Tasmania, visiting some caverns.
Is it just us? Our life bucket list involves things mostly to do with travel… Actually; it involves all things travel. That said, today was a BIG bucket list ‘tick – it- off’ day for our little fam bam. It’s the simple things in life that are often the best… I heard that somewhere once.. hee hee! ‘Simple’, meaning we didn’t conquer Everest or jump out of a plane, but it was exciting none the less. We have all been totally hanging to see glow worms and Sebastian adores wombats. He has always wanted to meet one up close.
So, we went to Mole Creek. Mole Creek is amazing! Pack your winter woollies because it had to be the coldest place we visited in Tassie; even over Cradle Mountain with all the shards of ice flying through the air! We seriously couldn’t feel our toes, even with 8 pairs of socks on! Joking… It was only 3.
Mole Creek is stunning. We are talking platypus in the sparkling streams and mossy green magical looking forests! The kids loved it. Funny… they were hoping to see moles there. “So… Where are the moles?” asked Mr 7. Hmmm… Lesson number one for the day; moles are not an Australian animal… But good question none the less! I had to Google that one! Apparently it is called Mole Creek because “the creek disappears into the local karst limestone “like a mole”. OK. So now we know.
Time for us to be moles and disappear into the Marakoopa Cave! We recommend walking through the super magical amazing forest to get there. So beautiful! You can also drive up from the main car park if you want to. The caves were stunning and we got to see those beautiful glow worms sparkling like the brightest stars in the sky. You are not allowed to take photos of them, so I digitally painted a pic to show you a little of what they look like. The kids learnt about karst landscapes. Karst is an area of land made up of limestone and consists of caves, underground streams and sinkholes formed via the erosion of rainwater seeping through the rock. They also learned about the living things dwelling inside the caves and how they have adapted to surviving in a world of darkness. Not only are there spectacular glow worms, we saw mountain shrimp in the stream! There are about 100 species of Troglobites (invertebrates that live in complete darkness) living in the cave system. There is also a cool cave spider but we didn’t see him!
Mole Creek National Park is the perfect spot to set up our Apollo classroom on wheels for lunch before heading off to the Trowunna Wild life Sanctuary.
Basically down the road – Trowunna is a fantastic place if you want to get up close to our beautiful wildlife. We got to meet the Tassie ‘BIG 5’ – Tassie Devils, Quolls, Wombats, Kangaroos and Echidnas! What an experience to literally be able to pat and feed these beautiful animals. Yes, we even got to actually touch the Tassie Devil – under supervision of her carer, of course. Nothing is more fascinating than watching those devils feed. They sure can create some terrifying screams!
Our hearts belonged to Tina though. Tina was adorable.
She is an orphaned wombat who has grown up at the sanctuary. They are doing absolutely amazing work for wildlife conservation, from raising orphaned wombats to assisting in bringing the Tasmanian Devil back from its 3rd brush with extinction; being the facial tumor disease which has wiped out huge numbers of Devils over the past few years. The zoo fee and the toys we purchased all go to a good cause at the wildlife sanctuary.
It costs a lot to feed and take care of the wildlife. These carers are truly dedicated to conservation. They do their utmost to ensure our future generations learn all about these beautiful creatures, and what we can do to help. Trowunna’s marvelous staff also spend their lives on broken sleep, having to wake periodically to feed the orphaned babies and keep them alive. It’s just like having newborn babies. Well done guys. We really appreciated you sharing your time and knowledge about these animals and conservation.
You can find a link to Trowunna Wildlife Sanctuary here!
Thanks for joining us and we look forward to seeing you on our next adventure!
Click here to read more about the Real Life Classroom journey in Tasmania.
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