An Educational Center and the Zoo

Our first full day in Sydney, Australia was a busy one. We began the day by taking a bus to Gibberagong Environmental Education Centre to learn about environmental education in New South Wales. (New South Wales is the state in which Sydney is located.) This place was a beautiful large piece of land with an educational center for school children. It was amazing to hear how this center provides great environmental educational for local students. After that we went to Taronga Zoological Gardens—the main zoo in Sydney. (And, no, Steve Irwin the Crocodile Hunter was not there. He has a newer zoo called Australia Zoo.) We had a catered lunch and then a presentation on eco-tourism. After that we got to have a guided tour of the Australia section of the zoo. We saw wombats, koalas, Tasmanian Devils, platypuses, kangaroos, wallaby, tons of birds, and many other great animals. We then had a presentation by a local zoo handler that allowed us to get up close and personal with several cool animals, including a black widow spider. (The spider was in a sealed box.) The first picture below shows me with a sign only found in Australia. The second picture is a close-up of an emu.