The Steamtug Blog

How did you spend your Easter? My brother and his family hired a house over at Philip Island so I tagged along.

Philip Island is probably most famous for it’s “penguin parade” where every night at dusk the little penguins walk up the beach after a days fishing in the sea to their nests, feed the chicks, watch “A current affair” on the tele (have you ever noticed the television “intelligence vacuum”  at 6.30pm? It’s so the penguins can understand how dumb humans have become) and have a good night sleep ready to go back to sea the next morning.

Some international visitors we have had staying reported to us how disappointing it was to go there, pay $40 per person only to be herded into grandstand style viewing platforms, hear the speel over the loud speakers then sit and watch as only 6 penguins came ashore.

Do you remember when we were kids? It was a typical aussie laid back affair where a guide with a torch took you down the beach to witness 100’s of penguins. Now they have built this giant visitors centre and pack in thousands of noisy visitors with bright lights, cameras with flash etc. If I were a penguin, I would say “bugger this… let’s move down the beach a bit”.

So we went to the penguin parade. We looked out of place because I was not wearing a turban, or a sari (I wonder who was driving the taxi’s back in Melbourne?) and…. yep, as predicted 6,000 tourists all paying $40 each to see 6 penguins.

And what about seal rocks??? Have we become a nation of total morons? Get this…

You walk, camera at the ready, all around the board walks at seal rocks only to see rocks, not seals. So how do you see seals? Simple! You go to the visitors centre and put $5 into a machine with a big screen then twiddle the knobs that move a camera to zoom in on where the seals are. Aparently they are just down below where you can’t see them, but I reckon the camera is mounted either in Antarctica or the seal enclosure of the Melbourne Zoo! Then there is a big blue button you press once you have found a cute seal, taking a photo, which is printed out where they sell the cafe lattes. How dumb do they think we are?

Have a happy Easter anyway.  🙂

PS Speaking of “A current affair” they are always doing a story about dodgy mechanics, well they should come to Geelong and do a story about good mechanics! I just picked up Mitchell’s new car from Scott and Troy at ” B & R Motors”. Those blokes down there are experts on everything! No fuss, no bullshit just good honest work, and they are not even expensive. Tell them Mark sent you, at 4 Riversdale Road Newtown. Phone 52212329