First, get your minds out of the gutter. I try to come up with catchy titles that describe our day and maybe have double meanings. I know you and what you’re thinking with today’s title. Totally what I was going for. 🙂

Random pub we walked by.

Today, we took a tour up to the Hunter Valley Wine Region. The first stop for our merry band of 14, including driver Sam, was the Walkabout Wildlife Park. This was how I found out about this tour, actually. I googled where I could pet a koala, and this park came up. Being about 1.5 hours out of Sydney, my next quest was how to get there. Which led me to this fantastic tour — petting koalas, wine and chocolate tasting, being driven around all day. I’m in!

As we were driving north through Sydney to start our tour, our driver asked us to fill out a form with a bit of information, and then awkwardly began talking about how the tour company had experienced some trouble recently with tourists discussing a certain subject, and how with wine and beer involved during the day, a few of the discussions had become heated and almost led to fistfights. He asked us to read this form (shown at right) he would pass around and follow the request.

The wildlife park was amazing. We were about 10 steps in when we spotted our first free-roaming kangaroos. Our guide told us we were free to pet them, but that we should always approach from the side or back.

We took lots of photos of ourselves petting the kangaroos, and even a photo of a mom nursing a Joey, although her warning look was enough to keep me about 10 feet away to take my photos! And we saw a Joey in the pouch. We also got to pet a cute little koala bear, which was so stinkin’ cute and looked just like a teddy bear, and was very patient as we all took turns petting her and taking pictures. I wanted to see the Tasmaninan Devils, as I’ve never seen one in real life. We wandered over to their enclosure and got lucky to see them in the daylight as they are nocturnal creatures.

Our next stops were all about sampling – in order – chocolate, wine, cheese, wine and beer. All fantastic and fun stops. The people here are very genuine and kind, and always want to make sure you’re having a good time.

Mom and I bought a bottle of wine, bread, cheese, salami, olives and chocolate along the way, and had a nice dinner in our hotel room while watching a movie. Great end to a great day!

Bonus – terrible cheese and beer jokes courtesy of our driver, Sam:

• Why didn’t the cheese want to be sliced? Because he had grater plans.
• I’ll tell you a beer joke when you yeast expect it.
• What did the magician say when he completed his trick? Chedd-ah!
• Be careful. The more you eat, the feta you get.