Unsentimental Traveler Melts in Arms of Koala

I’ve never been much for cute, cuddly animals. Too sappy for me. And I’ve been pretty dogmatic about it over the years.

That was until I visited the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary in Brisbane, Australia, last July. There I met Janet, the cutest, cuddliest koala imaginable. Janet was mine for a five-minute hug-and-photo opportunity--five enchanted, spellbinding minutes. With her serene disposition and her two-armed hug, she seemed . . . almost human. And, I was never much for anthropomorphizing animals, either. Now I’m as sappy as the next person, verging on being a koala groupie. How the mighty fall.

Lone Pine, set on 50 acres of bush land, with over 100 koalas, is the largest and oldest koala sanctuary in the world and Brisbane’s star attraction. The capital of the state of Queensland, Brisbane is half way up (or down) the east coast and is a low-keyed, San Diego-esque city (relaxing, temperate, a little bland). While Brisbane’s not enough of a destination by itself to draw visitors to Queensland (no Sydney, this), for those already in Queensland (perhaps to visit the Great Barrier Reef or the Gold Coast), Lone Pine is the best chance to see the famous Australian fauna: kangaroos, wallabys, emus and dingos, in addition to koalas.

Australian conservationist Claude Reid opened the sanctuary in 1927 with two koalas. Three years ago, when a Japanese corporation bought Lone Pine, Brisbanites were up in arms, fearing the sanctuary would lose its Aussie-ness (Aussies are big on Aussie-ness and, if the truth be known, many are nervous about the growing Japanese ownership- and investment-presence here). While Brisbane may not exactly laud Kimihito Kamari--the corporation’s CEO and major koala groupie himself--as a hero for saving their in-slow-decline preserve, they do admit it has been spruced up considerably and remains very Australian.

The sanctuary is situated on a riverbank in the Brisbane suburbs and the most pleasant way to get there is by boat, which takes longer but is more interesting than taking a city bus (there’s a bus stop at the gate of the preserve). One option is to travel upriver by launch to the preserve, returning by city bus to the central bus station. River launches make the 1 1/4-hour journey from a downtown pier around the bends of the Brisbane River, with captain-commentary along the way. It’s a pretty trip and a relaxing way to learn about the city’s history.

At the sanctuary dock, a German shepherd with a koala clinging to its back, barks a welcome to visitors. The dog and his koala jockey scamper up the steps and wait at the front gate, willing to pose for cameras. (This was in my pre-Janet moments, and I saw nothing particularly amusing about the dog-and-koala show. Everyone else seemed enchanted).

The high point at Lone Pine is having your picture taken with a koala. Everyone does it. At the photo pavilion, visitors line up in a Disneyland-style queue for the next available koala. For my session with Janet, the attendant instructed me to put my hands together at my waist to form a platform and to let Janet do the holding (best to wear long sleeves to protect yourself against the koala’s sharp claws). Then he nudged Janet and she crawled over and hugged me. It was like holding the sweetest six-month-old baby. Janet sat, almost, dare I say it, almost loving me. So placid. So serene. (I have since learned that koalas are nocturnal. Maybe what I saw as serenity was really a REM state? I don’t want to know.)

The attendant assured me that the koalas are not overworked--they have their koala-labor laws: no more than 25 minutes a day per koala, three or four days on then a few days of rest. Forty or 50 koalas work in rotation. Once female koalas become mothers, they are never again used for photo sessions, the attendant told us.

On busy days there are lines for this E-ticket ride and personal time with the koalas is limited. The best time to get your photo taken is when koala talks are held at a nearby pavilion (several times a day), drawing most visitors. That way, you’ll find three koalas to serve you and a chance to just hold a koala and chat with the staffer. Photos cost $5 and are mailed to your U.S. address in three weeks. The photographers will let you snap extra shots with your own camera, but only if you order one of theirs first. Hint: Don’t volunteer to relinquish your koala until asked to do so. Just keep up the questions. You’ll probably never hold a koala again. Savor the moment.

As we walked through the sanctuary there were koalas at every turn: pens with two or three or six everywhere along the paths. The sanctuary’s koalas are all in plain sight--not half-hidden in high treetops. Most are within 5 to 10 feet of visitors, sitting in what passes for trees (chopped-off six-foot branches braced in containers).

The sanctuary has its own eucalyptus plantation nearby where it meets the peculiar culinary demands of koalas. They eat only eucalyptus leaves and each koala requires between two and three pounds a day. Koalas like to nestle in the forks of trees and stare out. They could move over to the far side of the pens, away from people, but most seem to choose the people side. They remind me of Woody Allen. I’m not sure why. Maybe it’s the blank expressions, beady eyes and big noses. Babies scamper out of pouches and crawl on their mother’s backs. They never take an unflattering picture.

They seem unflappable. Sanctuary literature maintains that one of the best proofs of this is that, from a population of about 100 koalas, there were 43 koala babies born last year (the yearly average for the sanctuary is 24). Since Koalas require a certain sense of tranquillity to breed successfully, it would appear that their proximity to humans doesn’t stress them out. The koalas breed freely here, and many of the babies are sent to other sanctuaries and to state forests and national parks in an effort to re-establish the koala in its natural environment.

Lone Pine has more than koalas. There are fruit bats, too. Not cute, but intriguing--especially as viewed from only about four feet away, hanging upside down in their cages, sleeping in the warm sun. They are called fruit bats--because, from a distance, they look like fruit pods as they hang in trees--and also flying foxes, because of the beautiful reddish fur on their torsos. Their wings look like a da Vinci drawing, black leather stretched over bones. As they doze, they frequently open their wings--capes--wide to adjust themselves, fanning out like the Phantom of the Opera.

The sanctuary keeps its collection of kangaroos, wallabys and emus in a several-acre preserve where visitors can walk in with them. The day we were there, the kangaroos lolled about, sunning, posing, lounging like dogs and cats. Visitors approached to pet them, to pose with them--almost not believing they were touching live kangaroos. It seemed fine with the ‘roos. They are odd creatures with innocent, deer-like faces. When a baby kangaroo hoped out of its mother’s pouch, visitors did a double take. Where did he come from? The sound of food being set out pulled the kangaroos out of their late afternoon languor. Suddenly dozens of kangaroos were bounding across the meadow right in front of visitors--those tiny front legs tucked primly over their stomachs, those amazing leaps with the hind legs. (Big kangaroos have been known to jump more than 20 feet.) Feeding time is late afternoon, around 4 p.m. and a trip timed to that allows one to see kangaroos doing what they do best--bound.

The sanctuary also has emus (big, flightless ostrich-like birds), dingos (wild dogs) and wombats. Australians seem to be very fond of wombats and I’m not sure why. They are marsupials but look like hyperthyroid rodents--big, brown and blunt-nosed. Aussies find them cuddly. I can’t imagine picking one up. One morning, on Australia’s version of the “Today” show, I watched as the premier of the state of Victoria sat petting a wombat on her lap and telling viewers how she had 66 of them at home--all with cute little names.

Lone Pine has a pleasant picnic area, with tables, overlooking both the river and the preserve, and also an indoor/outdoor cafe near the sanctuary entrance. In addition to people food such as hamburgers, sandwiches, ice cream and popcorn, the cafe sells kangaroo food pellets.