Brand Irwin is very much alive at the late Crocodile Hunter's Australia Zoo, but there's nothing like feeding an elephant to get rid of cynicism, writes Pádraig Collins
AFTER MARK TWAIN visited Australia on a lecture tour, from September 1895 to January 1896, he wrote that the country "is full of surprises and adventures, the incongruities, and contradictions, and incredibilities, but they are all true, they all happened".
Only for the fact that he was writing 70 years before the first one was erected he might have been talking about Australia's obsession with "big things". Very big things. It started with the 13m-long Big Banana in Coffs Harbour, New South Wales, which was erected in 1964. There are now about 130 "big things", including the Big Merino, Big Ned Kelly, Big Captain Cook, Big Cassowary and, biggest of all, the 21m-long Big Bull in Wauchope, New South Wales.
The closest "big thing" to Australia Zoo is the Big Pineapple, at Woombye, near Nambour ( www.nambourtown.com.au). Although Nambour is now more famous for the fact that Australia's prime minister, Kevin Rudd, and treasurer, Wayne Swan, come from there, it was the Big Pineapple that initially put it on the map when it opened, in 1971.
It is a working farm as well as a tourist attraction, and the train journey through its pineapple and macadamia plantation is a delight. There is also a small petting zoo, and you can climb inside the giant pineapple. Best of all is the cafe, where the ice cream is sensational.
Twain could also have been predicting the bizarre, Norman-style Sunshine Castle ( www.sunshinecastle.com), at Bli Bli, which was built in 1973 and features a moat, turrets, towers and drawbridge.
It also has a large display of medieval armour, 350 dolls dressed in the national costumes of 57 countries, another 2,200 dolls in its doll museum and a dungeon, which our daughter loved.
My six-year-old daughter, Grace, is the reason we are at Australia Zoo. To my chagrin she loves Bindi the Jungle Girl, the TV series presented by nine-year-old Bindi Irwin, and insists that, as we are in the neighbourhood, visiting her aunt, the Irwins' zoo is added to the itinerary.
The zoo was opened by Steven Irwin, better known to millions of TV viewers as the Crocodile Hunter. He was killed by a stingray in September 2006. As with Elvis Presley and John Lennon, death has not dented the brand.
The almost 50 documentaries Irwin made for the Animal Planet channel are perpetually repeated around the world, and the zoo ( www.australiazoo.com.au), at Beerwah, on Queensland's Sunshine Coast, continues to operate as a multimillion-dollar business.
How lucrative is immediately obvious when there isn't much change from $200 (about €120) in the entry fee for our party of three adults and one child ($52 for adults, $31 for children, under-threes free).
The zoo occupies 28 hectares (70 acres) - and there are ambitious plans to expand it to 120 hectares (300 acres) - so there's a lot to see.
But first I pick up Grace and pretend to throw her into a crocodile enclosure. It's my tribute to a controversial incident from January 2004, when Irwin held his then infant son, Bob, in one arm as he fed a crocodile at the zoo.
I found Irwin gauche, not least because of the incident with his son, and my opinion is not helped by the slightly creepy fact that death does not stop him appearing all over the zoo, in photographs, videos and a bizarre statue. A video showing him being attacked by animals he has provoked is particularly strange, although, thankfully there are no stingrays on it.
The videos in which Irwin is not doing the voice-over feature a soundtrack of insipid pop-punk-lite songs with lyrics about his heroic adventures.
Our first stop is the 5,000-seat "Crocoseum", where staff dressed in khaki, as they all are, get up close and personal with a crocodile. Our hosts divide the crowd in two, hip-hop-concert style, to see who can shout Irwin's catchphrase, "Crikey!", the loudest.
They ask if anyone in the audience is from Canada, the UK, the US, New Zealand, South Africa, Japan and so on. It's no guessing game: everyone is asked where they are from on their way into the zoo.
Cynicism aside, it is an impressive show, which uses feeding time to demonstrate the awesome power of the crocodile. Bob is nowhere to be seen, mercifully. He is, however, still being used as a prop, by being given cute lines to say on a video message. And, just in case you haven't figured it out, they show you out-takes in which he fluffs his lines. His dad would surely approve.
After the croc has been herded back to his enclosure, some snakes are brought out in boxes. We are given admirable conservation messages and first-aid advice about what to do if you're bitten by a snake. The ultimate advice given is to call 000, Australia's emergency number, which is perfect if you get bitten in the city but of limited use most places you are likely to encounter a snake.
Before we leave the Crocoseum we are advised against littering, which can kill animals, in a way that is easy for children to understand. Unfortunately, the lesson is ignored by many visitors to the zoo. It strikes me that the only dumb animals that litter are humans.
Beside the Crocoseum is the apostrophe-free "Kids zoo". Grace has such fun feeding the goats by hand she says she wants to work at Australia Zoo when she's grown up. Later on I have a similar feeing myself when hand-feeding an elephant, at which point my initial reluctance to embrace the day seeps away. The keepers are all friendly and seem to love caring for the animals, which look well fed and healthy.
In the kangaroo enclosure it is hard to resist the urge to approach one and say: "What's that, Skip? A boy fell down the well?" But I do. Kangaroos are very cute creatures, and the leucistic one, which has white fur because of reduced pigmentation, is the cutest of all. There is also a leucistic crocodile called Casper, which is yellow.
In the food court at lunchtime we get talking to a woman whose son, Lachlan, has Down syndrome. They live in the area and go to the zoo about six times a year. Lachlan loves it, and getting him to leave at the end of the day proves very difficult.
We meet them again later at the reptile house. Lachlan tells me about his favourites while I explain to him how St Patrick ruined snakes for Irish people. Eight of the world's 10 most poisonous snakes are native to Australia, and most of them are in Australia Zoo. The glass between us and them looks pretty solid, though - until I get to an enclosure and the reptile it is supposed to contain is nowhere to be seen. I make my excuses and move on.
Water monitor lizards (which can grow up to three metres in length) roam freely around the zoo, letting you know who's boss, but their bigger cousin the Komodo dragon is kept at bay by a wall. Their even bigger cousins the crocodiles and alligators are close enough that we can admire their rugged, dinosaur-like beauty.
Of the birds in the zoo, the cassowary and bowerbird are the most impressive. The cassowary is huge, flightless and beautiful. It is native to northernmost Queensland and Papua New Guinea, and only an estimated 1,200 are left in the wild. With luck, Australia Zoo can help ensure its survival.
We see a male bowerbird running around, frantically building a nest and decorating it with anything blue - berries, paper, plastic - he can find to attract a mate. A zookeeper explains the bird's ritual as she hangs up a hand-written sign that reads "love shack".
After a long and lovely day we leave the zoo via the gift shop (you have no choice but to do so). Nothing here is cheap, but, unlike the Crocodile Hunter T-shirts, Crikey! hats and Bindi DVDs, the entry price to the zoo is worth it.
On the way out one of the zoo staff frighten the wits out of Grace by springing a Tasmanian devil glove puppet on her. She loved it. We'll be back.
Go there
Flights to Brisbane cost €1,100-€1,300,
whether you go with Qantas, British Airways, Singapore Airlines,
Etihad or Air France.
Airlines often give their lowest fares to specialist firms, so try Austravel (01-6427009, www.austravel.ie), Australia Travel Centre (01-8047100, www.australia.ie), Trailfinders, (01-6777888, www.trailfinders.ie) and Club Travel (01-5005544, www.clubtravel.ie).
From Brisbane, take a train ( www.qr.com.au) to Beerwah, Wombye or Nambour.
If you're staying elsewhere in Australia, you can fly to Sunshine Coast Airport from Sydney, Melbourne and other Australian cities.
Where to stay and eat Australia: destined for big things
Where to stay
Most of the best accommodation and restaurants on
the Sunshine Coast are in Noosa (
www.tourismnoosa.com.au), which has a lovely beach, botanic
gardens and a national park.
It can also be expensive, as befits its reputation as the place where upper-class Melbourne holidays. Noosa's main shopping area, Hastings Street, could easily be in one of Melbourne's posher suburbs but for the fact it is beside the beach.
If money is no object you could stay at the Netanya ( www.netanyanoosa.com), Sebel ( www.sebelnoosa.com) or Sheraton ( www.sheraton.com/noosa), which are all on Hastings Street. But there are 120 separate accommodation establishments, including apartments, resorts and hotels, within five kilometres of Noosa, with something to suit every budget ( www.noosa.com.au/accommodation).
Where to eat
Bistro C (
www.bistroc.com.au), at 49
Hastings Street, is not cheap by Australian standards but is pretty
good value for its quality by Irish standards - you will get a good
main course for €20. And, even better, you can watch the sun
set over the Pacific as you eat it.
As with accommodation, Noosa has enough restaurants to suit all budgets ( www.noosa.com.au/restaurants).