The Australian Sister

• 11 June 2026
• australia

My youngest sister, Sierra, is now living in Australia. As her oldest brother it is my solemn duty to go visit her. At least that's what I put on my Australian visa application and they let me in the country. She's the first sibling to move to a different continent which is both awesome but a huge change, so I was very excited to get to see her!

Reunited with the other sister! Not going to lie, Sarah and I were pretty thrilled her kitchen didn't tilt at a 40 degree angle while we visited.

Given Sierra has been mostly working, and adjusting to the wretched "real job" life of having limited vacation days, we had the opportunity to both explore some new areas around Melbourne! After months at sea and bumming around remote islands, it felt very luxurious to go visit Sierra in a high-rise in one of Melbourne's swankier neighborhoods. Austrlian coffee is incredible, and the food options outside her door are incredible. So we obviously took advantage of all of these things.

But, we also took the opportunity to take a holiday weekend (someone please explain why Austrlia cares about the King's Birthday again?) to drive out to the Great Ocean Road. I mean what a name, I don't really need to explain anything else. It's a road, and it winds along the ocean. See? You already knew that from the name.

Anyway, we had a few goals:

1. Birds.
2. More birds.
3. Kangaroos!
4. Koalas, hopefully!

I am very pleased to report we absolutely SMASHED those goals! And in the interest of full disclosure we might not have all shared the same exact goals.

Let's start with the Superb Fairy Wren (who exactly gets to name these birds and how do I get that job?).

Cool Dirk, what a great bird you're thinking.

But wait! There's more.

Singing the song of his people. The Superb Fairy Wren ladies and gentlemen.

The Australian Classic! The Laughing Kookaburra.

Enough with the birds you say? Well you're wrong, but OK. Next we have the kangaroos. If you haven't seen Sarah's video of them slapping each other, you should ask her for it. I would embed it here, but that's a level of technology prowess a step too far for a vacation blog, I already gave you people a comments section.

What's grazing in this beautiful Australian meadow? Why, a mob of kangaroos of course.

Kangaroo House Party?

Why hello there

Yeah, kangaroos are ridiculous. We just sat there and stared at them as they awkwardly grazed around like a bunch of cows with far-too-short front legs. And a giant tail. And they hopped. So maybe they weren't really like cows, except they ate a lot of grass. I dunno, I'm just some dude that stares at birds a lot, what do I know about kangaroos.

I lied about being done with birds. But tell me this cormorant isn't a beauty.

I know you have all been holding your breath for the final reveal, the koalas! Well, we only saw one koala, so the final reveal is just one koala. And it also was just sitting there, mostly sleeping, because I guess they just sleep 20 hours a day. And also they now have a one shot vaccine for koala chlamydia!

I assume this guy is celebrating the reduction in koala deaths from chlamydia due to the ongoing vaccination campaign in Australia.

Yes, clearly a celebratory hang going on.

I never promised you good koala photos. Ed got a far better koala shot when they were in Australia. And funny enough, when Sarah was texting with her parents they told her to go to this one spot, which we had just been to and is where we randomly stumbled into all these birds and the koala! I would tell you the name but I've already forgotten it.

Much love to all! I am currently sitting poolside listening to the call to prayer with some other family members. You'll have to wait for Sarah to fill you in, both because it's her turn to write a post and we'll lose massive numbers of readers if it's just me continuing to post birds. After all, this blog is just an elaborate money-making scheme, just waiting for me to figure out how to monetize it without ads or selling your personal information. Or refusing to post updates on social media.

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