One of my main goals while in Australia was to spot a wild koala, either snoring or munching on some leaves. During our entire six weeks here, I was anticipating seeing one if I was being optimistic; who would have guessed how many I saw by the end of the trip? 

After a quick Google search on where to find them, one of the best and most highly populated areas of these animals seemed to be Raymond Island (VIC), Kangaroo Island (SA), and so on. The hilarious thing was, a day before researching this, we had stayed right next to Raymond Island at a place called Lakes Entrance, and the next day, two hours of driving south of there, we decided to drive back two hours hoping it wasn’t all for nothing. 

Raymond Island isn’t particularly large and the only way to get there is by taking a frequent ferry service for free. Most of the island was turned into a suburban neighborhood, leaving the koalas stuck on an island living in backyard Eucalyptus trees. A part of the island, though – around a third – was turned into a nature reserve, although most of it isn’t suitable for koala habitat. 

Most of the Koala Trail (the popular route to take if you want to see a koala) meandered down residential streets, but even so, we found our first koala pretty quickly, actually two, sleeping snuggly in separate lofty gum trees (Eucalyptus). By the end of the roundtrip island trail, we found a staggering 30 individual koalas in the three hours we were there; way more than I had ever expected to see meaning it was absolutely worth driving back and again two hours. 

Below is a gallery of all the koalas we saw on Raymond Island: 

The next place I’d like to mention where we saw an insane amount of koalas was in Cape Otway National Park (VIC), along the Great Ocean Road. We didn’t spot them in a specific location, as the entire length of road to the lighthouse was sprawling with those creatures. We found at least a dozen along the drive, even seeing a parent and baby trio. Spotting a koala here felt far more exciting than on Raymond Island as the koalas seemed wilder, living in mammoth gum trees in a protected national park rather than in a neighborhood. 

Here is a gallery including photos of the koalas we saw here: 

The last location I’d like to mention during our trip is again in Victoria, Australia at Tower Hill State Game Reserve. The interesting thing about this site is that the park is situated on an island surrounded by a lake in an extinct volcano crater. A theme you might start to notice is that islands = more wildlife = more koalas. As they can’t exit/escape from the island, their population (not just for koalas) starts to grow without any harm from predators, and even wildfires! In total, we saw around a dozen koalas mostly around the parking lot and visitor center area. 

Here are more photos of the koalas we saw here: 

Tallying up the total amount of koalas we saw in our entire trip, the number adds up to a whopping 54, more than I ever imagined seeing, especially because of their increasing endangerment mostly due to habitat loss and wildfires. It is estimated that by, 2050 all koalas will be extinct in New South Wales, the state Sydney is located in. More and more conservation efforts have gone into the project of saving these innocent animals, however, including numerous rescue shelters throughout the country. Hopefully, as the world becomes more environmentally friendly and conscious, koalas will slowly repopulate to the initial and greater numbers that they used to be.