Tidbinbilla

Just down the road outside town is a magical land of protected Australian wildlife called Tidbinbilla. Now if the name's not intriguing enough to get you there, perhaps "the country's coolest playground" claim will be. We spent the afternoon walking amongst bird-filled flora and fauna, peeling our eyes for koalas and echidnas, swerving to miss wallabies and jackrabbits darting across the road, walking alongside pairs of emus, and sharing the playground equipment with no less than 30 kangaroos. It was awesome.

The only koala we spotted was in this enclosure - a newly acquired male to help populate the koala sanctuary there.

Koalas are very picky eaters and only feed off a few of the hundreds of species of eucalyptus trees in Australia. They receive very little nutrition from the leaves, which are tough and fibrous to digest, so they lack the energy to do much more than sleep up to 22 hours a day and switch trees (on grand occasions.)

There were 3 or 4 emu and kangas waiting for us in the parking lot of the playground and numerous others on the equipment. The animals like to drink from the trickle of water there so when we showed up we set off a cascade of bouncing, hopping marsupials.

I wasn't fast enough to catch the group on film, but the guy above was in no hurry.

Here are a few perfectly comfortable watching us from their safe retreat off to the side.

I find it amusing to compare playgrounds here to the ones in the States. Check out that slide. A total burn trap in the summer and enough speed to provide injuries year-round.

But oh so fun!

Care for a fall or neck injury? Super tall rope climbing structures, massive swings and these Flying Fox pulley things - even I just about fell off from the whiplash at the end, but they are a kids' dream.

Wind in your face, squeals from the thrill of danger...

You never find this stuff at U.S. playgrounds. Blame it on too many lawsuits or lack of trust in parental supervision - either way it's a shame.