Crikey! Not Another Cricket!

 February 7, 2025 

Mooloolaba ~ based on the Aboriginal word for "Red Bellied Black Snake"
Sounds like a regular Garden of Eden, huh?

Actually, Mooloolaba, our next port of call, is a very beachy, resort style area. Quite charming. And it was destined to be the location of our first encounter with wildlife in Australia. Unfortunately, it wasn't a cuddly koala or gentle kangaroo. 

It was an Australian cricket. 

I have an absolute horror of crickets at the best of times, let alone one that's big enough to fill a man's palm. 

If that sounds a bit unhinged, let me give you some background. When I was in 6th grade, some weaseley boys in my class decided it would be fun to wad up a ball of black yarn, throw it at the top of my head and shout, "Cricket!"

I sincerely dislike any creature possessed of more than four legs. They give me the willies. Always have. The worst school assignment I ever got was to create a bug collection. I begged my teacher to let me draw detailed pictures of the little nasties based on images in the encyclopedia instead. I'd even label the parts, I promised, but she insisted that I catch the bugs, drive pins through their carapaces and affix them to note cards. I felt sick the whole time I worked on the assignment and though I was used to getting A's, I didn't care when my efforts were only worth a C. I'd have taken an F if it would've gotten me out of doing it.

So when I had reason to believe one of those disgusting creatures who wear their skeletons on the outside was burrowing into my head, I screamed blue murder and started tearing out my hair.

The boys were wildly entertained. I came away from it feeling my deep antipathy toward insects was well founded. As was my disdain and healthy suspicion of sixth grade boys. 

Thank God, I have a husband who understands my phobia of things with 6 or 8 legs. When he told me not to go out onto the veranda this morning as we were just coming into the bay of Mooloolaba, I didn't argue with him. He's my primary bug killer (the man once stepped on a tarantulla for me!), but he just wasn't sure what to do with this one. He couldn't grab it and throw it overboard. There are strict rules against throwing anything over the rail. Smashing it would leave a mess for our room steward to clean up. If he tried to catch it and flush it, it might get away from him and I couldn't bear the idea of the thing being loose in our cabin. 

So I did the only sensible thing I could, while the DH and Wayan, our room steward, captured and removed it.  

"Where are you, Miss Diana?" Wayan called out as he came in to help.

"I'm in the bathroom hiding from the cricket!" I told him through the door. Silly man. 

Anyway, my encounters with Australian wildlife ticked up seriously after that. We went to Steve Irwin's Zoo and had a lovely time exploring this lush area with large enclosures for the well cared for animals. The DH has put together a montage of some of the critters we enjoyed visiting. I'll post that as soon as the Sky's wifi cooperates.  

In the meantime, please enjoy the terminal cuteness of this sleepy koala.

One of our guest lecturers on board has told us that half of a koala's skull is filled with water instead of brains, so they're not terribly bright. But they are terribly sweet looking and beat any cricket by my reckoning by several orders of magnitude!

But I want to leave you with a final thought. We weren't anywhere near land when the DH discovered the cricket on our balcony. 

How did it get there?