Australia is a long journey from just about anywhere in the world – certainly the northern hemisphere – so best to take full advantage of any spare time. Accompanied by his wife Angela, Sergio García is in Queensland this week to compete in the Australian PGA Championship (a European Tour co-sanctioned event), and they took time out in the lead up to the tournament to visit Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary on the Gold Coast.
While there they met the “locals”: a koala, a wedge tail eagle, a python, kangaroos and a family of rosellas.
“It was amazing,” said Angela. “I have never been to Australia before. I have seen a lot of images and videos of the animals here but to actually get to come and hold a koala, a snake and an eagle, as well as feed kangaroos, it was an incredible day.
“We learned a lot about the animals, and what they are doing here at the sanctuary is really important. They are helping a lot of animals that are injured or sick. They are trying to release them back out into the wild.
“We are animal lovers. Any time we see a dog or any kind of animal, Sergio always wants to pet the dog and I love animals as well. I am often yelling at Sergio to stop catching lizards because we have to be somewhere; we have lots of funny stories about that.”
Added Sergio, “It was a great experience to be able to see all the amazing animals they have here. It was an unbelievable treat and we really enjoyed it. I love animals, I always have.”
The couple enjoyed meeting and learning about all the Australian wildlife but the kangaroos stole their hearts.
“I loved the kangaroos,” said Angela. “There was a little joey (baby kangaroo) that I wanted to take home with me but I don’t think they would like that. He was pretty cool; to get to feed him was really neat.”
For Sergio it was the large male kangaroo that caught his attention. “He was the kind of guy you don’t want to mess around with. He was big; you could see he had a big chest. He was lying down but every time he got up a little bit you could see he had a massive chest. He was still very cool; I fed him a little bit and pet him and he was still really fine.”
