Description: Our first stop in Kuranda was the Australian Butterfly Sanctuary, where you get to enjoy hundreds of butterflies in large tropical greenhouse setting. We alternated between a few modes of tourism here: 1) Chilling out, admiring the variety of species, hoping they would honor us by landing on our hand or shirt. 2) Working very hard to get a good closeup photo, particularly of the giant iridescent blue Ulysses specimens or the brightly painted Cairns Birdwings, and 3) Learning from the guides as they describe the butterflies and the meticulous process of harvesting the eggs and nurturing the caterpillars to ensure their continuous supply of new butterflies.
After paying your admission fee, you're free to roam through the butterfly house at your leisure and stay as long as you want. It isn't huge, but we enjoyed exploring the corners of the path as you'd find slightly different species at various spots depending on what plants or lighting was present. They periodically offer a lecture during the day explaining the mission of the sanctuary (other than tourism) and detailing the life cycles of the butterflies. We liked seeing the laboratory where they gather the eggs, raise the caterpillars, and incubate the pupae. The guides (and other staff, such as at the front desk) were very friendly and happy to answer any questions that came up.
With patience, each of the four of us had butterflies alight on our hands, shirts, or cameras, which is a real treat, allowing us to examine their delicate wings up close. Taking your time, you can notice details like the fact that the scales on the wings of certain species highlight different colors depending on your viewing angle.
We thoroughly enjoyed our time at the sanctuary and the fact that they feature indigenous species like the Cairns Birdwing also made it special.
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