Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary: Day Pass, River Cruise or Your Own Way There?
5 min read
Lone Pine calls itself the world’s oldest and largest koala sanctuary, and there are two quite different ways to book it: a plain entry pass that you reach by your own means, or a boat trip up the river that includes the visit. Which one suits you depends mostly on how you feel about a morning on the water.
What the day pass is
The Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary day pass costs €38.84 per person, with 4.8 stars from 616 reviews. The booking page describes more than 100 koalas and some 75 species of native animals, including wombats, dingoes, reptiles and platypus, plus keeper talks, wildlife shows and a free-range kangaroo reserve. The sanctuary is at 708 Jesmond Road, Fig Tree Pocket, in Brisbane’s western suburbs.
It is a pass for one day, with cancellation up to 24 hours before for a full refund. The booking page asks you to check availability for starting times, and the sanctuary’s own site gives opening hours of 9 am to 5 pm every day. On Anzac Day it opens at 1:30 pm, and on Christmas Day it closes at 3 pm.
Check the inclusions before you pay: the list mixes what is part of the price with what is not. Entry, the koalas, keeper talks and shows are plainly part of the pass. Transport, food and drink, kangaroo feed and “wildlife experiences and encounters” appear in the same list without a marker, so do not assume any of them is covered. Ask or read the page before you pay for something twice.
Holding a koala
Queensland is one of the few places in Australia where visitors may be photographed holding a koala, and Lone Pine is the best-known place to do it. The sanctuary says on its own pages that it does not force interactions on its animals: holds can be reduced during breeding season and in extreme weather, and a legal limit applies to how long any koala is handled. Treat it as something that may or may not be available on your day, not as part of a promise. Whether a hold is part of the day pass is for the booking page or the sanctuary to confirm, so check before you plan your visit around it.
The river cruise option
The other way is the Brisbane river cruise with a koala sanctuary visit, €85.07 per person with 4.8 stars from 1,724 reviews. The booking page lists 5.5 hours on the MV Mirimar, run by Koala and River Cruises, from the Cultural Centre Pontoon on the South Bank boardwalk in front of the State Library.
Boarding starts at 8:30 am, check-in is 15 minutes before the 9 am departure, and the boat reaches Lone Pine at 10:15 am. You get three hours in the sanctuary; the boat leaves the jetty at 1:30 pm sharp and is back at the pontoon at 2:45 pm. The page lists skip-the-line sanctuary entry and the captain’s commentary as part of the price. Food and drink from the on-board café are at your own cost, and a koala encounter is an optional extra. There are 28 stairs from the riverbank up to the sanctuary gates, the cruise is listed as unsuitable for wheelchair users, and the page says a photo with or touching a koala is not guaranteed, because the sanctuary decides that.
Which should you pick?
| Tour | Price | Rating | Reviews |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary day pass | €38.84 | 4.8 | 616 |
| River cruise and koala sanctuary visit | €85.07 | 4.8 | 1,724 |
Take the day pass if you are short on time, if you would rather spend your money on a longer visit than on a boat, or if you already have a way to the suburbs. Take the cruise if the boat is part of what you want from the day: the page gives 75 minutes each way, from the city towers to the riverside suburbs. The cruise is a bad choice if you want to be at the koalas for the feeding and the shows with unhurried time, because the boat leaves at 1:30 pm, three hours after it arrives.
Practical points
The booking page lists the sanctuary as wheelchair accessible. As with any accessibility claim, confirm with the sanctuary before you travel rather than relying on a listing.
Bring a hat, sunscreen, water and comfortable walking shoes; all four are on the page’s list. Drones, bicycles, scooters, glass, alcohol, smoking and vaping are not allowed.
For other wildlife outings, see the wildlife tours around Brisbane, 18 of them from €38.84. For the river itself, the boat trips start from €30.21.
