You're in Sydney and would like to see Australian wildlife within touching distance. For this, particularly for families, Featherdale Wildlife Park would be ideal.
To see Australian wildlife when you're in Sydney, your main choices would be Taronga Zoo, Sydney Wildlife World and Featherdale.
Taronga Zoo is in an idyllic Sydney Harbour setting and is home to thousands of animals from all over the world. It probably has more species of Australian wildlife than either Sydney Wildlife World or Featherdale but this is in a zoo environment where you don't really get up close and personal with the animals.
Sydney Wildlife World is the most accessible place to visit when you're in the Sydney city centre area but you only do get to view the wildlife behind glass windows, much like in an aquarium except there's no water behind the windows.
At Featherdale Wildlife Park, most of the native animals are in enclosures as well, but you can walk with — and feed by hand — the friendly kangaroos and wallabies hopping around the courtyard. And yes, you can get photographed with a koala.
Unpretentious and informal, Featherdale Wildlife Park is comfortable to walk through and — for close proximity to the animals — is my choice for best Sydney wildlife park.
