Featherdale Sydney Wildlife Park
A compact park with one of the country's largest native collections — and the place to get nose-to-nose with the animals on the coins.
Opened in 1972 and packed into about seven acres, Featherdale focuses almost entirely on Australian native fauna, and holds one of the biggest collections of native animals and birds in the country. It trades scale for closeness: enclosures are low and open, and much of the park is walk-through.
That makes it a favourite first stop for visitors who want the classic Australian encounter — hand-feeding a mob of kangaroos and wallabies, standing beside a koala for a photo, and catching pop-up keeper talks throughout the day. A little-penguin colony and a strong line-up of native birds round out the day.
Signature animals
Koala
One of Sydney's best spots to stand right beside a koala for a photo.
Kangaroo & wallaby
A free-roaming, walk-through mob you can hand-feed.
Little penguin
A colony in a dedicated exhibit with scheduled keeper feeds.
Planning your visit
The park is small and flat, so the sensible route is a single loop rather than a plan. Start with the free-roaming kangaroo and wallaby areas while you still have a full cup of feed, then work through to the koala boardwalk for a photo, past the little-penguin exhibit, and finish at the reptile pavilion and the aviaries. Two to three hours covers it comfortably, longer if you have young children who want to linger at every enclosure. Keeper talks and feeds are the thing to build the day around, so check the day's schedule on the board at the entrance and loop back to whichever encounters you want to catch.
Doonside sits about a 30 to 40-minute drive west of the city centre; without a car, take the train to Blacktown and connect to a short bus. Book tickets online before you arrive to skip the queue, and check current prices and opening hours on the park's own site, as both change seasonally. There's a café and picnic space on site, the paths are pram and wheelchair-friendly, and most exhibits are open-air, so a wet day means an umbrella rather than a cancellation. Because it's on the western route out of Sydney, many people pair a morning here with a Blue Mountains drive in the afternoon.
Don't miss
- Hand-feeding the free-roaming kangaroos and wallabies — buy a cup of feed at the entrance before you start the loop.
- The koala boardwalk, where you can stand beside a koala for a photo (NSW rules don't allow holding them).
- The little-penguin colony and its scheduled keeper feeds.
- The reptile pavilion, with pythons, lizards and the park's dingoes nearby.
- Location
- Doonside, NSW — Near Blacktown
- Getting there
- ≈ 40-min drive west of the CBD, on the way to the Blue Mountains; or train to Blacktown then a short bus
- Time to allow
- 2–3 hours
- Good for
- Young children and close animal encounters; flat and pram-friendly
- Highlights
- Free-roaming kangaroos, the koala boardwalk, little penguins, the reptile pavilion
- Good to know
- Book online to skip the queue, and confirm current prices and opening hours on the park's own site
Before you go
No. NSW law doesn't allow members of the public to hold koalas, so no zoo in the state offers it. What you can do at Featherdale is stand right beside a koala on the boardwalk for a photo, which is about as close as the rules permit.
Yes, and many visitors do. Featherdale sits on the western route out of Sydney towards Katoomba, so an easy plan is two to three hours here in the morning, then continue up to the mountains for the afternoon. Arriving near opening keeps the plan on schedule.
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