About an hour's drive north of Sydney in the town of Somersby placed Australian Reptile Park - the habitat of various reptiles, including snakes, lizards and crocodiles, as well as other typical Australian animals - kangaroos, Tasmanian devils, cassowaries and others. One of the important directions of the park is a compilation of collections of poison snakes and spiders, which are then used in the production of antidotes - through this already saved more than 15,000 lives.

Reptile Park was founded in 1948 in the town aquarium Umina Beach, and in 1959 was transferred to North Gosford, which is located in the former garden of orange. Almost forty years later - in 1996 - the park once again moved, this time in Somersby. In 2000 there was a terrible fire, which resulted in the almost completely destroyed the main building of the park with hundreds of its inhabitants. However, after just seven weeks of the park opened again, thanks to the help of citizens and zoos from all over Australia.

Among the main inhabitants of the park - American alligators, crocodiles, turtles, Komodo dragon, geckos, iguanas and a variety of snakes. Spiders are represented by such species as the tarantula, Voronkov water spider, spider-mason, tarantula (the largest in the world) and others. Here you can see the huge skeleton of a dinosaur Diplodocus, which local media called Plodda.

For a long time, "star" inhabitant of the park was a crocodile Eric, who was born in 1947 in northern Australia. In the 1980s he was considered guilty in the disappearance of two children, were caught and placed on a crocodile farm in Darwin. But there he bit off the head of the two females, which was to live, and make a "duel" with another crocodile, which lost a hind paw. In 1989, a special flight Eric transferred to the Australian Reptile Park, where he became a real star - the army of his fans there are more than 10 thousand people around the world! Eric died in 2007 from a systemic infection. At the time of his death he weighed 700 kg and reaches 5 to 6 meters in length - it was the biggest crocodile in the state of New South Wales. Today, in a park in memory of Eric the memorial, and settled into his new cell crocodile named Elvis.