Upon arriving at my hotel in Port Macquarie the first thing I noticed was a sculpture of a koala outside the hotel. I soon learnt that there were many other koala sculptures like this around Port Macquarie and that the aim was to try and find all of the sculptures. If you go to Sea Acres Rainforest Centre they have a map you can take which shows you where all of the sculptures are, you can also get a map from the offical Hello Koala's store where they work on the sculptures and sell merchandise.
I met the Woman behind Hello Koala's Margret Meagher, she invited me into the shop and kindly shared with me the history of Hello Koalas. During a trip to the UK Margret came across the Larkin With Toads Public Art Project which inspired her to create Hello Koalas, she felt that these sculptures would be a good way to engage and up lift the community, Margret also explained that these sculptures can be beneficial to people with Dementia as art has been proven to help people with Dementia as it can increase brain stimulation and improve memory.
The sculptures are all hand painted by Australian artists, I think this project is amazing and I wish we had this here in Sydney, it was great fun going around with my map and one by one ticking the sculptures off.

Just love the concept of the Hello Koalas Sculpture Trail. There are over 70 of these beautifully painted Koalas dotted across the Port Macquarie and the surrounding area.
There is a trail brochure you can download or pick up which tells you where they are located.
Having a quite a large population of Koalas in Port and being home the the Koala Hospital it is a fitting place for the sculptures. They bring joy and raise awareness of these cute, adorable and unique creatures. But the sculptures also raise a more serious awareness to these marsupials plight, with dwindling numbers due to habitat destruction by firs and urban development.
My favourite one was tucked in front of a motel in Port Macquarie depicting lovely sea creatures. Being a lover of the ocean and a scuba diver this had to be my pick.

My wife and I started to take photos of the Koalas as we walked around town. We then found the brochure and the next day started to travel to all of the Koalas around Port. What a great way to see the town and adjoining areas. Would highly recommend this trail.