Key points:

• Lighthouse keeper Mark Sheriff said he spotted the koala climbing the lighthouse one night after coming back from a swim
• The koala climbed to the top and made its way inside where Mr Sheriff was able to capture it
• Mr Sheriff returned the koala to nearby bushland

On his way back from a night-time swim during a recent stint doing maintenance on Smoky Cape lighthouse on the New South Wales Mid North Coast, he spotted a koala making its way up the lightning conductor.

“I thought, ‘OK, that’s really interesting, that’s sort of something different’,” he said.

Mr Sheriff, who was a keeper at this lighthouse 30 years ago, said humans had tried before but the conductors were not normally strong enough to hold the weight.

A visit to the lantern room

He decided to act as spotter for the furry animal as it scaled the building, but soon realised it was going to get inside.

“I looked up and he’s gone all the way up the top,” Mr Sheriff said.

“I had the lantern room door open because I’d been working up there and I could hear a bit of a ruckus so I went up there and he was trying to climb the walls of the lantern room.

“I just stood in the lantern room, which is quite a beautiful place, it’s very quiet … we hung out there for a couple of revolutions, and then I walked back out down the spiral stairway.”

‘He had a lovely smell’

He soon returned the koala, which he named Pat after his mother, to the nearby bushland.

“When I grabbed him he was a bit sort of like ‘Woah, what are you doing buddy?'” Mr Sheriff said.

“He let me take him all the way up to the forest.

Mr Sheriff said one thing he remembers about the koala is its smell.

“He had a really lovely smell,” he said.

“You know how horses have their scent, well koalas have got their scent, it was cool.”