Australia
Travel in Australia is big. On the outside: over two thousand kilometres of barrier reef pulsating with hundreds of types of coral, teeming with technicolour tropical fish, dolphins, turtles, whale sharks, manta rays and humpbacks.
On the inside: over seven million square kilometres of scorched Outback, tropical rainforest and vertiginous mountain trails. Population: ferocious crocs, deadly snakes and scrummy bushtucker – and that’s just in Sydney! Chuck in a coastline of endless sand-between-toes beach and wild surf and you’ve got to admit: Australia has got it good.
Nature aside, the citylife’s not too shabby either. Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide are always buzzing with action thanks to Australia’s vast immigrant population - and they’re not just European ex-cons either! Throw thousands of Vietnamese, Malays, Chinese, Lebanese and Turks into the mix and you come up with a vibrant cultural scene – and one hell of a kitchen!
These people know how to party as well: hundreds of thousands turn out for the Mardi Gras parade in Sydney, led by the raucous Dykes on Bikes. But you don’t need an excuse to hit the beach for a bevy - just make sure you know your tinnies from your tallies, your pots, coldies and stubbies from your schooners, middies and slabs when you rock up to the bottle shop.
As for sports, well we all know: Aussie rules! Pack in with the crowds at the racing (and fashion) event of the year, the Melbourne Cup, or add your empties to a beer snake at the WACA watching the all-conquering cricket team. Or what about dragging a canoe around a desert slalom at the Henley-on-Todd boat races in bone-dry Alice Springs? Or saving up your empties and entering the Beer Can Regatta in Darwin?
Beneath this veneer of good-time frippery Australia is alive: rough, tough and ready to bite and at the heart of it all is Uluru, Ayer’s Rock. Simply stated, a trip to Australia is not complete without paying homage to the awesome power of nature represented by gargantuan Uluru. The Anangu Aborigines have been doing so for 20,000 years, now it’s your turn.