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AUSTRALIA TRAVEL: TRAVEL INFORMATION LINKS & MAPS
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Welcome to Australia - It’s a big country - heck - make that a BIG BIG Country - no - make that a HUGE country .. so please DO NOT try and “do” it in two weeks! Having lived in Australia most of our lives we still have not visited all the places in Australia that we want to! And - no matter how much you have read, seen or imagined - you still will not be able to initially grasp the vastness of Australia nor the often huge distances and travelling time between cities, towns and states...
So - just what does does Australia have to offer to UK visitors and why is the UK the no 1 inbound market in the world for Australian Tourism? (745 thousand UK tourists visited Australia in 2007, injecting $A4 billion into the Australian economy) - In a country that is 33 times bigger than Great Britain with less than a third of the population (approx 18 million total) it certainly offers something incredibly different to the UK!.
Firstly - It’s great value. For every UK *pound you get $2.17 Australian dollars. ( *exchange rate at 01 April 2008) Aussie’s speak English. (Or their version of it - mangled usually by the world famous laconic Aussie drawl...!) People are incredibly friendly. It’s laid back. It’s incredibly clean. The crime rate is very low by world standards. The economy is booming. Australian wine is now no 1 in the world! It is the home of Fosters beer! And - space - and more space. Coming home to Australia every 6 months or so we are still boggled by the enormous space and silent tranquility of rural Australia - as well as the breakneck development of its sleek sophisticated cities. Stunning weather - although contrary to the popular belief that it is drenched in sunshine all year round it can be as cold - if not colder than the UK in winter if you are down south, and in summer - especially in tropical north Queensland it can be extremely hot and very humid in summer ..(We lived in beautiful Port Douglas for 9 years and summer time was “24x7 aircon” and ‘wall to wall’ ‘pina coladas’..but that’s another story!)
There are no 8 lane M1’s to speed you between cities, nor thank goodness any gridlocked M25’s to park your car on all day! Australia’s version of UK motorways (called “freeways” after their American counterparts) are usually a maximum 4 lane road or highway (2 lanes in either direction) with a maximum speed limit of 120 kph, with hundreds of of extremely sneaky radar speed cameras and police to fight your way through all the way to your destination. (You won’t ever complain about the UK speed cameras again!) Try a 1800 kilometre (1100 miles) trip from Brisbane to Melbourne and you will see why most visitors to Australia travel around Australia by airline services, even if you are used to driving on the right hand side of the road. (Australia drives on the same side of the road as the UK) However - even flying is rather formidable - for instance Cairns (Great Barrier Reef) to Brisbane is a two hour jet trip - and you are still in the same state! - And Cairns to Melbourne - a 4 hour trip plus a one hour time change - total 5 hours - equivalent to flying from London to Cairo!
Whether you are looking for beaches, cities, desert, action and adventure or more sedate pursuits, Australia has it all. For first time UK travellers with only 3-4 weeks to spend, the most popular itinerary is still Sydney, the Outback, Ayers Rock (The ’Rock’) and the ‘Reef’, (Great Barrier Reef) although Australia’s wine regions and tropical islands are now also a “must see” on any visit..
OK - So where on this web site are the huge reams of electronic information on Australia? HERE of course! Weather, what to see, what to do, best time to visit Australia, what’s on, where to visit, accommodation - choices and costs, tours, attractions, New Year’s Eve on Sydney Harbour, rental cars, airline schedules and costs, currency, best buys, worst buys, designer factory outlets (incredible prices with your UK ££s) electrical appliances and voltage, roads and driving, taxis, where to see safe critters (koala bears and ...), where not to go to step on dangerous critters (snakes, crocodiles, jellyfish and all that stuff..!) surfing in Australia...and the thousand of questions and recommendations that you need to make your decisions...
We also think frankly that it is a huge waste of time (both for you to wade through and for us to continually update! ) to write thousands and thousands of pages of information when all you have to do is contact us for information on your trip to Australia, (Yes, we are a ‘high tech’ internet information business but in our opinion the ‘low tech’ telephone is still our favourite method of communication!) - as NOTHING beats first hand LOCAL knowledge - and you don’t have to call Australia - on your penny - to get in touch with us!
Probably what best sums up OUR Australia are two of our favourite Australian poets:
(acknowledgements to:)
Dorothea Mackellar “ I Love a Sunburnt Country”
“I love a sunburnt country,
A land of sweeping plains,
Of ragged mountain ranges,
Of droughts and flooding rains.
I love her far horizons,
I love her jewel-sea,
Her beauty and her terror
The wide brown land for me! COMPLETE POEM HERE:
Banjo Patterson: “The Man from Snowy River”
“There was movement at the station, for the word had passed around
That the colt from old Regret had got away,
And had joined the wild bush horses — he was worth a thousand pound,
So all the cracks had gathered to the fray.
All the tried and noted riders from the stations near and far
Had mustered at the homestead overnight,
For the bushmen love hard riding where the wild bush horses are,
And the stock-horse snuffs the battle with delight.” COMPLETE POEM HERE:
WALTZING MATILDA
And of course - our un-official National Anthem: WALTZING MALTIDA!
Actually - so it is sometimes held - a song about a German girl and an itinerant swagman “swaggie or tramp”..).. maybe..
Anyway - whatever - we love it - and sing it lustily at every occasion (whether asked to or not!) HERE IT IS:
So there you have it. We know Australia. Frontwards. And backwards. And we love it. AUSTRALIA!
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