« Mountain Gorilla Habitat Under Attack | Main | Interspecies Surrogacy - From Feral Children to Tigers Suckled By Dogs »

May 18, 2005

Roadtrippin' Oz

Australia is definately on my short list - a place I haven't been that I would really like to experience. I'd like to go great white shark diving in the Southern Ocean outside of Melbourne, and scuba diving off the Great Barrier Reef. I'd like to see the fence that was erected across the nation in an attempt to protect farmer's crops. I'd like to see the creatures found nowhere else in the world - not just the giant saltwater crocs, but endangered marsupials like the duck-billed platypi, and kangaroos, wallabies, and koalas.

But as much as I want to visit Australia for the ecological aspects, I'm just as excited about meeting more of the people of Australia. Over the years, I've had Australian penpals, friends online, and other close friends from Australia - and I've come to think that Australia produces some of the most unique people - with very strong characters. I have found many of the Australians I've known to be easy going, very friendly and vivacious.

Rather embarassingly, most of my knowledge of Australia comes from movies like Crocodile Dundee, Muriel's Wedding, Strictly Ballroom, Rabbit-Proof Fence, The Man From Snowy River, Mission Impossible II, A Cry in the Dark (Dingo ate my baby), and The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (there's a roadtrip for you). Ironically, these movies do not always portray the people of Oz in a very positive light... but you can't say they're not strong personalities.

Australia is big enough and wide-open enough that it seems to me to be the perfect place for a roadtrip.

The walls inside most of the bush pubs along the highway are stapled over with bras, underwear, foreign currency, and business cards—a few of mine included—left by visitors from around the world. Basic rooms cost about $35; given the volume of cold Victoria Bitter on tap, by bedtime most customers aren’t in a state to quibble over thread counts. Just about every pit stop is run by someone who could pass as the main character in a novel. The

More at: Fill’er up, mate! - Budget Travel - MSNBC.com

Also, here's a great site where you can practice Ozzie slang for your trip!

Posted by sorsha at May 18, 2005 1:07 PM