OZtralia.tv Blog

Charlie and Livingstone

By: Phoenix Arrien

It’s lovely stumbling upon Outback gems. The people and places type of gems - not the rock type though they are fun too.

In the top end of Australia a few hours southeast of Darwin is a station called Annaburro. I visited it and sat down with ‘Rex’ the owner:

“One of the reasons I brought Annaburroo,” he explains, “was to preserve a part of the old Outback. No development here! All the old buildings of the former station have been preserved.”

Nearby, ‘Yellow Charlie’s shed’ still stands, testimony to a local character who acted in the well known Australian outback film ‘Jedda’. Charlie may have been rough and involved in more than one fight, but Rex thinks he was a loving man. “Why he kept his wife’s bones in a suitcase rather than have her out there in a cold grave,” he explains with a twinkle in his eye.

Whilst maintaining the character of the place, Rex cleaned it up and gently transformed Annaburroo into an oasis, where visitors can kick back, swim and take time out. It has one of the only crocodile-free swimming holes in the area so it is well worth the stop.

However it’s not only the fascinating people you meet but also animals. Livingstone the Brahman Steer thinks he is a horse and is a fixture in a small horsey band that wanders around the campsite. A Water Monitor ambles around the trees, looking like a mini-dinosaur. Eagles spread their great wings surfing the wind currents above. Black kites dip and wheel in a day long aerial dance, cockatoos screech and finches dart among the bushes.

Aaah, yes another pleasant day in the Outback.

Richard Branson’s Australian Retreat

By: Phoenix Arrien

On a visit to Noosa on the east coast of Australia, I took a cruise through that region’s waterways and we passed a lovely-looking island with house on it. ‘Richard Branson’s island,’ said the guide.

The billionaire Virgin chief is building a luxury retreat for his staff on this island - called Makepeace Island - it is going be a two million pound, nine-hectare estate. Plans for a country club and helipad have been scrapped after environmental concerns.

The locals are still grumbling about the removal of trees and the 85-year-old timber house built in the classic ‘Queenslander’ style including wraparound porches.

Richard brought it for one million pounds in 2003. Nice to know those cheerful Virgin employees will have a swanky holiday hideout. Mind you, Noosa has plenty of swankiness.

More on that hip little town soon.

Traveling In Australia Is Safe For Females

By: Phoenix Arrien

I have never had a problem while travelling Australia as a single female. This country is one of the safest in the world - bar the wildlife. However many people do feel uneasy in strange places, so there are a few things we can do while enjoying this grand land to help us feel more relaxed while travelling solo.

At your accommodation:

• Check in under your last name and first initial only

• Ask if you room has a deadbolt

•   Request the bellman to accompany you to your room

• Keep your hotel door locked at all times and never open it to a stranger

Away from the hotel

•  Be constantly aware of your surroundings and focus on the present, not where you will be that night

•  If you are being followed in a street or parking lot, bang on cars to set off alarms

•  Keep hands free and not tangled in bags

• Ask for help. Australia has one of the world’s friendliest populations.

Lentil As Anything

By: Phoenix Arrien

Ya gotta hand it to some people. From an idea, emerges a seed, then from a seed a sprout, until you have several plants springing up around the place.

Lentil As Anything is one of those amazing ideas that you wouldn’t believe would work but has.

Begun by Shanaka Fernando who grew up in a third world country and wanted to create ‘circumstance of inclusivity’ that is, assist community and trust through having no fixed price on food.

It’s true, you walk up to a Lentil As Anything restaurant or kiosk and ask for what you want then put whatever you think it is worth or a donation if you are poor in a money box on the counter. No worries, no problems, just delicious vegetarian food.

It works too. There are several restaurants around Melbourne and related community projects. See more on http://lentilasanything.com and drop in to one next time you are travelling to Melbourne, Australia – it is more than just a food experience!

A Lesson In ‘Strine - The Letter “B”

By: Phoenix Arrien

‘Drier than a dead dingo’s donger’, is not something you hear every day in Australia, though I did hear it the other day and laughed my head off. I wedged it back into position and continued on my merry way.

Here is my first explanation of ‘strine or Aussie slang, an essential part of travelling in Australia.

I bring you the letter ‘B’:

Banana bender: a person from Queensland

Barbie: barbecue (noun)

Barrack: to cheer on (football team etc.)

Bastard: term of endearment

Beyond the Black Stump: a long way away, the back of nowhere

Bloke: man, guy

Bloody: very (bloody hard yakka)

Bloody oath! : That’s certainly true

Bludger: lazy person, layabout, somebody who always relies on other
people to do things or lend him things

Blue: fight (”he was having a blue with his wife”)

Boogie board: a hybrid, half-sized surf board

Built like a Brick shit house: big strong bloke

Brumby: a wild horse

Buckley’s, Buckley’s chance: no chance (”New Zealand stands Buckley’s of beating Australia at football”)

Budgie smugglers: men’s bathing costume

Bull bar: stout bar fixed to the front of a vehicle to protect it against hitting kangaroos (also roo bar)

Bundy: short for Bundaberg, Queensland, and the brand of rum that’s made there

Bush bash: long competitive running or motorcar race through the bush

Bushie: someone who lives in the Bush

Bushranger: highwayman, outlaw

And most important of all - when you see ‘BYO’ you are about to enter an unlicensed restaurant where you have to Bring Your Own grog. This may be true for a party or barbecue where a ‘dry’ visitor may raise eyebrows.

Eating Healthy While On The Road in Australia

By: Phoenix Arrien

Australia is fortunate to offer just about every type of cuisine you can imagine. However when you travel it is so easy just to grab anything that looks remotely like food as you pass through airports and cities.

A diet of fast food can make you feel bloated, irritable and depressed, as well as unfit and lacking in energy just when there is so much to see and do.

Tips to eating healthy while travelling in Australia:

• drink lots of water (this is (mostly) a hot and dry place)

• avoid sugary fizzy drinks

• go for white meat instead of minced reds like burgers

• ask for grilled food instead of fried

• make sure you have vegetables with meals

• use cutlery instead of hands so you slow down your eating by having to use a utensil

• avoid fatty sauces

• limit desserts

Eating can still be fun. Try emu, kangaroo, crocodile and even witchetty grubs. No? Then fine French fare, hearty Tibetan yak or delicious Italian may just fill the belly and get you ready for adventure.

The Great Ocean Road  is AMAZING!

By: Phoenix Arrien

Apart from its stunning views, Seatree is a useful base for visiting the attractions including the region’s new attraction, the Otway Fly. This 600 metre treetop walk, created from steel, snakes its way through moss-covered Myrtle Beech, Blackwood and imposing Mountain Ash. Well worth it, even though there was a distinct lack of wildlife as it is so new they have yet to return to the disturbed forest.

No trip along the Road is complete without a sunset viewing of the Apostles, a group of monument-type cliffs which, losing their grip of the mainland, now stand sentry in a long scattered line in the foaming sea. The enclosing cliffs rise to nearly 70 metres in some places and the highest Apostle is approximately 50 metres from base to tip. They change colour depending on the light, so as the sun sets, the rock catches the warm hues of the fading day while the clouds streak even more colour into the darkening blue sky in competition.

The apostles head a stunning list of natural features along this truly remarkable stretch of coastline. Great names like Pudding Basin Rock, Island Arch, the Razorback, Muttonbird Island, Thunder Cave, the Blowhole, Bakers Oven, London Bridge and the Grotto intrigue and just force you to explore them. Extensive boardwalks and viewing platforms ensure visitors experience sweeping vistas of rugged coastlines.

Activities which offer other angles to viewing this region include hang gliding off the cliffs, horseriding along the beaches and scenic flights buzzing low over the coastline. Good food and wine are dotted around the towns with local chefs making the most of the fresh foods produced in the area, including berries, cheeses, herbs, mustards, vegetables, honey, mussels and crayfish.

It’s a region in which to peer through a window to beautiful scenery, history and adventure as well as peace and quiet, all conspiring to be an ideal drive, one of the best in the world.

Ideal trip length along the GOR is 2-3 days by car. A bus also travels the Road from Geelong.  For more information click here.

A Look At Australia’s Rough and Tough

By: Phoenix Arrien

A man called Tony Mokbel is back in Australia to face the music as we say here. He is a criminal who was found in Europe and has just been brought back here.

It brings my thoughts to the criminal history of Australia. Britain, who had laid claim to this continent over 200 years ago, ignoring the indigenous population, had a serious over-population problem in its prisons at the time. So they solved it by shipping many of them over here to do hard time trying to create settlements out of a very different land and climate to anything they had previously known.

The criminal-made-good is part of this land now, as many of the convicts did their time and settled here. In the 1800’s and early 1900’s bushrangers roamed the countryside stealing cattle, the odd purse and generally making a name for themselves.

Ned Kelly is the most famous of these bushrangers. He was even portrayed in a few movies, firstly by none other than Mick Jagger and most recently by the newly deceased Australian actor Heath Ledger.

There are many places in Australia that you can travel to see where and what these wild men did. I recently visited the Victorian Highlands where towns such as Glenrowan boast monuments, shops, cafes, hotels and god knows what else, all marking the fact the Ned passed this way, drank at this bar, stepped upon this thresh hold and breathed the same air.

I think of Christopher Skase, a man involved in crime who escaped to Europe and never paid for his misdeeds. He is dead and reviled to this day.

Then there is Alan Bond. He was a hero who financed Australia’s win in 1983’s America’s Cup, got involved in white-collar fraud and ended up in jail. He is out and has been welcomed back into society with warm (if a little wary) arms and a reputation as a bit of a ‘larrikin’.

In true accepting convict fashion: if you do the crime then do the time, then you are all right in this country, mate!

From Darwin To The Tiwi Islands

By: Phoenix Arrien

“Ponki!” the old Tiwi lady cried, “if you see two people fighting, just go up to them and say Ponki.” How could people keep fighting if this jovial old lady says the Tiwi word for Peace with such sincerity, delight and a wide toothless smile? The people who inhabit the two Tiwi Islands in the Arafura Sea north of Darwin on Australia’s northern coast, have an innocence and joy that breaks through to even the most jaded visitor.

A regular flight 80km north of Darwin, Australia by light plane takes 30 minutes to touch down at the little airstrip on Bathurst Island, the populated of the two islands and soon everyone is in Tiwi mode - relaxed and smiling.

Doreen was one of the islanders who used to show visitors the way to make colourful baskets as well as the painted barks of the island. After a smoking ceremony, she and others danced their dreaming animals

Doreen had run away from her parents on the other side of the island when she was six, taking her younger sister with her. They were to go and live with an old man as was the island tradition.

Until very recently the Tiwis believed that children are born when spirits enter the woman’s mouth, which could happen at any age. To make sure baby and mother are provided for, baby girls were married at birth to old men, in what was basically a business deal between the new husband and father. This created a surplus of single young men who were understandably frustrated and also understandably looked upon with suspicion. Even though the women were monitored carefully, liaisons in the bush occurred.

Little Doreen crossed the island and came to live in Nugiu, the main centre, where she married a man she loved and now dances her ‘dreamtime being’ - the crocodile!

The only way to see the island is on a tour which will take you to settlements, craft stores, cultural experiences and to the eerie burial sites sprinkled around its southern end. The person who coined the phrase “endless beaches” must have seen the island’s wide white sands that cradle the expanse of bright blue sea of this tropical paradise.

Giving You The Best Australian Travel Experience

By: OZtralia.tv Staff

We are proud to continue to give you the best travel experience for Australia online.

From our video map, you can see all of Australia. But now, from our direct pages, we also give you a wealth of written information on every location we cover in Australia.

Below are links so you can check it all out yourself.

Watch videos and find information about
all the amazing Australia’s travel destinations:

» Great Barrier Reef and the Daintree Rainforest
» Sunshine Coast - Noosa
» Brisbane
» Canberra
» Melbourne
» Byron Bay and the Rainbow Valley
» Sydney
» Whitsunday-Overview
» Rainbow Valley
» Hobart and Southern Tasmania
» Northern Tasmania
» Perth and the Sunset Coast
» Cairns and Port Douglas
» Surfer’s Paradise and the Gold Coast
» Uluru
» The Great Ocean Road