Australia Travel News 01/26/2011

As part of the fantastic Get Your Passport initiative, we’ve put together this step-by-step guide to assist our fellow Aussies to get their passports. Hopefully we can get a few of you to join the two of us on the road and enjoy in the wonder that is international traveling.

Australians have a well-deserved reputation for colourful speech, and the country boasts its own dictionaries, which will explain the meaning of terms such as ‘ocker’, ‘drongo’ and ‘woop woop’.

But do 21st century Aussies really go around saying ‘Crikey, me old Cobber, don’t come the raw prawn with me’?

Returning back to your homeland to live after years of being away can be a very difficult experience. I have expressed some of this already when I spoke of the Land of Exoticness and Dealing with Reverse Culture Shock.

After driving more than 2300 km over several days, we entered a region called the Cassowary Coast. Cassowary Coast? My heart jumped in excitement when I heard that name! Neither of us really knew much about cassowaries, other than that they're some kind of large, rare bird. Do cassowaries really live here?

On this day last year, I arrived into Sydney airport via JFK and an overnight flight from Hong Kong at 9:30 in the morning verklempt and in need of some antiperspirant and anti-frizz spray.

While I adore so many places in Australia, it’s fair to say that Sydney is my favorite. It was my introduction to Oz four years ago, and it’s where I kicked off my journey last May. Places speak (or don’t…) to people for different reasons, and Sydney just happens to have me under her spell.

The first day we were in Sydney, we must have lost our minds. I’m not sure if it was the jet lag, the effects of the Bridge Climb or too many VB’s (Victoria Bitters), but all our travel experience and knowhow went out VAustralia’s window. Let me set the scene for you, if I may…

I had never been surfing before in my life until my lesson with Beach Bum Australia. Since I kinda-sorta have a fear of what lies out in the deep blue (look, I grew up in the Midwest, far away from the
ocean), our 7:30 am wake-up surf was a little nerve-wracking. But, I wasn’t alone in my fear, so with the other members of the newbie surf club, we took the plunge.

OPRAH'S hugely publicised visit to Australia has been screened in the US – but the travel industry says the shows have made little impact on the number of US holidaymakers travelling Down Under.

Tourism Australia (TA) says Oprah Winfrey's TV specials have already had an immediate effect on booking numbers, now that all four episodes have been broadcast.

QUEENSLAND tourism operators believe it could be at least a year until the industry returns to normal after the state's devastating floods.