Australia Travel News 02/27/2011

When it comes to crazy-cool engineering, nobody can top ze Germans. If it’s even vaguely plausible, you can bet that some German crackpot inventor has done it. Well, now two Germans – Stefan Simmerer and Dirk Gion – have broken three Guinness World Records in a … wait for it … wind turbine powered electric car.

AN increasing number of lovebirds are weighing up the sun, sand and surf on the Gold Coast and Hawaii — as the beach locations battle it out for the Asian honeymoon market.

An Australian fast-food chain with a cult-like following in that country is opening its first American restaurant in Southern California on Friday.

SHOCKING evidence has been released claiming that nearly all of Australia's coral reefs are at risk of being wiped out in less than two decades

Tourism Minister Malarndirri McCarthy has told a gathering of tourism operators in Alice Springs that it is important they work together to help resolve anti-social behaviour issues dogging the town.

Some of Australia's leading hotel groups have joined forces to develop a new industy association to help promote the sector.

Though über power-broker and kingmaker wine critic Robert M. Parker, Jr. saves his best 95+ point plaudits for Down Under wines from Barossa, McLaren Vale and Rutherglen, lately, Western Australia is where the fashionable buzz is at.

But five years after his death, aged 44, the attraction he made famous has suffered a dramatic fall in patronage. It can no longer rely on Steve-struck international visitors who made up as much as 70 per cent of its customers.

Australia's premier luxury travel company The Tailor is celebrating the launch of its new website – www.thetailor.com – by giving people the chance to be one of the first to follow in Oprah's footsteps on a new itinerary: Oprah's Ultimate Australian Adventure.

And what better place than Fraser Island, which a couple of weeks ago was serene and calm, having been untouched by Queensland's ugly weather of the past month.

A homeless Melbourne man has been fined more than $3000 for suggesting to a plane crew he had bombs and weapons in his hand luggage.