Signs and Meaning along the way – unusual as well as obvious. Below: The Coles’ family shop

Travelling around a different country always throws up surprises – none more so than Australia. Perhaps it’s because as an Anglo somewhere nestled in the subconscious you assume that things in Australia should be pretty similar. We know about Vegemite, koalas, chiko rolls and corks on hats, but here are just a few more things that cropped up on my visit. 1] Kangaroos – A Slide Show Arguably the world’s best known creature? 2] The Ute Utes come in a variety of sizes and sport varying levels of machismo. Despite those above clearly coming from a bygone era, many proper…

A map of Tasmania always shows, pretty distinctly, a large green wilderness to its western side. If you look closely, that wilderness comprises of around 20% of the island’s total area. For Australia this wild refuge may seem small in comparison to the size of the mainland, but within the land space of Tasmania the Franklin Gordons and Wild West National Parks cover a world of their own. A day after the excesses of the MONA experience I studied the map and realised that there were really NO roads into this wilderness. Bar one that crossed to a place called…

Hobart: Tasmania’s Capital and a lot more according to the guidebook. I can’t really comment as I only spent 36 hours there, but did tick off perhaps the two most recommended things. Salamanca Saturday Market and MONA; The Museum of Old and New Art. I don’t know these people, they’re just in my shot of the market… Hobart is really no older than 175 years*. Early settlers were pretty canny back then, and doubtless chose places for a variety of reasons – not least the viability of the harbour potential. Shelter from the storm was more important than anything in…

Taking my route south from Binalong and the Bay of Fires, I turned inland on a bright and promising Friday morning. Destination Hobart, and Mrs Motel had told me ‘it was gonna be a hot one’. She was right: By 11 the car temp gauge [which I was later told not rely on], was already showing 37C. An hour later and 100km later it was fixed on 41C and remained that way until I started the tortuous climb into the coastal mountains. I turned on the radio and got a broken signal from ABC where I learnt that most of…

This is a pictorial account of my route north from Port Arthur to St Helen’s on Binalonga Bay. The car says I did it in 480km, which is probably right if you consider the various detours I made. Above: The beach at Dunalley. Fox and Hounds Inn – with its very own Drive thru bottleshop. I managed a visit on foot. Looking towards Nine Mile Beach from the village of Swansea. Beach near Nubeena. Rocky Cove, Remarkable Cave [coming up]. The Cave that gives its name. Please tell me, everywhere it seems you go now, someone has made piles out…

For the first time on my trip I felt cold. Waking up to the spectacular view from my room at ‘The Fox and Hounds’ I noticed a wall thermostat and radiator. The climate here felt like it was going to be what everyone had warned – distinctly British. It was January, the Southern Hemispere’s midsummer and someone somewhere had said it’d be jersey weather. However, today it wasn’t; today turned out to be unusually warm. Stewarts Bay. Seawater and not much tide. Noisy Kookaburras somewhere in those trees It was my first morning in Tasmania; the night before I’d made…

Noarlunga is part of the urban coastal sprawl that seems to stretch from the suburbs of Adelaide all the way down to McLaren Vale. Although I was told these ‘suburbs’ are largely for Adelaide bound commuters, the places overlooking the sea and fantastic bays were also serious-money holiday accommodation. Noarlunga Port is nothing more than a jetty, snorkelling centre and a [another] life saving club. The jetty and reef [just visible] from my plane – not a drone And the same jetty from the beach. An impressive 500m Beach and jetty aside, the area behind Noarlunga is McLaren Vale, Adelaide’s…

  Some time in 1865, a man called George Goyder, the then Surveyor General of the ‘new colony’ of Australia was tasked to produce charts marking areas of land that were viable for arable and livestock farming. Despite only having 30 years’ worth of data for South Australia, he was able, based on rainfall and soil records, to give settlers an idea of what was possible as they ventured into the latitudes north. He drew up an imaginary line beyond which it was recommended that arable farming was not possible. Uncharacteristically, the following 10 years produced exceptional rainfall levels well…