by Anne StClair

Created on: October 18, 2008   Last Updated: October 21, 2008

Australia has some of the world's best beaches, and some of the most amazing wildlife, but there is much more to the country than that. Australia has the unique outback, it has cities, sporting attractions, festivals, and a range of climates and types of scenery, from ski slopes to scuba diving paradises.

The Australian outback is like nowhere else on earth, and there are few places with so much open space. It is hard to describe the space and the sparseness of the population, but I will use an image to try to express what it is like.

We were crossing the Nullarbor Plain, and stayed at a roadhouse overnight. I decided to drive away from the lights alone, and onto the plain after dark, because there are more stars visible in a moonless night sky in the outback than anywhere. I stopped the car and lay in the middle of the road and looked up at the trillions of stars splashed across the sky. (I was quite safe lying in the middle of the road because the road is so straight and flat you can see headlights half an hour before the car or truck gets there.) The silence was broken by an amazing sound: frogs! Lots of frogs in one of the driest places on the driest populated continent. I could also hear in the distance the soft whispering of air emerging through blow holes from the massive network of caves beneath the plain.

There are many outback places that have no equivalent elsewhere. Coober Pedy is a town in which almost everything is underground. Uluru (formerly Ayers Rock) rises like an island mountain in the Kata Tjuta national park. Nearby attractions include Kata Tjuta (formerly called The Olgas), and Kings Canyon. Elsewhere in the outback are the Kimberleys in the north-west, Lake Eyre in the south, the MacDonnell Ranges, the Devil's Marbles, and Kakadu in the north.

The Australian outback is not the only attraction apart from beaches and kangaroos. Each of the major cities has many unique features and offers a variety of things to do, including lots of festivals. Sydney is well-known of course for its opera house, bridge, the "rocks", Darling Harbour, and the night life generally, but the other cities are also well worth a visit. Visit the markets, shopping precincts and art galleries in Melbourne, the vineyards around Adelaide, Kings Park and the Swan River at Perth. Visit a crocodile farm or the Mindil markets in Darwin, the National Gallery and War Memorial in Canberra, or the casino or theme parks in Brisbane. The towns and cities of Tasmania are full of charm

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