Australia
Australia is the unexpected: a place where the world’s oldest cultures share vast ochre plains, stylish laneways, and unimaginably blue waters with successive waves of new arrivals from across the globe.
The last discovered
continent in the world is a separate planet, where everything seems to have
evolved in a different way. From nature with brutal landscapes, to its unique
inhabitants such as kangaroos, koalas or wallaroos, not forgetting the strange
aborigines with their fascinating history.
Culture & History
The culture of Australia The
Commonwealth of Australia has its main reference in Western culture, although
it is influenced by the unique characteristics imposed by the geography and
environment of the Sahul, by the cultural contribution of the Australian Aboriginal
peoples and Torres Strait Islanders, and by the influence of successive waves
of emigrants of multiple ethnic groups
Saying culture in Australia is
synonymous with talking about music. If you travel to any of its main cities,
you will see that numerous bands and soloists perform live in the streets, bars
and clubs. Studying and composing music is something that is encouraged in the
educational system.
In Australia, you will experience a national devotion to sports, like few other countries in the world. And is that Australians take advantage of any time of day to play sports or wait until the weekend to leave the cities and go to the field to play.
Flavors
Decades of migration combined with the re-emergence of native
ingredients have brought Australian cuisine on to the radar of the world’s best
chefs. You can buy a mouth-watering kangaroo steak complemented by indigenous
greens at high-end restaurants, or take a bush tucker tour outside Alice
Springs and learn first-hand which local plants to taste.
Contemporary Australian cuisine combines British and indigenous origins with Mediterranean and Asian influences. Australia's abundant natural resources provide access to a wide variety of quality meats, and roasting beef or lamb outdoors is a long-standing national tradition. The vast majority of Australians live near the sea and Australian restaurants serving fish and seafood are among the best in the world. "Bush tucker" is an Australian term for traditional Australian Aboriginal diets. Much of this food and dishes is considered typically Australian - prepared with ingredients such as Macadamia, or kangaroo meat (which is undergoing a renaissance in its use in contemporary Australian menus).
Urban Experience
Nowhere builds cities quite like
Australia: each is a homage to magnificent waterways or beachfront, while
offering different experiences across different geographies. Grab a bicycle
from one of Melbourne’s bike-share racks and tour the city’s fashion districts
and cafe-lined laneways. Only a city like Darwin can fuse southern-Asian
influence with contemporary Aboriginal culture (and leave you with an
impressive sunburn to boot). Want a bit of everything? Sydney will take your
breath away with its natural beauty and bustling neighborhoods, while Hobart
strikes a chord with its Gothic history and contemporary art.
Outdoors & Adventure
Australia is a country, or Australia is the name for the land that encompasses many countries; to understand the latter is to walk in the footsteps of the first peoples. Whether you’re tracing outlines of rock art more than 20,000 years old in Kakadu National Park, floating in the azure waters of Rottnest Island, or admiring the iconic sites of Sydney Harbour where the Eora Nation traded for centuries, you are on Indigenous land.
You only have to travel a stone’s throw from any of Australia’s capital cities before you’ve landed somewhere truly out of this world. Not scared of the deep blue? Dive into famous reefs from the Ningaloo to the Great Barrier Reef, or witness majestic southern right whales along the Great Australian Bight. Like thrills? Head to the incredible wildlife parks outside of Brisbane (Australia Zoo) and Darwin (Crocodylus Park). And nothing will steady your sea legs more than getting on a 4WD tour and hitting one of the many dirt roads leading to rocky outcrops, from Uluru to the Kimberley.
No
trip to Tasmania would be complete without planning exactly where you’ll slurp
freshly shucked oysters, and don’t leave South Australia without a Barossa
Valley taste tour. And a word for the brave: Darwinians love their spice!