Australia: News and Views

In a couple of days (21st July local time) it will the 40th anniversary of the Apollo moon landings. What is not as well known is that Australia was an important part of the NASA infrastructure that saw man walk on the moon. Being “down under” was critical because observatories in Australia could cover communications with the space missions while Florida was on the wrong side of the world to have line of sight contact.

Of the three original tracking stations in Australia: Carnavon, Honeysuckle Creek and Parkes - only Parkes radio telescope is still in operation, and well worth a visit if you are interested.

The other well known connection that Australia has with Nasa - is that Ausralia is where Skylab ended up-  parts of the space station broke up and hit earth in remote Western Australia - driving the Nullarbor you will see some of the remnants in roadhouse museums!

The clear air and wide open spaces still attract both amateur and professional astronomers to Australia - but he romance and excitement of the moon landings has long gone. What is sure though when man does land on the moon again - Australia will be part of the communications team!

Hopetoun is a pretty little town on WA’s south coast about mid-way between Albany and Esperance. No one had much heard of the place until a few years ago when BHP developed and opened a nickle mine just up the road at Ravensthorpe.

Hoptoun sprang to life - property boomsed and for the first time sub-divisions started to be developed. A new primary school was opened and the secondary school extended. Prices jumped  in what had been a flat property market for decades.

Property prices always follow the population and a large influx of a well-paid population into a small country townsaw all propertyprices go through the roof.

Many of those moving to town on the promise of a mine life of 25 years - with an eye to retirement to the stunning beaches and fishing opportunities which WA’s southern coast  has to offer. Hopetoun is under 10km from the Fitzgerald River National Park.

Now the boom is bust, the mine is due to close at the end of the month, and house prices are turning into bargains. A development which had 4ha sections for sale at $239,000 has slashed prices to $69,000 - now that could almost be a bargain if you fancy a holiday home within 600km of Perth - Hopetoun could be the spot for you.

The Australia Movie premier is today! No not in Hollywood but in the towns where the Australia Movie was filmed: Sydney, Bowen, Darwin and Kununurra

There was actually pre-premier viewing yesterday to selected members of the press: but they aren’t allowed to say much until the Australia movie goes to general release on November 26th.

The word is that the movie length is over 2.5 hours: a long running time for a movie these days. And that the Hugh Jackman’s character “The Stockman” may die - or there again he may not! Because Australia Movie has its own unique screenplay- and the movie is not based on a book - this is the real cliff-hanger that it being kept very secret!

What is sure that Australia’s movie industry has big hopes for Australia Movie as does Tourism Australia who wants to use the movie to kickstart Australian tourism

The premier is closing streets in Sydney where both Hugh Jackm and and Nicole Kidman plus Baz Luhrmann will be attending. Nicole Kidman is jetting in from the US for about 24 hours. While tomorrow, immediately after the premier Hugh Jackman is re-locating to Hollywood - after living the last 2 years in Sydney.

The traffic problem for the Australia premier in Bowen isn’t such a big deal. But the Mayor is currently Bowen’s most unpopular man having to prune a potential guest list from 10,000 to 240! He claims to have issued invites to the “people who did the real work”. That would be nice - but Bowen is in northern Queensland a state well known for its cronyism. Bowen was the site of Australia’s initial scenes as it stands in for Darwin as Nicole Kidman’s character, Lady Sarah Ashley, arrives at “Darwin”. The cattle drive through the streets was also shot in the sleepy tropical town of around 10,000. In fact Baz Luhrmann seems to have woken Bowen up from its stuppor and the Council is revamping the pretty site and turning “Bowenwood” into a tourist town rather than a sugar cane town.

At Kununurra’s Australia premier they will be preying that the weather holds: the forecast is usually for “isolated showers and thunderstoms” - so hopefully it will hold off - otherwise the outdoor-theatre - the only one in Kununurra will have fairly damp red carpet.

There is a new TV campaign advertising Australia movie in Austraila. The emphasis appears to be on the love story, some stunning Kimberley landscape scenes , secenes of the bombing of Darwin, some aerial shots showing just how large the Australian landscape is at the catttle station. There is little dialogue to be heard but Nicole Kidman looks stunning even in the middle of a bombing raid and Hugh Jackman appears to have his shirt off quite a lot of the time!

So will America make the Australia movie a blockbuster? Who knows but Oprah liked it - that has to be a start!

Australia is about to feature in the new Australia movie . Well not all of Australia but a special corner of North Western Australia called the Kimberleys and the main town of the region: Kununurra , on the banks of the Ord River. And Hollywood and Kununurra are a very strange duo.

The locals are still talking about the weeks that Hollywood came to sleepy little Kununurra, but what you might not know is that this town is very new. It was built in the 1950’s and 1960’s to support the huge Ord River irrigation system. The local newspaper has been highlighting the stories of some of the men, yes they were all men, who came to work on the Ord Scheme, and ended up staying on and opening businesses in the area.

The local premier of Australia Movie will be shown at the Kununurra Picture Gardens which date from the early 1960’s. This is an open-air cinema or drive-in, the only sensible option in a time before air-con became common. David Ammon was posted to Kununurra in 1964 and was responsible for the upkeep of the Picture Gardens. He remembers:
“During the Wet if the skies opened up most of the patrons stayed seated, because they were already drowned. The movie would continue until the projectionist couldn’t see the screen and then we’d re-run it the next night at no charge”

It may well be that nothing has changed originally 20th Century Fox left Kununurra off the November 18 premier list - because the open-air cinema is still the only one in town, and it is the Wet season. But after local protests Kununurra join Darwin, Bowen and Sydney in the simultaneous release of the Australia movie.

Just hope it doesn’t rain!

Australia is renowned for its big waves and they don’t come much bigger than the breaks of the south coast of Western Australia. From Margaret River all the way to South Australia’s Eyre Peninsular the cold and shark infested ocean produces some spectacular breaks often far out to see as the huge rollers from the Antarctica hit rock platforms.

You certainly have to be crazy to chase the big ones and there are quite a few who are. The annual Australian Big Wave Awards even reward them for their craziness. This spectacular picture taken by Andrew Burkley of crazy-man Kerby Brown who nearly died on this lonely stretch of sea some 15km off the coast at a secret location.
The 12m high wave knocked him off his board and snapped is leg rope and he ripped a shoulder muscle. Kerby apparently can’t wait to get out there again though.

To see the whole remarkable sequence check out Surfing Life’s site

One of the things   I think is important with a blog is to develop a structure to your postings. It means that readers know what to expect but also means you the writer needs a little less inspiration from day to day So like it or not I am going to use this blog to bore you with some of the photos we have taken over the 6 month trip that took us across most of Australia’s out back! Its OK it won’t be every day but once ever week or so  I am going to post a photo

The first time I ever had an digital camera was a trip we took to Vietnam in 2005 and one of those first photos is the header image on my other Today Blog In fact  I am still using the same camera: a Fujifine Pix 5600, mainly because it still takes great photos still takes regular AA batteries and still has a 10x optical zoom!

This is  our 1985 Landcruiser and the camp at the start of the trip: tent still clean and no read dust to be seen! The camping ground was on the Maroochydore, Sunshine Coast Queensland.

Hi and welcome to my new Australia blog! First a confession, I am not a native born Aussie, though I am entitled to the passport. I am a New Zealander who is currently living in Perth, Australia. This is the second time I’ve lived in Australia for any significant length of time. Previously I lived in Broken Hill (that’s in the middle of nowhere (or the back of Bourke as a true Aussie would say). I worked in the mines there and also spent a year living in Canberra, Australia’s capital.

Australia is similar enough to New Zealand to be comfortable for many Kiwi’s to live here but it is also different enough to be amusing every now and then.

I know a lot of Americans and Europeans dream of relocating to the warmer climates of Australia, or even just coming here for a holiday so I hope to give you a few insights into the place.

Please drop me a comment if you’ve got some specific Australian related questions.