Crocodile Dundees in Australia

Mick had been on the road for four days and had two more days to go before he reached home in Perth. When he wasn't driving he was unloading stuff, or sleeping while his co-driver Marty took over.

I was travelling across the Kimberley in Western Australia by road train – a 160ft-plus, three-trailer, 64-wheel truck, which might as well have been a locomotive as far as the kangaroo was concerned.

I met the tattooed "truckies" in Alice Springs, and with personalities bigger than their beer bellies, wearing shorts, "thongs" and singlets, Marty and Mick were every bit the Crocodile Dundees of the road. They spoke of "sheilas" and warned me: "There's no dunny stop, so if you're coming with us, you'll have to pee in a bottle." As a farmer's daughter I can take most things in my stride, but aiming into a bottle seemed a tricky proposition.

Australia voted top holiday spot despite global slump

SINGAPORE (Reuters Life!) - Australia has been voted the most coveted destination by travelers in a global survey that also showed two-thirds of people were reviewing their holiday plans because of the global economic crisis.

Asia Pacific was named the number-one region for those intending to travel overseas this year and next in the survey, commissioned by credit card firm Visa and the Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) and which polled over 5,500 people.

Nearly half picked Australia, which is expecting the number of foreign visitors to fall to their lowest level in two decades this year, as a place to visit, a likely boost for a multi-million dollar tourist campaign launched late last year.

Australia may lift Fiji PM's travel ban

Australia is considering lifting travel bans on Fiji's interim Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama so he can attend a special Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) meeting in Papua New Guinea.

Leaders from PIF's 16 member states, including Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, will next week fly into PNG's capital Port Moresby to discuss the fate of Fiji's membership.

The easiest way for Bainimarama to arrive in Port Moresby is a flight via Brisbane, but Australia's current bans restrict the self-imposed leader from all travel in the country, including transfers.

Australia surrounded by SARS, bird flu 'ring of fire'

AUSTRALIA risks being caught unawares by outbreaks of SARS, bird flu and other diseases in what a study describes as a "ring of fire" of disease hotspots.
The study, conducted by Dr Peter Daszak of the Consortium for Conservation Medicine in New York, constructed an earthquake zone map to predict where new outbreaks of diseases such as foot-and-mouth, avian influenza and SARS are most likely to occur.

It found that Australia is effectively under siege from its northern Asian neighbours.

The risk map shows that Australia is surrounded to the north by countries that are some of the hottest of the hot-spots, Dr Daszak said.