August - October 2022

Australian Traveller

The most trusted guide to travelling this great country

Australian Traveller1 min read
Australian Traveller
EDITORIAL Editorial director LEIGH-ANN POWDeputy editor IMOGEN EVESONWriter + chief sub editor CARLA GROSSETTI ART Art director ANITA JOKOVICHContributing designer JULIAN JONES ONLINE Digital editor-in-chief KATIE CARLIN Digital travel writer/pr
Australian Traveller1 min read
Wish You Were Here
YOU WILL HAVE a front-row seat of the sun painting the landscape at dawn and dusk each day from the comfort of the infinity pool at the Northern Territory’s newest wilderness retreat, Finniss River Lodge. Owner Robert Venturin believes there are few
Australian Traveller2 min read
Editor’s Letter
THIS IS A LINE-IN-THE-SAND MOMENT for Australian Traveller, the moment we go all-in with our commitment to approaching travel within Australia in a more conscious, sustainable, ethical and responsible way so that our readers know they are making the
Australian Traveller3 min read
Pillow Talk
QT Newcastle gives back to the community by virtue of the fact it’s housed in the iconic 113-year-old former David Jones building, which Novocastrians have a high degree of ownership over. As well as respecting the elegant bones of the building, the
Australian Traveller1 min read
Online
Follow our eight easy tips to becoming a conscious camper, like using eco-friendly products, minimising your use of single-use plastics, shopping locally and travelling with BPA-free water bottles and reusable coffee cups. Book a stay in a sanctuary
Australian Traveller2 min read
Culture Club
A leisurely walk around The Rocks with Aunty Margret Campbell of Dreamtime Southern X offers insights into Aboriginal people’s saltwater heritage and spiritual connection with Sydney Harbour and the adjoining waterways and foreshores. Illi-Langi mean
Australian Traveller6 min read
Wine + Dine
Celebrated Turkish-Australian chef Somer Sivrioglu and business partner Tarik Köni, of Origins Dining Group, have launched a predominantly plant-based venue on Carrington Street in Sydney’s CBD. Maydanoz means ‘parsley’ in Turkish and you can expect
Australian Traveller3 min read
A Moment In Time
THE ROMANCE OF THE MOMENT was not lost on Charmaine Ingram when she discovered several boxes of photographs during a clean-up of the Land Progress Aboriginal Corporation (ALPA) office headquarters in Darwin in 2020. As ALPA’s media and communications
Australian Traveller3 min read
Munga-Thirri–Simpson Desert National Park
THE SPRAWLING Munga-Thirri-Simpson Desert National Park covers an area that is full of contrasts and incredible natural beauty. The desert sands here are home to the longest parallel dune systems in the world, stretching for hundreds of kilometres an
Australian Traveller2 min read
Vince Frost
As a child, our family holidays were always to… We used to live in a place called White Rock near Vancouver, on the West Coast [of Canada] and right on the border with America. It was an easy drive into Washington to a place called Chuckanut Drive (1
Australian Traveller2 min read
Land Values
IT IS OFTEN OUR PAST EXPERIENCES that influence our future choices. In the case of designer and business owner Emily Riggs, her determination to “design a life with purpose” was informed by both triumph and loss. “When I was 10, I was diagnosed with
Australian Traveller6 min read
Green And Golden
IS IT ANY WONDER WE’RE YEARNING for the pure escapism of travel? The sobering realities of life in 2022 – from catastrophic floods to coral bleaching to the ongoing spectre of COVID-19 – are enough to send even diehard optimists scurrying for their s
Australian Traveller3 min read
On The Streets
WALKING TOURS ARE A GREAT WAY to get under the skin of a city, exploring its streets with a local to get a real sense of place and find out how those who live there interact and engage with their surroundings. In the case of Ryan Mossny, director and
Australian Traveller3 min read
A Precious Gem
JESS TAUNTON HAS BEEN AT THE LEADING edge of the conscious travel movement for about a decade. After helping to establish Swell Lodge, the eco-lodge retreat on Christmas Island, in 2018, the young eco entrepreneur reached a turning point in her life
Australian Traveller2 min read
What’s On
Expect a lot of sequins, feather boas, glitter, disco balls, divas and drag queens inspired by the cult movie and stage musical, Priscilla, Queen of the Desert at this outback festival, which includes comedy, cabaret and live music.bhfestival.com A
Australian Traveller1 min read
Look Good, Do Good
PHOTOGRAPHY: LEMON LIME CREATIVE (BLONDI BEACH. SALT SPRAY); DATE OF BIRTH (ROCC NATURALS); ZERO CO (‘FOREVER’ SHAMPOO AND CONDITIONER BOTTLES AND RECYCLABLE POUCHES); COURTESY OF AESOP (ROLL-ON HERBAL DEODORANT) ■
Australian Traveller3 min readRegional & Ethnic
Strait Talking
CATCH NORNIE BERO IN THE EARLY hours of the morning walking along Williamstown Beach, plucking samphire from rock crevices, and you will find a woman wearing a quiet, satisfied smile. Three decades ago, Nornie would have been wearing a similar painte
Australian Traveller2 min read
Curve Appeal
NAME: LOTI LOCATION: ST KILDA, VIC DESIGN FIRM: MITCHELL & EADES EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW again is a perfect description of LOTI, the latest eatery to debut in St Kilda’s always interesting restaurant and bar scene. Taking up residence on the inner-city
Australian Traveller2 min read
Water World
Considered one of the Kimberley region’s most spectacular attractions, no less than Sir David Attenborough has been mesmerised by the spectacle of the fast-moving tidal current of Talbot Bay being squeezed through two of the narrow gorges of the McLa
Australian Traveller3 min read
Why You Should Tick That Offset Box
In layman’s terms, the concept of carbon-offset schemes effectively means you are paying a price to remove the emissions produced when you fly or drive by investing in programs that have a positive effect on the Earth, thereby cancelling out or neutr
Australian Traveller5 min read
Travelling Consciously
GREEN. SUSTAINABLE. ORGANIC. The buzzwords of our earnest efforts to do better as we finally start to understand the consequences of our collective global actions over the last few centuries are increasingly attached to everything from our morning co
Australian Traveller3 min read
All That Glitters
REGIONAL CITIES HOLD SOME of the nation’s most precious gems. But, like all valuable stones, they could do with a good polish every so often to revive their glimmer. Nestled in Bendigo’s central Rosalind Park, the Bendigo Ernest Hotel is the latest e
Australian Traveller3 min read
Good Times Ahead
YOU COULD FORGIVE Two Good Co. a lot when it comes to dining at its first cafe, tucked into a leafy pocket of the inner-city Sydney suburb of Darlinghurst. The social enterprise, which sprang into action when co-founder Rob Caslick and a few friends
Australian Traveller1 min read
House Proud
Australia’s new breed of bathhouses are pleasingly contemporary and deliciously chic spaces in which to spend an hour or an entire day cocooned in luxury. Go for a massage at Melbourne’s design-centric Sense of Self, stay for a bath and a sauna, and
Australian Traveller6 min read
En Plein Air
THE SHOALHAVEN RIVER BENDS AT BUNDANON in a wide, glossy expanse that anchors the landscape folding softly around it. At night it looms even larger – glowing gently in the half light of a waning crescent moon and not surrendering its presence to shad
Australian Traveller6 min read
Message In A Bottle
IT’S 4PM ON A FRIDAY afternoon and I’m standing in torrential rain on 75 Mile Beach on K’gari (Fraser Island), with the wind whipping sand and rain into my face. After southern Queensland’s recent deluge of rain, the water is choppy and the brown, fo
Australian Traveller6 min read
Through The Grapevines
“THE FIRST THING YOU NOTICE when you go hiking is that it’s a mistake.” So said American comic Jim Gaffigan while delivering one of his pithy observations onstage. “There’s nothing at the end … no bar, restaurant, or even a vending machine. We’re jus
Australian Traveller4 min read
The New Calm
IT HAS BEEN SAID THAT TO GET MORE OUT of life, you need to do a lot less. Australia’s revival of bathing traditions comes at a time when many of us have emerged from an extended period of doing less, with a burning desire to dive shoulder-deep into d
Australian Traveller4 min read
Dairy Road, ACT
SPRAWLING OVER 14 hectares in an area known as East Lake – industrial Fyshwick on one side and a precious wetlands on the other – 1 Dairy Road is an intriguing neighbourhood emerging on the edge of the city. It’s home to an eclectic collection of cre
Australian Traveller6 min read
Life In The Slow Lane
READY TO TAKE IT SLOW? Congratulations! Booking a Slow Stay is the first step in the right direction when it comes to slowing down. How you actually spend your time while there, however, can be a challenge – especially if you’re not used to sitting s
Australian Traveller3 min read
Northern Rivers
MIKE SMITH moved to the Northern Rivers region in 2020 to set up Zero Co, the company he founded as part of his mission to stop single-use plastic packaging in every kitchen, laundry and bathroom in Australia. After selling his stake in Cake Wines, t
Australian Traveller10 min read
Rainforest Renewal
THERE’S A TRANSFORMATIVE MOMENT that happens for each guest during a stay at Silky Oaks Lodge. The moment they feel their shoulders soften and residual stress wash away. You might recognise it by their espousal of the ‘river look’ at pre-dinner cockt
Australian Traveller1 min read
Ciao Bella
From reinvented inner-urban precincts to cutting-edge cafes and cellar doors, and chilled-out coastal towns, the beauty of Geelong and the Bellarine Peninsula can be keenly felt with a short ferry ride from Melbourne across Port Phillip Bay. Turn to
Australian Traveller6 min read
The Boat Less Travelled
SPINDLY COLUMNS OF DOLERITE TOWER hundreds of metres above me, the dark-grey igneous cliffs slicked with a fine mist of sea spray. To my left a pod of whales breaks the surface, one by one, plumes of air spouting from their blowholes and mixing with
Australian Traveller7 min read
Country Style
I’M JEALOUS. STANDING AMID THE EPHEMERA of 144 years of living and aspiring and upgrading, the dusty, discarded objects crammed into an original shearing shed at Callubri Station, a 11,500-hectare working farm in Buddabadah, about 50 kilometres outsi
Australian Traveller7 min read
Celebrating Christmas
ON CHRISTMAS ISLAND THIS YEAR, the price of a single imported lettuce hit $20, but there’s no catastrophic floods or sudden inflationary pressures driving the eye-watering cost. “Lettuce has been $12 to $15 for the past decade or more,” says regenera
Australian Traveller1 min read
Come With Us...
HAVE YOU ALWAYS dreamed of visiting Birdsville? Can’t get enough of Bunbury? Does Byron Bay (pictured) never get old for you? We Aussies love our charming, quirky, unique towns, but which ones are our absolute favourites and why? We’ve asked around a
Australian Traveller6 min read
Across The Water
FROM THE YARRA RIVER, THE GREY SPEARS of Melbourne’s skyline shrink behind us, replaced by open water with a handful of distant container ships resting on the horizon like tiny caterpillars. Within an hour, a new horizon comes into view, low-rise and

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