On a fine and sunny non-race-day Saturday morning, the Lismore Turf Club’s sensational sub-tropical setting is generally race-horse-and-people-free.

And the Lismore Turf Club Loo is generally unused and unappreciated with an uninteresting view!

But last Saturday morning the sunny serenity of the Lismore Turf Club Loo was disturbed by a sight never before seen anywhere in the WORLD. On that day, the view from the loo – beamed all around Australia – will be forever remembered (at least by ONE person) as Red Nomad OZ’s first appearance on National TV!

If you were lucky/unlucky enough to view it (strike out that which is not applicable), you’ll no doubt agree it’s quite probably the last!!

So why was a Weekend Sunrise TV program guest lurking outside a loo at the Lismore Turf Club, over 700 km from Channel 7’s heartland in Sydney?

That’s what I was asking myself as the Rainbow Region’s morning fog melted into a clear sunny day and cameramen Peter and Ben wired me up for sound, fixed the light (dang, those glasses were tricky!) and calmed those last minute nerves.

My awesome publicist, Jenny had rung a couple of days earlier. Yes, she knew I was on the road. Yes, she knew the publication date (1 July!) of my book “Aussie Loos with Views!” was still a way off. Yes, she knew I’d be nervous.

But this was WEEKEND SUNRISE!  And they could do a live cross from anywhere with a race course!!

A race course?  Go figure!!

In my defence, a live cross isn’t an ideal situation despite the calming cameramen, pacifying producer (thank you, Kate!), or welcoming Weekend hosts!

To the onlooker (ie Pilchard) I was just a dazed redhead, standing in the middle of an empty Turf Club surrounded by lighting equipment and cameras, an earpiece taped to my neck channelling my imaginary friends and randomly speaking!

Camera and lighting equipment aside, perhaps not that different to my normal state?!

The absence of visual cues made it all a bit unreal (I’m on National TV? Yeah … whatever!) so I didn’t feel nervous at all.

On the other hand, the producer and crew have probably already rewritten the old showbiz adage, vowing never again to work with children, animals OR redheads who’ve written toilet books and never been on TV before!

Being the Aussie Scenic Public Toilets poster girl is a double-edged sword – I got to write a book about my special subject AND have it published (thank you ExploreAustralia!).BUT I DID get the chance to make a fool of myself on National TV!

Even if I discovered a new scenic loo while I was doing it!

Will the fun ever stop?

The Lismore Turf Club Loo isn’t Australia’s most scenic, and it doesn’t have the most spectacular setting or staggering view.

But it’s the most memorable!  For me, at least!!

Take a look at what the dunny saw that day on the Dunnies Downunder Video Clip from Weekend Sunrise!

Read MORE:

• Lismore and the NSW Rainbow Region
• My Book: “Aussie Loos with Views!”
• My Australian Scenic Public Toilets Blog Series

The post World Exclusive at the Lismore Turf Club Loo! OZ Scenic Public Toilet #39 appeared first on Australia by Red Nomad OZ.

The FAAAAAABULOUS colours of OZ make the life of a downunder blogging, photographing, writing traveller with a penchant for bakeries REALLY easy …

Getting a good pic from right in front of a spectacularly AWESOME panorama, a weird and wacky BIG Thing or a KILLER sunset is what’s called, in the technical photographic terminology used by us amateurs, a SURE THING.

It’s SO easy, in fact, that worrying about my eventual exposure as a photographic fraud just makes me break out in capitals all over!

So when the wonderful Linda of Journey Jottings tagged me to enter this year’s Capture the Colour competition sponsored by TravelSupermarket, my heart sank momentarily. Because not only am I a loud & proud photographic AMATEUR, the impact of my photos very much relies on the stories I tell about them.

Just FIVE photos? In Red, Blue, Yellow, Green and White?? That STAND ALONE???

Yeah … I can do that! Kind of!! Let me show you my FIVE colours of OZ as captured in FIVE very different Australian towns!!! Towns I haven’t before shown you!!

BUT … because I struggle with brevity AND I’ve got a snowball’s chance in hell of winning anyway, I’ve backed up each town with another photo to help show its true colours!

RED … Marree, South Australia

These days, thanks to roads now mostly sealed in recent times, this little outpost on the edge of the remote South Australian Outback is less than a day’s drive – 685 km – from Adelaide.

But that wasn’t always the case. Once the rail head for the Ghan railway, then an important link on the now defunct rail route to Alice Springs, but only accessible over a LOT of gravel, like in this photo, Marree was once considered WAY beyond the Back of Beyond!

And that’s also the name of a documentary about Tom Kruse, legendary Outback mailman who for nearly 30 years battled extreme temperatures, dust storms, sand dunes, floods and breakdowns to deliver mail in this RED 1936 Leyland Badger mail truck along the 519 km of the notorious track from Birdsville to Marree.

The truck now rests at the old rail yards across from the Marree Hotel – which ironically offers scenic plane and helicopter flights!  And why not? You wouldn’t want to miss Lake Eyre and Marree Man now, would you?!

MORE about Tom Kruse and Marree

BLUE … Brunswick Heads, New South Wales

An ecstatically happy combination of beaches, river, cafés, historic buildings, markets, shops, restaurants and other good stuff, Brunswick Heads is often (unaccountably) bypassed in favour of its bigger and WAY more brash neighbour Byron Bay, just down the coast from the Queensland/New South Wales Border.

And did I mention the bakery?

A vibrant community set amidst some of the most beautiful scenery in the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales, whether you’re a surfie, fisherperson, yuppie, grey nomad, tourist, trendy, backpacker, retiree or hippy there’s always something interesting to do at Brunswick Heads! And I’m not just talking about the bakery … although that’s SO fine, it’s worthy of visiting in its own right!!

Surrounded by the sea (see 1st photo above), the Brunswick river, and the hinterland behind, it’s hard to imagine Brunswick Heads featuring any colour but BLUE!

Sigh … I’m going to stop writing about it RIGHT NOW, so I can save it ALL for myself …

MORE about Brunswick Heads

A thirsty traveller on the Windorah Sand Dunes (see below) … Outback Queensland

YELLOW … Windorah, Queensland

Actually, small town Windorah, a great base from which to explore the Barcoo shire, is better known for its RED! SO red they hurt the eyes (see above), the incredibly photogenic local sand dunes just west of the township within cooee of the well known Coopers Creek are a tourist attraction in their own right.

BUT despite that – or maybe because of it – I couldn’t help noticing this YELLOW Backhoe (? can anyone enlighten me??) just off the highway in a Windorah backyard.

Actually, the matching toy backhoe right next to it is really what caught my eye …

And while yellow is an aberration in this Outback Queensland town dominated by the strong reds, greens and blues that typify the region in a good year, it’s a story in the making!

I wonder what the toy-owner will become when she or he grows up?!

MORE about Windorah and Coopers Creek

GREEN … Shepparton, Victoria

Nothing says ‘Shepparton’ or ‘Goulburn Valley Food Bowl’ better than an individually decorated life-size fibreglass cow – part of the MOOOOVING Art project – right??

Well, this one DOES have a GREEN agricultural bent …

For several generations of Aussies raised on Goulburn Valley products, the large regional town of Shepparton is worth a visit. And not just for the factory outlets such as Campbells and SPC Ardmona either!

Check out its natural attractions, wineries and walking trails, restaurants and – yes – bakeries, including the award winning slices of Tatura! But for my money, a morning walk around Lake Victoria is hard to beat – and it’s also GREEN!

MORE about Shepparton

WHITE … Carnarvon, Western Australia

Carnarvon will always be remembered as the town where Pilchard & I first spotted Laughing Dove (Streptopelia senegalensis) – an interloper native to Sub-Saharan Africa, but on the official Australian Bird List nonetheless. We take our ‘Lifers’ where we find them …

And … celebrate with copious quantities of chocolate coated frozen banana and mango – just two of the fabulous treats on offer from this Western Australian food growing region on the banks of the Gascoyne, 900 km north of Perth. Just check out the plantation produce stalls and the Gascoyne Growers Market if you don’t believe me …

Then check out the Heritage Precinct with One Mile Jetty and the Tramway (check out that WHITE fence!) to really get a feel for this beautiful town! And, like me, plan a return trip to finish off the bits you missed …

MORE about Carnarvon

They’re MY true colours!  But there’s PLENTY more colour in Australia’s colourful country towns!  Check out my other TOP Aussie Towns HERE!  Or better still – visit some and see what I mean for yourself!!

The post Capture the Colours of OZ Country Towns! appeared first on Australia by Red Nomad OZ.

Hi There!

Amongst Nimbin’s main street throng of weekend hippy trippers, bong-brain backpackers and Rainbow Region locals I stood out like a tourist.

The specially chosen bright orange chain store T-shirt I’d worn to Australia’s alternative lifestyle capital just didn’t stack up against the psychedelia of wildly experimental natural-dyed organic hand-woven fibres in daring and cutting edge styles.

The locals who stayed on after Nimbin’s 1973 Aquarius Festival and transformed this small dairying community 30 km north of Lismore forever have had a massive head start on me …

But the REAL proof that Nimbin personifies life OFF the grid wasn’t the Rainbow Power Company on Alternative Way; the Hemp Embassy; or the Nimbin Candle Company’s use of medieval monk technology to produce its all-natural product.

It was the artist WAAAAAY younger than me who refused to own a mobile phone!

Later, Red x

Read MORE:

• Nimbin, Northern New South Wales
• Lismore and the Rainbow Region, New South Wales

The post Postcard from … Nimbin, New South Wales! appeared first on Australia by Red Nomad OZ.

Once upon a time – WAAAAAAY back in the dim, distant world of 1989 – Ballina’s tail-less BIG Prawn sat atop the West Ballina transit centre and restaurant. Inside, visitors could climb up into its head and view a distorted world through the thick perspex of its concave eye. Over time, as businesses came and went below, the passive prawn’s exotic colouring faded from the original cooked-prawn red to pink, then finally a ghastly, ghostly white.

20 years later, after reports it was suffering from crustacean concrete cancer, the local council approved its demolition.

What were they thinking??

Yet, while some – especially those with good taste and refinement – see Australia’s notorious Big Things as trashy and tacky kitsch, for better or worse they’re a part of the Aussie culture.

Which should give non-Australians a disturbing idea of our national condition … but I digress!

To us Aussies, it’s quite normal to wander through a landscape awash with giant fibreglass and concrete objects that almost – but not quite – represent actual fruit, animals and people.

But to actually destroy one?

Our inbuilt nationalistic tendency to defend the underdog kicks in!

That’s possibly why nearby coastal town Yamba’s 2012 takeover bid was thwarted and the shrinking shrimp received a stay of execution demolition order!

Locals from Ballina, in Northern New South Wales and an hour’s drive south of the Queensland border, weren’t going to give up their placid prawn without a fight.

After all, watching the Prawn Trawlers head down the Richmond River, across the churning waters of its treacherous Bar and out through its mouth to sea for a night of fishing is one of the joys of walking Ballina’s twin breakwalls. It’s even more exciting watching the trawlers return to cross the bar through a mountainous swell in seas so heavy I’ll never to complain about the price of seafood again!

With Ballina’s inaugural Prawn festival date of November 2013 fast approaching, it somehow seems right for the Big Prawn Ballina to remain.

So when hardware giant Bunnings tapped into the community outrage with a masterful blend of goodwill, expedience and positive publicity by writing a new lease of life for the controversial crustacean into its development proposal for the site on which it stood, the shiftless shrimp’s future was assured.

And in a lucky break for the Big Thing loving public – and quite possibly Ballina’s international tourist industry – the Big Prawn Ballina has not only been preserved, but given a makeover.

Now, after being moved to it’s final resting spot, raised 3 metres so its brand-new tail would fit underneath, and repainted to a mouth-watering shade of cooked-crustacean salmon pink, the Big Prawn is BACK!

And although the finishing touches were still being applied on this rare rain-free Northern Rivers afternoon, the pulchritudinous prawn looks better than ever!

Want MORE?

• Ballina, New South Wales
• Northern Rivers Region, New South Wales
• More Aussie BIG Things
• See MY PHOTO in the Little Aussie Book of BIG Aussie Icons!

The post The Controversial Crustacean! Big Prawn Ballina, New South Wales appeared first on Australia by Red Nomad OZ.

Being a drama queen is a good thing, right??

So the naturally monochromatic landscape of a stormy day on Australia’s east coast where an offshore low made mountains of the waves and piled the sky high with clouds thrilled my little DQ soul to bits.

And has given me a rare opportunity to silence those who, based on my photos, ask if it ever actually rains anywhere downunder!!

In the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales where accessories like mobile phones, handbags and i-pads are replaced by fishing rods, guitars and surfboards, a stormy day is no reason to stay indoors.

In fact, it’s apparently perfect surfing weather!!

And so, as the sparkling blues and greens and the light that catches the waves (and the odd whale) on a fine day are replaced by the greys of sky, mist and sea; the whites of surf, cloud and spray, and the blacks of rock, wetsuit and breakwall in and endless variations of the monochrome palette, I ask you this.

Which is better?

Of course, to a true DQ, the answer is obvious …

The thrilling compulsion of watching surfers pick their way through the rocks as waves crash all around, then paddle out through a monochromatic monster sea satisfies my DQ soul far more than seeing the same scene in blue and green.  No matter how perfect!

Then, just down the coast from where the Sharpes Beach surfers rocked the waves, the scene at the South Ballina Breakwall, where the mighty Richmond River enters the sea stirred my DQ photographic heart with a mixture of elation – and apprehension.

But being a drama queen isn’t just about watching from the sidelines.  It means embracing whatever the dramatics bring – even if it’s an unwelcome bout of stormy weather.  And that’s a good thing, right??

RIGHT!

Want MORE?

• Ballina, New South Wales
• Northern Rivers Region, New South Wales
• Visit New South Wales

The post Drama Queen Dreaming … Ballina, New South Wales appeared first on Australia by Red Nomad OZ.