2Day FM Website - Listen Live!

If you’re planning on staying in Sydney for a while this would be one of the popular radio stations to listen to. They’re morning hosts appear to be quite popular over there. If you listen at 3pm in Canada you can catch them live. Also the traffic reports are quite funny to hear as well. The reporter uses a lot of slang and most of the time you have no clue what’s going on in traffic!

If Sydney is where you’re bound than I suggest having a listen to this station for fun. It’s really neat to hear all the accents and the use of some words you wouldn’t think of hearing on the radio. I’d say it’s a good taste of what you’re getting yourself into.

Backpack Victoria is really worth a visit! I’m planning on staying in Melbourne for a few months and this site helps with accommodation, jobs, places to eat and everything that’s going on! It’s a super helpful website and very current with everything you need right on the home page.

Everything you need to know about getting around, customs and the best places to check out are on this site. Go ahead and bookmark it! It could come in handy on your travels!

I stumbled across Lost Outback Podcasts a few days ago and have yet to listen to most of them but they answer a lot of questions about Australia that you would only find out by talking to the locals. I can’t wait to hear more of them. It seems they haven’t updated in over a year but still this is useful information if you want to know some more tid bits of info on the great land of OZ. Enjoy!

Travellers at Work- Job Search

I came across this job website today and it looks promising. It’s designed for travellers looking for work. All the job postings are for casual/term positions so you don’t waste time looking through all the full time ads. While searching through it for ten minutes I found a handful of jobs that I would be willing to apply for if I was heading out in a month like I will be this time next year. It’s worth a look incase you need a job ASAP!

During my future travels in Australia next year I plan on taking the Ghan from Adelaide to Alice Springs. Better to see the outback on the ground than barely from the air. It will be a long ride but I think it will be more of an adventure than just simply taking a plane to Alice Springs.

The fares are reasonable if you go Red Kangaroo service and you can also get a cabin for sleeping since it’s a two day journey.

Visit The Ghan website.

A little bit about The Ghan:

The Ghan is a passenger train operating between Adelaide, Alice Springs, and Darwin on the Adelaide-Darwin railway in Australia. Operated by Great Southern Railway and with locomotives provided by Pacific National, the journey takes 48 hours to travel the 2,979 kilometres (1850 miles). The service’s name is an abbreviated version of its previous nickname The Afghan Express, which comes from the Afghan camel trains that trekked the same route before the advent of the railway.

Can’t wait to ride it!

Brisbane is the state capital of Queensland. Brisbane is the third largest city in Australia and most populous city of Queensland. It is situated on the Brisbane River on low-lying Floodplain between Moreton Bay and the Great Dividing Range in south-eastern Queensland.

The local indigenous people knew the area as Mian-jin, meaning ‘place shaped as a spike’. The city is named after Sir Thomas Brisbane, the Governor of New South Wales from 1821 – 1825. The settlement grew from a penal colony established at his direction in 1824 at Redcliffe, 28 kilometres (17.4 mi) to the north. The colony moved to the current location of the Brisbane CBD in 1825, and free settlers were permitted from 1842. It was chosen as the capital when Queensland was proclaimed a separate colony in 1859.

GoAbroad Network is the newest social networking site for travelers. This site is dedicated to travelers worldwide - if you love travel, this is the site for you!

GoAbroad Network is the ultimate postcard! Friends and family can follow your every adventure through your journals, travel photo galleries, and interactive maps. Your friends can sign up for RSS feeds and read your journals and blogs every time you post.

I have created a page for my Australian adventure when it happens. But for now you can check out my first journal entry and maybe even create your own profile and add me as a friend!

Aussie Dreamer Profile

Happy Travels

SWAP Working Holidays
Live-Work-Play at one of our 12 destinations!
Have a lingering question about living and working abroad? When should you go? Where should you go? How do you prepare to live and work overseas? SWAP has all the answers.

SWAP not only gets you the Work Visa, but once in your destination, we offer support services for the full duration of your stay.

I am going to live in Australia!

Yes, I am. This is my ultimate goal and it will happen. Need to save loads of money though. Here’s a little about the Swap Australia program:

SWAP Australia is one of our most popular programs! Our main hosting centre in Sydney is a fantastic base with everything you need to get set up when you first arrive. Melbourne is an alternative arrival option, it is a satellite centre to the main Sydney hosting office and though it offers more limited services, orientations and support resources are available to you throughout the year. We are also happy to announce that our Australian partner organization has teamed up with YHA Australia to offer you an extensive country-wide network of internet access and support throughout your working holiday. With the vast number of employment opportunities available in the tourism industry, SWAPPERs typically locate jobs on the busy east coast, but many participants choose to remain in the thriving cities and earn excellent wages doing clerical or career-related work. The word is in: Australia is choice. Go for it, mates!

Well hello. I have a goal. And that is to go to Australia on a working holiday.

It’s quite easy to put down in words but the actual planning and process of getting there is going to take a lot of time and money. Money being in short supply for me right now is going to be the most challenging. Having this goal will really make me work hard for it though.

So yesterday I was sitting at my boring job (which ends Friday) and thinking of places I’d rather be at that moment and I returned to my dream I had the same time last year. Australia. I looked into www.swap.ca and instantly was convinced that this is what I have to do before it’s too late. This exact line is what did it for me “It’s Now or Never. Travel now, while you’re still eligible and before you have major commitments.”

Exactly, before major commitments. I don’t have a house, I’m not married and don’t have any dependants to take care of. It’s the right time to do this! And I don’t want to be thinking ‘what if’ in 10 years. So I’m completely set on doing this.

Yes it will be an incredibly difficult challenge for me. Number one the flight is insanely long and I have trouble enough flying for 4 hours. Number 2 I have too much anxiety when dealing with new and unfamiliar situations. I really think being forced to deal with things might help me get rid of that issue. This could really change my life. Or when I come back I could appreciate the life I had even more and find satisfaction out of living here. At the moment I’m bored to bits. I just want an adventure and independence.

Luckily my boyfriend of 3 years has agreed to go with me. But the chance of him saving enough money is pretty unlikely. It’s a lot and I encouraged him to start taking more shifts at his part time DJ job. So what if I don’t see him all weekend. It might all be worth it in a year or so.

My mom is totally on board with the idea which is great! I thought she would be trying to change my mind. But she is trying to recommend other countries because she’s heard of all the snakes in Australia. She likes New Zealand better and I also have a cousin living there. But I’ll explore both places and see what is the best route. hmmm…. Australia it is!

I’m thinking of writing more entries and things progress and I start registering with Swap. Maybe my experiences will help others thinking of doing the same thing.

But for the moment it’s only an IDEA.

The Daintree Rainforest is home to the most diverse range of plants and animals on the planet, period. It is also the largest area of tropical rainforest in Australia. This is arguably the most important ecological site in the country, more so for it’s incredible plants than anything else. Many species that now live here originated when Australia was part of Gondwana, more than 120 million years ago. The rainforest is easy acessable from Cape Tribulation just north of Cairns in Queensland and is a must see for anyone visiting the region.

Plants
The Daintree is home to over 3,500 vascular plant species but along with the simply massive variety, perhaps the most unique thing about the Daintree is that along side the more ‘modern’ species of are plants that have existed on earth for millions of years. Of the 19 known primitive plant families on earth, 12 are found in the Daintree. The rainforest is also host to Australia’s largest range of ferns. Some of the more famous plants in the rainforest include the Strangler Fig and mangrove swamps.

Wildlife
One of the most well known animals living in the Daintree Rainforest area is the Estuarine Crocodile however the rainforest is also home to almost half of all Australia’s bird species (including the Cassowary, nearly a quarter of Australia’s frog species, has more freshwater fish species than any else in the country and over 60% of Australia’s butterflies.