Security (from LJ): usemask
Often, we've been comparing our travels in Australia with other travels we've done. It's something everyone does—we weren't the ones to invent the analogy that "Sydney is just like San Francisco". But some people think that Chris and I do it just a bit too much, and are too harsh on Australia, not accepting it on its own terms, and always comparing it to the US.
Perhaps. But there are three factors at work here.
The first is simple: Australia is very different to anywhere else in the world. It's sparsely settled, often hot and dry, with many remote places, and unique plant and animal life. There isn't much of a frame of reference to hang things on, so descriptions often have to rely on comparisons to get a fuller appreciation. The best comparisons are those that we think that our friends and family are familiar with—and most of them live in North America. Describing something through similarities and differences goes quite a bit farther than just dry statements; for instance, saying Brisbane has a similar climate to Orlando is a lot clearer than saying "Brisbane as a climate that's best described as summer rain, with a dry winter period of mild temperatures, even at night, though sometimes approaching freezing." It's a better description, it's more concise, and gives a better feel for where we are. (Though we can't help that many people reading our posts probably don't know where Brisbane is at all.)
The second factor is more subjective, and deals with what I'd call misinformation. Australia has quite a few wonderful places… and quite a few uninteresting ones. And from reading guidebooks and tourist information, it's hard to figure out which ones are interesting to us and which ones are dull as dishwater. The guidebooks aren't a help. Lonely Planet, based here in Australia, very rarely says a town isn't worth your while; in fact, they almost always say that a town is worth a few days visit, with plenty to do. (It's almost as if they're stock analysts who never seem to advise their clients to sell). The same goes for the local motoring association guidebooks. Sure, they list the many things to do in town under the "Activities" section, but it almost always seems to be 'take a fishing charter' or 'go on a bushwalk' or 'go fossicking'. Not much variety there.
The guidebooks aren't the only source to blame: the local tourist information offices and tour operators do their fair share of spreading misinformation. Often, you'll pick up a brochure plugging a local attraction, showing a wonderful waterfall leaping off a cliff into a verdant gorge below, a beautiful white sand beach with crystal clear warm water, or a vibrant Aboriginal community working on exciting art pieces. The reality when you get there is more abrupt. That waterfall will only flow in the Wet season, which is why the gorge is green as well, and the Wet season is six months away. You get to see a stain on the gorge wall and wilting plants, perhaps even recently burned by a bushfire. That beach is nice looking, but it also has nasty sandflies that leave red welts, and the wind blows day and night at 50 kilometers an hour. And that Aboriginal community you can't really visit—off limits to visitors--but you can see their gallery and the four white people that run it on the outskirts of their community. Now, we're not naïve enough to believe that what these brochures and (particularly) guidebooks say is the ultimate truth. We'd just like it to be based a bit more on reality.
This much misinformation leads to disappointment. And we've got a lot of that on this trip, particularly in these tourist towns and destinations we've been seeing since the middle of May. That's anything from the Queensland coast to the Northern Territory and into northern Western Australia. After three months of this, we're a bit jaded.
The third factor is simpler than misinformation: distance between things, or more precisely value for time. Most attractions and sights are far apart from each other. Kakadu National Park looks close to Darwin on the map, but it's three hours drive. Alice Springs to Uluru is five hours drive, with nothing in between. To see something in Australia, you have to spend a lot of time driving and a lot of money in fuel, and often the payoff isn't worth it. While we found Kakadu and Uluru to definitely be worth it, for these past few months we've just been finding other attractions aren't worth the bother. Our trip to Cape York was in that 'why did we bother category?'
So, between the necessity of comparing things here in Australia to places that people are familiar with (and that we enjoy), the huge hype that the tourist industry generates, and the long time it takes to get somewhere… yeah, we get disappointed fairly often. And it comes out in our posts and emails.
Still, in a few weeks time we'll be back in 'normal' civilization, and away from the primary tourist regions, as we head into Perth. We can eat in interesting restaurants, visit national parks that aren't swarming with tour groups, and see small scale tourist operations like roadside wildlife parks and botanical gardens and wineries and local museums. We've really enjoyed that earlier in the year; the month we spent in Tasmania was particularly memorable, as were our stays in and around Melbourne, Sydney, and Brisbane. That should be nice.