This week, your intrepid investigative journalist has been exploring the practice and business of ecotourism. He has travelled by scary single prop plane to the remote Lady Elliot Island way out on the southern tip of the Great Barrier Reef. I hope you’re grateful I’ve endured this hardship. No Australian we knew had heard of […]

Read more "Happy together"

When we arrived in Australia, the passport control officer took my papers, looked me up and down over the top of her spectacles, and sternly back at the forms. She straightened her back like someone weary from a long day’s work, yawned and lazily cracked her bulbous knuckles. A broad grin swept across her face […]

Read more "Memories, myths and dreams"

Walking along from Coogee Beach to Bondi – as one does – I overheard a couple talking about Australian history. ‘You know, that guy?’ ‘What, Captain Cook?’ ‘Yeah, him. You know, he didn’t die a natural death. He was killed by the Bee Gees.’ Now blow me down with a feather. I knew of their […]

Read more "My Pal Joey"