Lose yourself in Western Australia

If I worked for Tourism WA, I’d implement the advertising slogan “Get lost in Western Australia” or maybe even “Western Australia. Escape civilization”

Ok, so both these slogans elicit negative and positive connotations. If you’ve heard of the 2005 horror flick Wolf Creek, which surrounds the disappearance of backpackers in the WA outback and is based on true events, you may not want to "get lost" or "escape civilization" in WA. But all of us, at some point or another just want to get away from it all and escape the dramas of everyday modern life. And if that’s the case, then WA’s the place to do it.

The state of Western Australia covers 2.5 million square kilometers which equates to approximately 1 million square miles. To put that into perspective, that’s four times the size of Texas and larger than Western Europe. Physical size is irrelevant until you take into account Western Australia’s population which is a mere 2.3 million people, 1.7 million of which live in the Perth metropolitan area.

If I still haven’t captured your attention, imagine the following. Take the western portion of the US all the way to the eastern borders of New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming, and Montana and add in, say, Kansas for good measure. That’s roughly the size of Western Australia. Place a metropolitan area about the size of Austin, TX somewhere in the vicinity of Los Angeles and then scatter another 600,000 people primarily along the coast. Separate Canada and Mexico by vast oceans, and you’ll have WA.

As a whole, despite Australia’s rather prominent stature on the world map as the island country in the Southern Hemisphere, it’s a rather lonely and desolate place. The remaining 20 million residents reside primarily along the east coast, separating West Australian’s from their neighbors by thousands of miles of outback desert. Compare this to the US where a population of 310 million is scattered about all nooks and crannies of the nation. Even the motherland, a much smaller island, is the home to 62 million people – three times the population of Australia. Maybe it’s not just the sunshine and hot weather that continues to attract and upward of 20,000 UK migrants to Australia each year.

I laugh every time Shane answers the question as to how he ended up in St. Louis as an 18 year old foreign exchange student. The answer is he didn’t have much choice. He knew nothing about St. Louis except that it was inland, but his perception of inland was Houston, TX not smack dab in the middle of America’s heartland. He was dropped into St. Louis, in the middle of August, in 100 degree heat with 200% humidity and no beach in sight.  Imagine his surprise.

Each time a friend back in the US talks about a trip to Chicago one weekend and San Francisco the next, I'm reminded that those days are over, as logistically (and financially), it’s just not possible in Australia.  Even our days of living in England, with cheap and easy European weekend trips at our fingertips, seem like a distant memory.  Tomorrow, I embark on my monthly two day pilgrimage to Sydney for work. Sydney, the largest city in Australia and one of only five with a population over 1 million - Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and finally Adelaide, being the closest of the lot to Perth at 2,700km away. This business trip is the extent of my plane hopping mini-breaks these days.

Most short-lived getaways for those in Perth are done by car and for the pleasure of lounging on the beach away from the city, surfing big waves, catching massive fish, or exploring the vineyards of Margaret River - and relaxation and beautiful scenery are high on the agenda. No fast paced cities and weekends filled with endless tourist traps - just peace and quiet and relaxation in a place where you can escape civilization and lose yourself in the millions of stars amongst the milky way.