A country like no other – Happy Australia Day.

It’s the best day ever – after months and months without rain – it’s finally raining. I know it may ruin some of the Australia Day festivities but as I look out the window I just sigh with happiness. The water tanks will be full and now the grass will grow for the horses. I know to live in Australia you have to get used to extreme weather conditions but you do become worried when the months pass by and there’s no rain.

The worry is worth it though, when you live in such a sensational country but what a diverse country Australia is, from cosmopolitan cities to tiny outback settlements, tropical rain forests and inland deserts. The home of Aboriginal tribes for a period in excess of 40,000 years with clear evidence of their occupation.

Australia’s deserts are as vast as the Sahara; it’s snowfields rival those of Switzerland; it’s surfing beaches would be among the best in the world. The entire continent is criss-crossed by major highways and rough bush tracks a distance of 3700 kilometres from north to south and 4000 kilometres from east to west. Within this area of some 8.5 million square kilometres you can find an extraordinary range of flora and fauna, a variety of climatic extremes and astounding geological wonders.

Australia is a land of parched deserts, dry for years and then flooding rains to produce an inland sea. The colours of Australia excite and amaze, red, blue and green; inland, you find the stark red of the Simpson Desert sand-dunes contrasts dramatically with the deep azure blue of the noonday sky. Dotted here and there you see clumps of velvet-green scrub and, after rain the Sturt Desert Pea blooms scarlet.

Simply put, all Australia is a wonderland ever beaconing for a once in a lifetime adventure, you should come see for yourself …