Amazing Australian Distances Many visitors to Australia do not realize how unbelievably ginormous this country is until they actually start travelling around, the distances are simply amazing!

There are over 800,000kms of roads criss-crossing Australia. Less than 50 per cent are sealed.

Highway One circumnavigates Australia and is 24,000kms long, the coastline is about 36,735 km.

It takes three days to cross Australia by train and five hours by plane, the country measures approximately 4,000 km from east to west and 3,200 km from north to south. The Eyre Highway that crosses the Nullarbor Plains in Western Australia has the longest stretch of straight stretch of road in Australia near Caiguna - 148 kilometres!

Crossing the border from Northern Territory into Queensland near Borroloola.

Photo by Rob Lapaer of Rainforest Hideaway B&B, Cape Tribulation, N.Qld. Australia has the world's longest straight stretch of railway line; from Nurina in Western Australia to Watson in South Australia, the railway line is dead straight for 478 kilometres. In some parts of Australia distances between petrol stations are that big that warning signs have been erected to warn people as in some cases having enough fuel and water can mean the difference between life and death!

Only 560 km. to the next fuel stop!

Photo by Rob Lapaer of Rainforest Hideaway B&B, Cape Tribulation, N.Qld.

Even on the main highway petrol stations can be that far apart that you

need to refuel from a jerrycan to make it across if you have a thirsty old car. A system of measuring that was never officially terminated but gradually disappeared in the late 1990s was beers.

In outback areas where nobody used to worry about drink driving distances were often measured in beers, the distance to a nearby town could be 'only a sixpack' but a longer trip to the nearest city could be as far as 'a carton'.

The government started to try and convince people that driving and alcohol don't mix but in place like the Northern Territory where outside the city you always buy your petrol and beer at the same shop ( the local 'roadhouse') this was not easy. Some residents of "dry areas" have been known to drive 800kms or more to the nearest bottle shop or even charter planes to pick up their grog.

Dry areas are areas where no alcohol what so ever is allowed to be consumed or brought in to combat alcohol problems in Aboriginal communities, this having been decided in liaison with Aboriginal elders and Land Councils. Do you know of, or have travelled, any amazing Australian distances? Then contact us !







