Avalook at Australia News
Issue Number 5, 16 December 1999
ISSN 1443-0797
Editors: Eric Lindsay and Jean Weber
info@avalook.com.au
In this issue...
Is your gadget compatible?
Motorcycling
Ballooning
Australian music
Music: Yothu Yindi
Travel: Train passes
Australia: A readers guide online
ABC Shop online
Gleebooks
The Good Australian Wine Guide 1999/2000
Learning to drive again
Subscription information
Is your gadget compatible?
Wondering what electrical and related gadgets you can:
- Bring with you when you visit or move to Australia?
- Send to a friend in Australia?
- Buy in Australia and send or take to friends overseas?
- Buy overseas and bring back to Australia?
Or, more importantly, what gadgets will work in different countries?
This article has some clues. The list doesn't cover everything, but it should get you started.
http://www.avalook.com.au/gadgets.htm
Motorcycling
In July 2000 some members of the Veteran, Vintage and Classic Motorcycle Club of the Australian Capital Territory will start a ride around Australia to promote motorcycling. The Club has extended a welcome to all motorcyclists to join them for any part of their trip.
For more information about the club and an itinerary of the ride, visit: http://sunsite.anu.edu.au/canberra/vvcmcc
Ballooning
Several places in Australia offer hot-air ballooning. One of them is Canowindra, which calls itself the "Ballooning Capital of Australia". You can read all about the town (much more than just ballooning) at this site: http://www.canowindra.org/index.html
We're really keen on small country towns promoting themselves on the Web, because many places have really fascinating local features that you otherwise don't hear about. Canowindra, for example, has fish fossils and historical sites, in addition to the balloons. (The site also contains links to related sites.)
Australian music
The Australian Music web site wants to be the definitive source of information about Australian musicians. It has news, biographies, gig guides and links. You can search for band and artist information, find out where you can buy Australian music on the Net, check on TV and radio programs, playlists and current pop charts.
Music: Yothu Yindi
Moved to our Aboriginal Australians page.
Travel: Train passes
One way to explore Australia's east coast is with a Countrylink East Coast Discovery Pass. You get six months' economy class travel, one way on NSW's Countrylink and Queensland Rail's rail and coach networks, plus unlimited stopovers.
For more information: http://www.countrylink.nsw.gov.au/
Australia: A readers guide online
For the serious student of Australian culture and history, this database might be useful. It has over 1400 annotations and bibliographical details of major Australian books.
The guide claims to include "the best contemporary non-fiction books about Australia and the available seminal works about our country by Australians, covering all authoritative and accessible books about Australia. One of the main selection criteria is availability, with all titles being available for purchase or accessible in libraries... [some] titles that were once popular or important for their scholarship are not automatically considered eligible."
In addition to the works in the guide, readers are directed to additional titles by the same authors.
http://www.arts.monash.edu.au/ncas/multimedia/argo/index.html
ABC Shop online
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation has gift shops, which sell books and other things (usually related to their radio and TV shows). They've also got a web site where you can buy the same things. I found it difficult to use, because some pages used colour combinations that were difficult to read, and the book pages didn't seem to list books in any logical order. The search function worked well, so if you know the name of the book you want, you can find it quickly. This could be useful for tracking down books that aren't readily available through other online shops such as Amazon.
Gleebooks
If you like to browse in bookshops, Gleebooks (located in Glebe, an inner suburb of Sydney, close to the University of Sydney) is a great place to visit. They're famous not only for their books, but for their events (discussions, readings, etc) and their newsletter.
If you can't get to Gleebooks in person, you might like to visit their Web site, where you can read reviews and news, buy books, and follow a great set of links to related sites.
The Good Australian Wine Guide 1999/2000
Speaking of books, here's one of interest to wine fans: The Good Australian Wine Guide 1999/2000, by Hooke Huon et al, ISBN 0140287736, paperback.
The book's publicity claims "For ten years The Penguin Good Australian Wine Guide has been THE guide to the best Australian and New Zealand red, white, sparkling and fortified wines. It has charted the changing nature of the Australian wine industry, and delivered the very best in informed, lively wine writing and sharp industry observations."
You can buy the wine guide from a variety of places, including Gleebooks.
Learning to drive again
Last issue we mentioned buying a large motorhome. Since then we've been learning to drive it. This is quite an experience for two people who haven't driven anything much larger than a very small car in over 20 years. So far we're doing very well, but it's taking a lot of time. That's why this issue is late.
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Page last updated 20 June 2002
