Australia

I moved from Sydney to the Netherlands a couple of years ago. In my six years of living in Sydney, I fell into the trap of not doing the "tourist" things - I lived there, I wasn't a bloody tourist. In the end, I moved back to Europe in a bit of a rush, and missed out on most of the Australian highlights. Luckily, I've been back in Sydney for the last couple of months with work, so I decided it was now or never to make up for this.

Uluru

A common debate amongst folks living in Sydney is whether it's worth going to visit Uluru (Ayer's Rock) or not. "It's just a big rock." "It's too hard to get to." "It's too expensive." I was undecided myself, until I read Bill Bryson's account of his visit in the brilliant Down Under:

".... And then you see it, and you are instantly transfixed. (...) It's not that Uluru is bigger than you had supposed or more perfectly formed or in any way different from the impression you had created in your mind, but the very opposite. It is exactly what you expected it to be. You know this rock. You know it in a way that has nothing to do with calendars and the covers of souvenir books. Your knowledge of this rock is grounded in something much more elemental.

In some odd way that you don't understand and can't begin to articulate an acquaintance with it - a familiarity on an unfamiliar level...."

My buddy Mark also decided it was worth the gamble, and we headed there for a weekend. Yes, it is expensive to get to. Yes, accommodation is expensive, unless you're willing to rough it in a dorm like we did. But it's totally worth it.

Uluru, sunset

Bryson was right. The rock is pretty much what I expected it to be. It's huge. It has that signature shape. But it's not just about the rock. It's the location. There's nothing but flat dry bushland as far as the horizon in all directions. Totally out of place, it's like Uluru was placed here by some supernatural force. It's the colours. This is the reddish-brown Australian landscape I dreamed about before I visited the country for the first time. It's the searing, unrelenting heat, with no natural shade anywhere. It could not be more different from Sydney, yet in many ways, this is the "real" Australia. It only took me eight years to find it.

Yulara is the resort town, 20km north, where you stay when visiting the rock. It's a strange, fake place - the town was purpose built for the tourist hordes in 1984, replacing the accommodation options that were built right at the base of the rock, which is now rightly part of a national park to preserve the area and respect the local Aboriginal wishes. It serves its purpose, but you don't come here to see the town.

Uluru itself is the main event here. Mark and I saw it in four different ways - at sunset from the south east, up close in an energy-sapping 10km walk in dry 36 degree heat around the base, at sunrise from 30-odd kilometres to the west, and, saving the best for last, from the air. Flying in a helicopter had been on both our bucket lists, so this was as good a place as any to give it a go.

The luck of the Irish meant that we got to do a 30 minute flight even though we'd booked and paid for half that (our pilot pulled us aside and asked that we don't mention that fact to the other passengers). Helicopters are awesome. I'd love to pilot one someday, it looked easy enough (yeah right). The views from up on high were mightily impressive - it really gave us a sense of the remoteness of the place.

To top off our one full day in the area, we did an astronomy tour well after the sun had set. The light pollution levels in this area are really low, so it's a great spot for stargazing. We got lucky to be there during a new moon, the best time of the month for star visibility. No picture taken with my camera could possibly do the naked eye view of the Milky Way justice - it was pretty damn incredible.

Kata Tjuta, sunrise

Another set of big rocks collectively named Kata Tjuta are found 35km west of Uluru. We had a sneak preview of them on our extended helicopter flight, and did a lovely hike on our final morning through the undulating troughs between them. A nice way to round off a well-spent weekend. I'm firmly in the "go see Uluru" camp now. If you head there, allow more than the 2.5 days we had - there's more to see further afield, and from what I've heard it's fully worth of a wander.

More Uluru photos

Great Barrier Reef

This was the other big hitter I had yet to experience, except there was more urgency for this one because the Great Barrier Reef is slowly being destroyed by human activity. This destruction can still be reversed, but as with a lot of environmental issues, right now greed is winning out. In 30 years time, the reef as it is today might not exist. I thought it was best go see what all the fuss is about while I still could.

I took the easiest route to the reef from Sydney, a flight up to tropical Cairns in north Queensland. Cairns is a tourist town that's right on the backpacker route that snakes up and down the east coast. Treating this weekend as "practice" (I was travelling alone) for my big upcoming trip, I booked a hostel to sample backpacking life once again. A couple of years ago, when I was visiting home in Ireland, and after a few, some of my oldest friends and I decided to revisit an old haunt from our youth. The warm nostalgic glow we expected upon entering An Bróg in Cork city was quickly quenched by realizing we were the oldest people in the bar by some distance. I experienced a similar chain of emotions when I checked in to the hostel. I'm one of those old-fogey travellers now. Fingers crossed there's more folks closer to my age in South America.

From talking to people that had visited, I knew that snorkelling alone doesn't do the reef justice - I needed to get below the surface to really experience it. Having never scuba dived before, and with not enough time to get PADI scuba-diving certified (a full-on four days), I opted for the "introductory dive" option.

Maori Wrasse, left, Irishman, right

This was one of those experiences that'll stay with me for a long time. Absolutely incredible. There's so much life just a few metres below the surface, and some of it really does look otherworldly. I have never even come close to experiencing anything close to this before. It's fair to say that I've been bitten by the scuba diving bug. I'm sure there's not many better places in the world to get bitten.

More Great Barrier Reef photos

So, a successful couple of weekends that not only assuaged my guilt for not seeing these things while I lived in the area, but also whetted my appetite for seeing more wonders of the world. Bring it on.