Bill Bryson’s Travels Through Australia

In A Sunburned Country by Bill Bryson, a travel guide for visiting Australia

Many people dream of taking a vacation in Australia, that paradise “Down Under”. But from most parts of the world it’s a long and expensive flight away, and remains something they can only dream about. In that case, reading about a trip to Australia is the next best thing, and one of the most entertaining travel books about Australia is Bill Bryson’s In A Sunburned Country, also published under the title Down Under.

Bryson is an American-born travel writer and humorist, who has lived in Great Britain for the last thirty years. His sense of humor is a mix of dry British puns and direct American jokes, and this makes his perspective on Australia especially funny. He visited Australia in the lead-up to the 2000 Sydney Olympics and managed to travel both to many major cities and a number of more off-the-beaten-path destinations, giving us a balanced overview of the real Australia.

What makes this book most readable is Bryson’s clever – but scarily true – observations about what makes Australia unique. Along with the Aussies’ unnatural obsession with the slow game of cricket and the country’s large range of poisonous animals and insects, Bryson finds beautiful landscapes and must-see sightseeing spots. He makes us believe that a country where a Prime Minister can go swimming one day and simply disappear is definitely a place worth visiting.

Tags: Australia | Travel Books