A Big Outback Adventure

Up until now I have endeavoured to keep work separate from my personal blog because it makes life simpler. Next week however I am working on an awesome project for Flight Centre UK that I can’t help but share with you guys – they are sending this London girl to the Outback!
Last year Flight Centre UK ran a contest in conjunction with the radio show Kiss 100 to find 5 people and their lucky friends to send on a Big Outback Adventure in Australia’s Northern Territory – and I’m going to spy on them!

I’ll be reporting live from Down Under for Flight Centre on facebook and twitter as the group travel to Darwin, onto Alice Springs and into the Red Centre. In Darwin we’ll be facing wave pools and crocs, sampling harbour cruises and deckchair cinemas. Intrepid Travel will be introducing us to Kakadu national park, an area the size of Wales, where I’ll be channelling Crocodile Dundee! We’ll also be flying to Alice to get up close and personal with the legendary Uluru and sleep under the stars in her presence.

Jim Jim Falls Kakadu National Park – Photo by Tourism Northern Territory

In between worrying about snakes and bugs and having a mild wardrobe crisis (what does one wear in the Outback?!) I am super, super excited to be returning to Oz and filling in the gaps from my last visit. Like many visitors to Australia who are on a backpacker’s budget, I explored the East Coast of Oz from top to bottom; I even made it over to Perth to visit family, but had to sacrifice exploring the middle and top because my funds couldn’t get me there. From research and reading blogs on the Northern Territory ever since then, I know this was a huge mistake. Now I’ve got the chance to rectify that.

You can follow the whole group’s progress via the hashtag #BIGOBADV on twitter (in case you didn’t catch that from the image above!) Also Charlie from the Kiss 100 Breakfast show will be joining us and updating the Breakfast Show listeners each morning live from the Outback – if you hear a cockney girl in the background cackling, it is probably me!

I’ll be taking heaps of photos and noting down travel advice and general observations for the Flight Centre blog. If, however, you want to get the inside scoop on how I deal with the bugs and snakes, whether I dare to sample kangaroo steak and if the men in the Outback actually look like Hugh Jackman (I sure hope so!) then you’ll need to check back here in a few weeks!
In the meantime if you have any advice for a city slicker about to make her first foray into the Outback, kindly leave it in the comments section below. Yours gratefully 🙂