Seven teams of travelers have been under going their own Amazing Race across the Outback, traveling a collective 30,000 km around Australia. Through their adventures, which has included skydiving, swimming with dolphins, beer drinking and cave exploring, the teams have been filming their antics and posting them on Youtube.  (All told, there are 100 videos, as well as online diaries.)

Now WorldNomads.com wants some of the Van-Tastic videos to go viral by getting people to vote on the best team coming out of the trip. The winners get $10,000 (AUD) and some plane tickets on Virgin Blue — which is just like Virgin America but in Australia.

And unlike American elections where there are no door prizes, WorldNomads.com is offering voters a slew of prizes — including $5,000 Australian.

Other prizes include:

-  iPod Touch 32GB

-  $100 voucher iTunes

-  MacBook Pro 15’

-  iPhone 32GB

-  Canon Legria HF20 video camera

-  WorldNomads.com adventure travel kit

Now to get some of the goods, you do have to register with the website and we can’t be responsible for any spam they decide to send your way. But if it’s on you new MacBook Pro, who’s really going to complain? Voting begins July 2 and will run through July 25. You can vote here.

It appears WorldNomads.com has recently hired a social media expert, as you can follow the teams on Facebook, subscribe to their videos on YouTube and even follow them on Twitter.

Note: We grabbed some of the Van-Tastic photos from Flicker @Van-tastic Adventures.

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Through military connections we were able to gain access to some prime real estate right on the water with panoramic views of both North and South Sydney, the Harbour Bridge and the World Famous Opera House. New Year’s revelers lined the water’s edge beginning at 2 p.m. just to secure a few square feet of coastline to be a part of one of the World’s biggest midnight parties.  

Just after 5 p.m. the waterways within the city were covered in boats and the skies were greeted with bi-planes ready to celebrate. With wine in hand and good company, it was an amazing experience. Next year in Sydney people, it’s warmer and one hell of an experience. 

Me and my son waiting to ring in the New Year on Sydney Harbour.

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The city that brings in the New Year with a serious bang is Sydney Australia, one of the most sought after places to be when the clock strikes 12 and the New Year begins. This event is lauded as the second largest New Year’s event in the world, second to Rio de Janeiro, with more than 1.5 million party-goers flooding the streets and lining every inch of the city’s Harbour. Sydney will rock into 2010 with two sets fireworks over the world-famous Opera House and Harbour Bridge.
Hipster Travel Guide will be on hand to cover the event, barring the forecasted thunder-showers putting a serious damper on the event. Cross your fingers, people!

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The lucky sop got paid 150,000 Aussie bucks ($120K U.S.) to blog about his experience there. More than 35,000 people applied for the job and Southhall was the lucky one to get it.

But his luck ran out in the waning days on Hamilton Island.

“I’ve avoided being boxed by a kangaroo, nibbled by a shark and bitten by a spider or a snake – but then in my final few days on Hamilton Island I fell foul of a miniscule little creature known as an Irukandji,” he wrote on his blog yesterday.

“I was enjoying a post Christmas jetski session with some friends at a quiet beach on Hamilton Island and as I climbed off the back of the ski and onto the beach felt a small bee-like sting on my forearm, I didn’t think too much of it at the time as it disappeared very quickly and left the beach to head to a sports massage appointment I had.  As I arrived I noticed that my feet and hands were tingling slightly and before I started my treatment commented on the chain of events which had led to this – the member of staff immediately suggested that I get the symptoms checked out and within minutes had the islands security there to escort me to the doctor’s room, only a few hundred metres away.”

Oh, Australia can kill you — and the Irukandji in particular will do it pretty quickly. In 2002, two people were killed by the marble-sized jellyfish with tiny tentacles that stretch for more than three feet. In fact, much of the Outback is dangerous with man eating crocs, rifle shooting kangaroos and whatnot — oh, wait, that was just a Paul Hogan movie.

Come across one of these bad boys — the jellyfish or a Paul Hogan movie — and you could end up painfully sick for more than a week, or have your blood pressure rise so quickly, your heart pops like a balloon. Luckily for Southall, he was quickly treated and now just has another good story to tell when he returns to Britain.

Always cheerful, and who wouldn’t be with that job, Southhall joked,

“I’d had a minor brush with what can be a very serious jellyfish and has led to people being hospitalised for a number of days, my slight knock was enough to tell me that it’s not something to be messed around with and I really should have been wearing a full stinger suit, as it recommended at all beaches here at this time of year…even if you’re in the water for just a couple of seconds as I was!

“This is what I should have looked like:”

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This is my third trip to Sydney and Melbourne this year and the more time I spend here, the more differences I see in the language; Aussies talk baby talk. The idea here is that they add an ‘ie’ to the end of many things and adopted the language as common. Most people I have talked to don’t even know they are doing it, it’s just normal.
Examples:
Sunglasses = Sunnies
Converse = Connies
Board Shorts = Boardies
Christmas = Chrissy
Relatives = Relies
Barbecue = Barbie
The list goes on. This ‘ie’ phenomenon does not apply to every word, but it seems to be ok for most words.

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