Tourist attractions in Australia include The Great Barrier Reef, Blue Mountains, Sydney’s Opera House, Bondi Beach in Sydney, and the Queen Victoria Market in Melbourne.
The Great Barrier Reef (www.gbrmpa.gov.au) is the world’s most famous reef formation, consisting of over 2,900 individual coral reefs and of around 900 islands, all located within an area with the length of 2,600 kilometers.
It tells something of the place’s size that the Great Barrier Reef is visible from space. CNN even named the coral reef as one of the 7 natural wonders of the world.
Thanks to its extensive biodiversity and warm, clear waters, there is an entire tourism industry that has developed around The Great Barrier Reef.
To get to the place, you can use the daily boat trips that depart from many coastal cities from within the state of Queensland, and many of these tours also offer a chance to participate in dives within the reef.
Popular ways to get to know the coral reef formation include, in addition to scuba diving, glass-bottomed observatory boats, as well as helicopter flights over The Great Valley Reef.
Of the tourist attractions in Australia, Blue Mountains (www.visitbluemountains.com.au) is a mountain region, located around 50 km from metropolitan Sydney.
Major attraction of the mountain is its dramatic nature, whose highlights include the steep, at best 760 meter mountain drops, and as high as 1,190 meter tall mountain tops.
The best parts in Blue Mountains include Katoomba Sightseeing Railroad, which is the world’s steepest railway, descending at the most at an angle of 52 degrees. Historically, the railroad was used by the Katoomba mine, during the early 20th century.
From the Blue Mountains, you can also find the glass-bottomed “Scenic Skyway”, which you can use to get down to the Jamison valley, as well “Scenic Flyway”, the steepest of its kind in Australia.
The region has many opportunities for mountain hiking in the breathtaking natural surroundings, using the safe, marked routes.
Sydney’s Opera House (www.sydneyoperahouse.com), designed by Danish architect Jørn Utzon, is one of the most famous landmarks representing both Sydney as well as the entire country of Australia.
In terms of style, the building is representative of an expressionistic modern design, with the most notable feature being a series of massive, shell-like constructs one on top of the other., forming the building’s roof.
The building also consist of a concert hall, opera theater, as well as a drama theater and studio, functioning as a home for Opera Australia, Sydney Theatre Company, and Sydney Symphony Orchestra.
A tour to the opera house is easy to combine with eating at the place, as the building houses an excellent restaurant called “Bennelong”.
Included in the highlights for tourist attractions in Australia is also Bondi Beach (Sydney), one of the world’s most famous beaches, representing well the nation’s profile as a country of sunshine and beach life.
Bondi Beach is located about 7 km from the city center of Sydney, and is around one kilometer long.
If you’re planning on swimming at the beach, keep only to the areas that have been particularly marked for swimming. This is because parts of the beach, not suitable for swimming, have a reputation as “Backpackers’ Express”, due to the undercurrents that flow out to the sea.
The area has, in addition to the beach, also several seaside restaurants, cafes, and hotels.
Queen Victoria Market (www.qvm.com.au) in Melbourne, is the biggest outdoor market in the Southern Hemisphere, at over 7 hectares of selling space.
The marketplace has been open since around 1850, and today, it offers visitors a chance to purchase, among other things, fruits and vegetables, meat and fish products, as well as deli and gourmet foods.
However, for tourists, the more interesting products include the non-food parts of the marketplace, where you can find Australian made clothing, shoes, jewelry, and handmade art and original crafts.