Oz – A Hitchhiker's Australian Anthology

Book excerpt: At the age of 22, Jonathan Nicholas spent a year travelling in Australia. He lived for the first few weeks in a sleeping bag underneath a stranger’s stairs. He ran out of money very quickly and took a job selling paintings in the evenings and spent his days surfing at Bondi Beach. He then moved on to a cockroach-infested tenement in North Bondi, sharing with some rather outgoing girls before escaping north to Queensland. This was just the beginning... In Brisbane, he lived near The Gabba Cricket Ground with a gay New Zealander whose brother was a drug dealer on the nearby Gold Coast. He spent the next few months quite detached from reality as his visa expired and he missed his flight home. He packed his rucksack and hitchhiked north a thousand miles to tropical Townsville and then west into central Queensland. Jonathan often stood for hours in the searing heat waiting to catch the next lift across the many miles of hot, dusty outback. From Darwin to Katherine, onto Alice Springs and through the red centre of Australia, Jonathan successfully hitchhiked across the sun-baked wilderness. He lived on baked beans straight from a can and spent most days alone. Jonathan has now converted his detailed diary from his extraordinary time Down Under into a deeply honest, often sad, yet sometimes hilarious account. The book includes original maps, photographs, sketches and poetry penned by the author which helps to convey how truly life-changing his year in Australia was. Oz - A Hitchhiker’s Australian Anthology is a detailed account of Jonathan Nicholas’s experiences as he explored the wonders of Australia. This brilliantly written book will appeal to readers who have an interest in travelling and those fascinated by Australia’s culture and landscape. Jonathan Nicholas has been inspired by the writing of Sir Dirk Bogarde.