Animal magnetism
eucalyptus forest and forming a beautiful real-life blue lagoon, but I didn’t know what was lurking beneath and besides, we had something even more daring planned back in the city.
So we hiked back through the rainforest – with me cursing my stupidity as ants and thorns attacked my feet – and jumped into the awaiting jeep.
There was a sensible, nicely tarmacked road, which hugged the mountain, curving around it gently to the bottom. And then there was the off-the-beaten-track route that plunged down dried mud ravines and clung perilously to the far edges of the mountain. No prizes for guessing which one thrill-seeker Darran took, laughing as the jeep’s back wheels almost spinning in fresh air as the front whipped round blind corners.
My stomach swooped and soared as we descended, my knuckles turning white I was holding on so tight. The last time I’d been so scared was on a desert safari on the outskirts of Dubai where the driver went faster every time I screamed.
But we were all laughing as we came to a stop back in the city, and stepped out of the jeep, pumped up with adrenaline. No wonder the tour’s been rated as the number one activity by TripAdvisor for the past two years.
The Las Vegas of Australia
The Gold Coast – a city of skyscrapers perched on the edge of some of the world’s most beautiful beaches – is Australia’s Las Vegas, glitz and glam, with great weather all year round.
And there’s only one way to get the perfect view of this metropolis – from above, so we jumped into a helicopter for the ultimate scenic tour.
Flying over the towers, including the iconic Q1 Building – which at 322m is one of the tallest residential towers in the world – the golf courses, private villas and hotels, I could see how the city hugged the coast on one side and was surrounded by hinterland on the other.
Fifteen minutes later, we came back down to earth without a bump – and headed for our hotel, Hilton Hotel Surfers Paradise.
A mere stroll from the beach, the hotel has a shopping mall and is in the heart of the action, surrounded by boutiques, bars and restaurants.
My room was actually a two-bed apartment, complete with living room, open-plan kitchen, a terrace and an ocean view. But there was too much to explore to stay inside, so after freshening up, I headed downstairs to dine at Moo Moo restaurant a short drive away at Broadbeach. As the name suggests, it’s a steakhouse, but has won a clutch of awards, including best restaurant and best steakhouse on the Gold Coast and in Queensland.
Luckily we’d reserved a table because it was packed with a cosmopolitan crowd that included groups of friends, couples and families. Eating out in Australia is a national pastime, and when they’re not throwing another shrimp on the barbie, most Australians are enjoying home-grown Wagyu steak or lamb at chic eateries like this.
The Middle East is now getting a prime cut of Australia’s meat, as it’s one of the fastest-growing emerging markets, with 49,147 tonnes of beef shipped to the Mena region in 2012, along with record amounts of lamb.
Known for its high quality – all Australian beef is pasture-fed for the majority of the animal’s life, and they have premium herds, such as Wagyu and Angus – all the hard work comes down to one thing: taste.
With tender meat, high marble scores and the very best cuts, discerning diners and chefs in the
UAE and across the Middle East are clamouring to get as much steak from the world’s third-biggest beef exporter as they can, resulting in rapid growth, only just behind China and Russia.
Lamb is on another level altogether – the Middle East is Australia’s number one market, which – considering the land Down Under is the world’s largest exporter of mutton and the second biggest exporter of lamb – means that a large proportion of its exported sheep are headed to our shores. So it makes sense for all of Australia’s beef and sheep herds to be halal.
“Australia has one of the strictest halal policies in the world and as demand for Australian meat is increasing, Muslim markets are of crucial importance to us,” Ben Larkin, market specialist for Meat and Livestock Australia, told us over dinner. That’s why we decided to see a cattle feedlot so we could understand how Australia has geared its entire operation to the Middle East market ‘from farm to fork.’
I imagined us riding up to Kerwee Feedlot on horseback, galloping so fast that our horses’ flashing hooves would kick up orange dust clouds to hang in the still air.
Hugh Jackman and Nicole Kidman looked impossibly glamorous as they rode through the outback herding cattle in the film Australia. But we travelled by minivan, and instead of jodhpurs and riding boots, I was wearing a sundress and those flip-flops again.
Walking gingerly across the lot, which grain-feeds 11,100 heads of cattle, I blinked, then stopped. In front of me were herds of huge Wagyu and Angus bulls, all looking like they could easily stampede or gore me. I shuffled back as quickly as my flip-flops would allow me, and listened intently as Lachie Hart, who looked more like Crocodile Dundee than the Feedlot CEO, explained how they are fed steam-flaked grains and live in a clean and stress-free
environment. The lot was certainly pristine, and the cattle looked like something out of Pablo Picasso’s famous Bull lithograph.
Australia takes its meat business seriously – making sure the cattle (and sheep for that matter) are looked after from birth to slaughter – even employing Temple Grandin, America’s foremost animal behaviour expert and the world’s most famous autistic woman, to design a stressfree slaughterhouses at the certified-halal production plants.
Seeing all this, I could understand why farmers such as David Blackmore can charge $199.99 (Dh730) a kilo for his full-blood dryaged grain-fed Wagyu Scotch fillet – which gets sold-out in swanky butchers across Australia.
But the proof, as they say, is in the pudding, or in this case the steak, so as we travelled around Australia my friends tucked into rib-eye, braised short rib, Wagyu brisket, sirloin and fillet, and declared them all delicious. I’d enjoyed the meaty masterclass, but I wanted to see some other local animals – ones that wouldn’t end up on my friends’ plates – so we headed to Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary.
Set within 27 hectares of eucalyptus and rainforest, I saw a host of reptiles, birds and a crocodile before finally being given a koala to cuddle. The size of a puppy, it was soft and smelled of eucalyptus leaves. It was so docile and peered at me with such a look of adoration that I couldn’t put it down, insisting on having picture after picture taken with this gorgeous little marsupial.
Then it was time to hand-feed a mob of kangaroos, whose mouths were velvety like a horse’s, and who lay in the dust, nibbling the grain, their lips tickling my palms. Once they were full, they jumped up and hopped off to play, much to the amusement of the families gathered to watch.
Australia is incredibly family friendly, with fabulous beaches, wildlife and attractions. Warner Bros MovieWorld is along the Gold Coast’s Pacific Highway and boasts six shows and 16 rides including the terrifying Green Latern rollercoaster – the steepest inverted drop in the Southern Hemisphere – and Superman Escape, which shoots screaming riders from 0–100kph in just two seconds.
Needless to say, I stayed on the ground, watching as the bravest of my friends yelled or got splashed on WildWest Falls adventure ride.
But I was in the front row for the Hollywood Stunt Driver live show, which had high-speed car chases, motorbike wheelies and cars flying through the air, narrowly missing each other while we cheered.
After all the thrills and spills, I was ready for some culture, and so our next stop was Bondi Beach. Famous for its big waves and surfing, Bondi is also home to Sculpture by the Sea, the world’s largest free-to-the-public annual exhibition.
Set against the rugged and dramatic backdrop of Bondi and the coastal walk from the beach to Tamarama, more than 100 artists from around the world create installations – ranging from the small and colourful Polyrock by Bev Goodwin, to Stephen King’s gigantic wooden sculpture Fallout.
Strolling along the windy path, with whales making an appearance off-shore, we could almost touch the works of art and literally bumped into many of the artists, who were checking out the competition.
I wanted to climb the stairs of David McCracken’s beautiful Diminish And Ascend, or start a fire – an accidental ‘benefit’ of People’s Choice-winner Lucy Humphrey’s Horizon, a glass sphere which caught the sun from the cliff ledge it was perched on, meaning you could hold paper next to it and watch it burn. “You shouldn’t do this,” founding director David Handley warned before jumping back in pain as the paper scorched his fingers.
Coming to the end of the walk, there was nowhere better to see the sculptures from than the beach, and