Word: outbacker
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...kangaroo accidentally gets hit by the train, you don't really feel it," conductor Scott Fels informs me as the scrublands and giant termite mounds of the Australian Outback whisk by. "But if the train drivers see a camel on the tracks, believe me, they get away from the windows...
...Camels in the Outback? Yes indeed. There are estimated to be over a million of these ungulates roaming at will through the desert, descendants of the original camel caravans led by Afghan drivers in the 1860s and 1870s. It was these migrant cameleers who helped opened up the continent's arid interior to travelers. The country's most famous train, the Ghan, www.gsr.com.au, is named in their honor. (See pictures of Australia's hidden islands...
...Ghan's tracks were first laid in the 1880s, the entire line wasn't fully completed (on an upgraded track) until 2004, and at a cost of nearly $1 billion. Now, luxury trains up to one kilometer long, sometimes numbering 52 carriages, crawl through the forbidding primordial stretches of Outback twice a week, like giant high-speed caterpillars. It's a seemingly endless landscape of Martian redness, and to be able to enjoy it all from a private Platinum cabin - while taking high tea served to you by a personal butler - is a curious lesson in the persistence and ingenuity...
...blander style of oratory, Rudd, 51, doesn't fit the typical mold of an Australian man of action. A former diplomat and veteran technocrat, he often seems more comfortable roaming the international halls of power than pressing the flesh with laid-off workers or drought-stricken farmers in the Outback. Rudd is the consummate globalized citizen, and makes a point of reaching out to those in other nations who share his sense of international community. "He'll put in a full day in the Parliament and then, because of the time difference, call world leaders way into the night," says...
...Technomic, a food-industry consultancy, 82% of New York City residents said the new highly visible nutrition information has affected their ordering. Of those people, 71% said they sought out lower-calorie options, and 51% said they no longer ordered certain items. (See how many calories are in the Outback Steakhouse Aussie Cheese Fries...