I don’t know what to make of North American backpackers. Not to put them all in a box, but there is a trend I’ve noticed in relation to their geographic nous, which you’d expect someone to have plenty of if they’re going to be backpacking.

 

Anyway, a lot of these folks seem to be labouring under the apprehension that the way Australia is represented on a map is somehow distorted to make it appear bigger. Why do they think this? I have no idea. It’s not like there aren’t other places on the map that are just as big, if not bigger – look at Russia. Maybe it’s because Australia is an island, so they can’t believe it would be of any great size. I don’t know.

 

As someone who runs a car hire shop next door to a backpacker hostel, I’ve seen this misapprehension get people into a variety of sticky situations. A common one is people thinking it’s possible to drive from Sydney to Perth in a couple of days. Sounds unbelievable, right? Well, you’d be surprised at how many of these fools hire a car from me and proceed on this very journey, only to call me from Birdsville three days later, dehydrated and thoroughly confused about how far away everything is.

 

I even had a kid call me last week who’d miscalculated so severely, he was trying to drive all the way across the Simpson desert to get a car service around Midland, which is a suburb of Perth. My shop is Bondi. Go figure.

 

Given the way he’d been driving the car (a small sedan meant for zipping around the city, not offroading), it was now completely thrashed. Among other things, it needed an alternator repair, which this guy expected his rental insurance would cover. I had to explain to him that unsealed roads were off limits, as per his contract, and that I’d be retaining the $5000 bond I’d frozen in his account.

 

Needless to say, he wasn’t too happy about that, but I think he was mostly annoyed with himself – as he should be.