Courtesy SMH Online - Harriet Alexander
July 12, 2005

Sydney has been named the world's best city by wealthy American globetrotters.

Photo: Jim Rice

Sydney has been named the world's best city by wealthy American globetrotters. Again.

It is the eighth time Sydney has won the US Travel + Leisure magazine award since it started 10 years ago, consistently beating the postcard cities of Paris, New York and Barcelona.

The magazine's 900,000 subscribers were asked to evaluate each city by its sights, culture and arts, restaurants and food, people, shopping and value.

This year Sydneysiders can permit themselves a modest smile to learn that the city rated particularly highly in the "people" category.

The NSW Tourism Minister, Sandra Nori, was more effusive in a statement released last night, ahead of the announcement in New York.

"Sydneysiders themselves deserve most of the praise. It's the friendliness, sophistication and vibrancy of the people that has contributed so much to Sydney's image," she said.

The announcement was made on NBC's Today Show at 1am today, Sydney time.

Tourism brings $23 billion to the NSW economy every year and the tourism industry employs one in eight members of the state's workforce.

The state has spent $4 million promoting the city through its "There's no place in the world like Sydney" campaign, with advertisements broadcast on television in Australia, New Zealand and Britain, as well as displayed on the internet.

The advertisement shows misty-eyed surfers and tourists staring at panoramas of the harbour, beaches and city.

Tourism NSW's executive director, John O'Neill, said the State Government and its partners spent $2.2 million a year promoting Sydney around the world. "Given the relatively modest resources for international activity, what we tend to do is market through a combination of PR, and also we work with partners to take our Sydney brand to consumers," Mr O'Neill said. "For instance, every year there's a 'G'day LA' Australia week in Los Angeles and this year we sponsored a couple of film premieres."

Travel + Leisure is pitched at wealthy people who enjoy travelling and leisure activities.

Sydney has won the gong every year except 2000, when it lost to San Francisco, and 2001, when Florence took the prize.

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The highest of the peaks that encircle Wilpena Pound, St. Marys offers sensational views across the central Flinders Ranges to the glitter of the salt flats of Lake Frome. One of the finest one-day walks in the country, the trail to the 1190 metre peak is well marked, but a tough scramble in some parts. Most visitors take the outside trail on the way up, then return via the longer but less demanding inside trail, which dips down into the interior of the pound and through the narrow gap alongside Wilpena Creek.

Rising out of the Simpson Desert like some gaudy leftover from Priscilla, Queen of the Desert is the Pink Roadhouse on the Oodnadatta Track. Out the front is a pink phone box and pink canoes for hire, for boating on the creeks that drain into Lake Eyre. There is usually a pink truck parked at the pink petrol pumps. Inside, owner Lynnie Plate can usually be found cooking up her famous hamburgers. Ask to borrow the keys to the railway station, which was once the northern end of the Ghan and lifeblood of the town.

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Australia.com is set to send the potential visitor's pulse racing! The website's adventure area has recently been updated and now includes editorial, destination and product information on activities such as quad biking, sand boarding, canoeing and snorkelling.

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The most expensive attempt to entice North American tourists down under since the Paul Hogan 'throw a shrimp on the barbie' era has been launched in the US.

The $10 million campaign features Australian landmarks and native animals and promotes Australians as friendly and hospitable.

Federal Tourism Minister Joe Hockey told a gathering of tourism officials and operators in Los Angeles that Australia had to move from being a destination to becoming an experience.

The US market is one of Australia's most important, with 430,000 Americans visiting over the past year.

Courtesy Sun-Herald 20 July 2003

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Sydney Tower Observatory has won approval to create the Skywalk on Sydney Tower. Skywalk will offer a unique opportunity for visitors to walk on top of Sydney Tower at a height of 270 metres over street level - the highest point in Sydney. The fully-supervised 75 minute walking tours will feature two specially built perspex viewing platforms offering views of the Blue Mountains to the West, Central Coast to the North and Wollongong to the South. Skywalk is expected to be operating by the summer of 2003/2004.

UK Conde Nast Traveller Readers' Travel Awards for 2003 were announced in London this week. Australia was voted the second favourite holiday destination, just behind Italy. Hayman was also named Best Overseas Leisure Hotel Australasia and South Pacific with a range of other Australian properties also in the top 20. Click here for more information.

Americans have voted Australia their dream holiday destination (if cost was not an issue), for the seventh consecutive year according to the annual Harris Interactive Survey. The complete list of favourite destinations were Australia followed by Italy, Great Britain, France, Ireland, Germany, New Zealand, Japan, Spain, Greece, Switzerland, Canada and Mexico (equal rank) and Brazil.

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City scores rich praise as travel destination


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