Backpackers

Backpackers – how Australia loves them! About 500,000 visit each year and bring in an outstanding $2.4 billion into the country. Over half of them come from Dorset alone; well that’s what my long-suffering Aussie partner has expostulated on more than one occasion. So the Tighes Hill B & B sign has kept swinging as old friends, new friends, cousins, children of friends, cousins of friends have all found refuge over the past few years. Short stops between Cairns-bound buses, a quick barbeque before the next trip, short stays, stays extended by illness, long stays, protracted stays – we’ve had them all.

I blame Richard Branson. He of the acclaimed Virgin Airlines encouraging all those outrageous adventurers. Not content with an island and a visit to space he has recetly commissioned a very large ocean-going super-yacht, anchored in Newcastle Marina at present, to whisk away luxury-loving stars to destinations unknown with hot and cold running champagne. With rental of approximately $100,000 a week you'd want hot and cold running everything! So all those adventurers wing their way here.

Now don’t get me wrong. I love the adventurous gap year, the fluttering of the wings before roosting. I love the Dorset accents, oh yes they now sound like accents. I love to reminisce. I love to catch up on the news. They even help around the house, cook the occasional meal and buy the occasional grocery item. Most off all they love lounging in the sun spotting or evading the Australian wildlife; the quite needlessly large golden-kneed garden orb spiders being the most feared if not the most venomous. Without a doubt our visitors' abiding memory of Tighes Hill will be the prolific guava crop. I have given them guava jam, guava chutney and now guava mixed with apple juice. This latest story may have reached Bridport and what chance do I then have of attracting the visitors I, not my daughters, wish to come to Australia? I had better be quiet on the subject of snakes.