Australia is a land of contradictions - nationalistic, competitive, superficially welcoming and casually racist - a 'Garden of Eden' forever teetering on the edge of the next natural disaster. A country built on wave upon wave of economic migrants governed by politicians that have repeatedly adopted immigration policies designed to be racially selective. The author and his wife undertook a 40,000 km journey visiting the remote Outback, small country towns and the cities of 'The Lucky Country' and discovered an alien land, simultaneously frightening and familiar - a county living in a parallel universe half a world away from the glossy brochures and television commercials produced by Tourism Australia. Despite these contradictions, they also discovered a country of breathtaking beauty with charming people in possession of an infectious informality. This is the real Australia viewed through a pair of squinted eyes able to highlight both the absurd and the wonderful.