AUISTRALIA DAY

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 Today is Australia Day. 

We won’t  enter into the debate on whether it should be regarded as Invasion Day or whether the date should be shifted to a day other than the anniversary of the proclamation of British sovereignty over Australia.

What we will do is have a look at some facts and trivia about this great country . . .

Australia is the world's largest inhabited island and the smallest continent.

Australia is the largest continent occupied by one nation and is the least populated.

Australia is the only English-speaking country to have made voting compulsory in federal and state elections. It results in a voter turnout of 95 per cent. Many polling stations have barbecues and sell sausage sandwiches, dubbed “democracy sausages”.

The world's largest electorate (2,255,278 km2) is Kalgoorlie, Western Australia.

The secret ballot box, the most prized symbol of democracy, was pioneered in Victoria in 1856.

Between the towns of Ooldia and Nurina in Western Australia, is the world's longest straight stretch of railway, 478.4 kilometres in length.

From 1897 to 1905, Kings Cross, Sydney, was called Queen's Cross.

The Great Barrier Reef is the longest coral reef in the world, extending over 2,012.5 kilometres.

Tully, in Queensland, is the wettest town in Australia with an average annual rainfall of 355.6 centimetres (11 ft, 10 inches).

Western Australia is three and a half times as big as Texas.

Lake Eyre, 16 metres below sea level, has the lowest elevation. It is also the driest area.

The oldest daily newspaper in the southern hemisphere is the Sydney Morning Herald (1831).

The Australian coastline totals 36,735 kilometres.

Marble Bar, Western Australia, recorded the longest period of extreme heat of above 37.7 C. for 160 days from October 1923 to April 1924.

The average Australian can expect to eat during his or her lifetime: 17 beef cattle, 92 sheep, 406 loaves of bread, 165,000 eggs 8 tons of fruit, half a ton of cheese and ten tons of veggies.

Australia's record 24-hour rainfall of 907 mm (36.28 inches) occurred at Crohamhurst, Queensland, in 1893.

No part of Australia is further than 1000 kilometres from the sea.

Between 1788 and 1856, 157,000 convicts were sent to Australia. This is only one-third of the total sent to the United States.

Fifty percent of the continent has less than 300 millimetres annual rainfall.

Granny Smith apples were originally cultivated by Maria Smith of Eastwood, New South Wales, in the 1860s.

The first radio station in Australia was built near Pennant Hills, Sydney, in 1912.

The first television station in Australia opened in 1956 as TCN Channel 9, Sydney.

Sydney's Opera House was designed by Danish architect Jorn Utzon in 1957. Construction began in 1959 and it was officially opened by Queen Elizabeth II in 1973

Sydney Tower, at Centrepoint, is the highest building in the southern hemisphere, 324.8 metres above sea level.

Ayers Rock is a red granite monolith, 859.53 metres above sea level. It is 8.85 kilometres in circumference, and is 347.3 metres above the plain.

Wolf Creek, Western Australia, has the largest meteorite crater in Australia, measuring 853.44 metres in diameter and 61 metres deep.

In 1854 a large meteorite was found at Cranbourne, Victoria, weighing more than 5 tons.

The last tram ran in Sydney on 26 February 1961. Trams still run in Melbourne.

The highest recorded temperature of 53.1 C was at Cloncurry, Queensland, on 16 January 1889.

The world's largest cattle station, 30,028.3 km2, is almost the same size as Belgium.

The oldest skeleton found in Australia was at Lake Mungo in New South Wales. It is believed to be 38,000 years old and is the skeleton of a female.

Sydney hosted the Olympic Games in the year 2000!