Top draws at London's (free) British Museum
Free to enter, the museum maintained prime position with 6.4 million visitors in 2024, an 11 per cent year-on-year increase from 2023 and even higher than its pre-pandemic 2019 figure.
Expect a fair chunk of the crowds to be clustered around the museum's ancient Egyptian treasures, the centrepiece of which is the Rosetta Stone, whose discovery in 1799 allowed researchers to crack some of the hieroglyphic mysteries of one of earth's most enthralling civilisations.
Yet there are numerous other galleries to discover at this London landmark. Stocked with incredible finds, these rooms nevertheless tend to attract slightly fewer people.
Visitors' jaws tend to drop when greeted by the two colossal winged human-headed lions that soar in the Assyrian galleries (rooms 6-10). Made of gypsum in the late 9th century BC, and weighing about 16 tonnes each, these mythological guardians flanked an entrance to the royal palace of King Ashurnasirpal II at Nimrud, a thriving city in ancient Assyria (modern-day northern Iraq). Other relics here include a huge beast that stood by the Temple of Ishtar, a goddess of war, and fragments and replicas of massive bronze gates from Balawat, another Assyrian archaeological site.
Unless you're a giant, you'll also be dwarfed by the robed marble statues in room 21. Towering almost 2.7m in height, they're two of the gobsmacking exhibits in the museum's Mausoleum of Halikarnassos. Regarded as one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, this elaborate 40m-high tomb for King Maussollos of Karia, south-west Turkey, dates from about 350BC. Later destroyed by earthquakes, its ruins still scatter the vibrant coastal resort of Bodrum, while some of the mausoleum's most intact remains are displayed here at the museum. Rivalling the free-standing statues (of Maussollos and queen Artemisia) for wow factor is a chunk of the vast four-horse marble chariot that once crowned the stepped pyramid on the tomb's roof. You'll also see sculpted reliefs that chart episodes from the king's royal court and his hopes for the afterlife.
Head to room 33 - the Sir Joseph Hotung Gallery - for some of the museum's finest exhibits from Asia. Stretching 115m, and reopened by the late Queen Elizabeth II after a revamp in 2017, it's the longest gallery in the entire museum. While one half flaunts priceless jade, lacquer and ceramic artefacts stretching across 7000 years of Chinese history, including from its imperial dynasties, the other half channels exotic (and erotic) items from South Asia. Tantric sculptures are displayed alongside items from Indus and Mughal civilisations and statues of gods and goddesses, including Shiva and Tara. Sandstone Buddhas, commemorative postage stamps from Bangladesh, Pakistan and India, and paintings by Calcutta-born polymath Rabindranath Tagore - who won a Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913 - also bless this bewitching gallery.
Roaming most of the galleries here, you might think the British Museum is a misnomer for this place. Perhaps the World Museum would be more appropriate (more than two million years of global human history and culture are explored here). But there is a more domestic flavour at least between rooms 41 and 50, where you'll find Bronze Age, ancient Roman and Viking hoards unearthed on the British Isles as well as relics from the Norman and Tudor eras. Beyond the gaze-worthy coins, pottery and jewellery are standout objects like the helmet from the Anglo-Saxon ship burial discovered at Sutton Hoo in Suffolk, one of most important moments in British archaeology when it was dug up on the eve of World War II. Another object that stirs the imagination is the bronze head bust of Hadrian, Roman emperor from AD117-138. Believed to have once topped a statue that stood in a public space in Roman-ruled Londinium, it was plucked from the River Thames near London Bridge.
The British Museum is the kind of place you could (and probably should) visit every time you're in London, because as well as its mind blowing permanent collection, it also stages a mix of free and paid-for temporary exhibitions with themes that may pique your interest. From the Silk Road to the Incas, Islamic empires to the pharaohs, every region and epoch comes under the museum's spotlight at some point. Current exhibitions showcase the 19th century art of Utagawa Hiroshige, an icon of Edo-era Japan, and the heritage of traditional Afghan rugs (and how they're woven with highs and lows of the nation's knotted history). A new exhibition, Ancient India: Living Traditions, begins on May 22 and will run until October 19. Check the museum's website closer to your visit to see what else is on. You may need to book tickets and a time slot for the most popular exhibitions.
+ Apart from December 24-26, The British Museum is open daily 10am to 5pm (and until 8.30pm on Fridays). For more information, see
britishmuseum.org
+ To help plan a trip to Britain, see
visitbritain.com
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Sydney Morning Herald
4 days ago
- Sydney Morning Herald
Nowhere on Earth feels more connected to the ancient world than here
On the desert outskirts of Cairo, new and old stare each other down. From atop their lofty plateau, Giza's pyramids peer over what's being billed as the world's largest archaeological museum. Twice the size of the Louvre and New York's Metropolitan Museum, the Grand Egyptian Museum will harbour 100,000 artefacts when the doors to its full 12 galleries officially open to international and domestic visitors by year's end. But you needn't even set foot in a museum in Egypt to sense history on the grandest of scales. Nowhere on Earth have I felt the ancient world as real and all-encompassing as on a journey through this country, with this my first visit. In its millennia-old temples, tombs and pyramids, ambition and accomplishment remain on vivid display, but even as I travelled between its ancient wonders on a 16-day visit with Bunnik Tours, new wonders materialised, with Egypt's vast modern ambitions and aspirations on full show. In one of the world's greatest ancient civilisations, what's old is new. The greatness of Giza Car horns chatter, the call to prayer sounds across the city and there are the constant cries and shouts of roadside exchanges. It's the everyday cacophony of a single city – the largest in Africa – with a population almost that of Australia. From the windows of our tour coach, the rooftops of Cairo's apartment blocks sprout satellite dishes like fields of metal mushrooms. Minarets rise like the hands of drowning swimmers. It's a sensation as much as a city, and yet it all ends so suddenly and reverently beneath the Giza Plateau. Where modern Cairo finishes, antiquity begins. Atop this limestone mantelpiece, a trio of pyramids – burial tombs for Egypt's pharaohs – has come to embody the ingenuity of the ancient world. Tallest among them is the Great Pyramid, rising almost 140 metres above our heads. For about 4000 years, this was the world's tallest building, puzzled together from 2.3 million limestone blocks during the lifetime of the pharaoh Khufu, who would be buried within. Despite my Egypt first-timer status, it all feels so familiar that there's almost a sense of deja vu. Camels lollop across the sands, tourists riding high on their backs, and souvenir vendors chirp their soon familiar, cryptic greetings: 'Welcome to Alaska' (yes, Alaska…), 'Walk like an Egyptian', or the seemingly promising entreaty, 'Only $1', though, of course, what they're selling is never only $1. But even as I ponder the scale of everything around me – the pyramids, the desert, the expanse of history – I realise that a member of the party is missing: the Great Sphinx. To find this celebrated stone creature with the head of a human and the body of a lion, we must head down, for it's set shyly into a hollow, seemingly guarding now against encroachment from the city that's grown to almost reach to its paws. Once, the Sphinx would have loomed large from the desert but today it feels so much less prominent than I've imagined all my life. Over its 4500-year battle-scarred life, it has lost its nose and, at times, it has been buried up to its neck in sand. It's a survivor, and in this narrow space between the city edge and the pyramids, it's a kind of bridge between antiquity and modernity, like Egypt itself. A town called Alex Egypt is 95 per cent desert, but you wouldn't know it on the so-called Desert Road from Cairo to Alexandria. Once a grey line through a dun-coloured landscape, the road is today a strip turned green. A fertile facade of wheat, peanuts, grapes, oranges and tomatoes flicker past the coach window as we drive through an irrigated corridor from Cairo to the coast. Running beside the road for a time also are the supports for one of Egypt's newest infrastructure projects: the world's longest driverless monorail, a 53-kilometre line that will connect Cairo to the prosaically named New Administrative Capital. Inaugurated as Egypt's capital city in 2024, NAC is one of 24 new cities built in Egypt over the past 15 years to ease congestion in metropolises such as Cairo. Travel the country and you see them rising like sci-fi settlements in places such as El Alamein and New Qena, just outside of Luxor. Behind its outer skin of industry, Alexandria is a city where you can almost feel the formation of language. The Pharos of Alexandria lighthouse, one of the Seven Ancient Wonders of the World, gave the Greeks the word 'pharos' for lighthouse, while the Mouseion of Alexandria, built in the 3rd century BC, was the origin for the word 'museum'. Suitably in this city of words, it's a library that commands centre stage. On the shores of the Mediterranean, the Bibliotheca Alexandrina is one of Africa's most striking buildings and proof that not all of Egypt's grandest constructions are ancient. Opened in 2002, the library is a giant, angled disc, resembling a sun rising from the Mediterranean and covered in eye-shaped windows (complete with eyelids) that flood the world's largest reading room with natural light. It's as far in appearance from Egypt's temples and tombs as it's possible to get, but despite the modern design, the Bibliotheca is, in effect, a cultural replica of one of the world's most impressive ancient libraries. The Great Library of Alexandria was one of the largest cultural centres of its time, holding up to 400,000 scrolls, and it is said to have gone into decline only after being accidentally burned by Julius Caesar in 48 BC. Today, the Bibliotheca holds 2.1 million items, including half a million books and a replica of the only surviving scroll from the Great Library, held in one of its four museums. Step outside the library, and it appears like the Mediterranean's northern shores, with Alexandria more architecturally reminiscent of Italy or Greece than Cairo or Luxor. 'I've been to Turin [in Italy] twice, and I felt like I fitted right in,' says Hassan Abdelrazik, our Bunnik tour guide, archaeologist and Egyptologist It feels fitting for a city with European origins, having been founded by Alexander the Great in 331 BC. Hunt further within the city and a 26.5-metre Roman column known as Pompey's Pillar spears up from between apartment blocks. Burrow beneath the city and the 30-metre-deep Roman-era Catacombs of Kom El Shoqafa, rediscovered in 1900 when a donkey fell through the earth, reveal themselves. They're sights worthy of Rome or Athens, but in Egypt they're like tales from modern history. Of temples, tombs and Tutankhamun After a night back in Cairo, it's an hour by plane to Luxor, flying over a blank sheet of desert marked only by the long green squiggle of the Nile River. Egypt's capital for 1500 years, Luxor was the city of Tutankhamun, Ramses II and Nefertiti, and yet this city of 420,000 people feels more like a town grown large. Horse-drawn carriages wheel visitors around its riverside streets, and at dawn the sky fills with hot air balloons – I count 50 hovering overhead one morning. The Nile River is Luxor's defining line. On its east bank, the ancient Egyptians built their colossal temples, and on its west bank they buried their regal dead in tombs that line the suitably barren landscape of the Valley of the Kings like houses on a dusty street. Luxor is claimed as one of the world's oldest continuously inhabited cities, though it's still a 900-year step forward in time from the Giza pyramids when you enter the Valley of the Kings. And lessons had been learned. Pyramids had proved easy targets for tomb raiders, so Luxor's rulers elected to be buried underground in this valley opposite the city. To date, the tombs of 64 royals and nobles have been discovered in the Valley of the Kings, but there are likely to be more hidden within. A new tomb was discovered as recently as 2006 (and other nearby tombs have been unearthed even this year) and tombs for Ramses VIII, Nefertiti and Tutankhamun's wife, Ankhesenamun, have never been found. Entry tickets grant access to any three tombs in the valley, and while the tomb of Tutankhamun, containing the 19-year-old's sarcophagus and, rather ingloriously, his withered mummified body, is the resoundingly popular choice, it's the painted tombs of Ramses III and Ramses IV that are most memorable. As I step inside these tombs, the colourless desert is replaced by brightly painted walls and ceilings – scenes of kings interacting with gods, wartime heroics and ceilings bedazzled with stars. They are 3000-year-old creations, and yet at times it looks almost as if somebody ducked out to the hardware store for paint just a few months ago. I feel as if I'm standing in a Sistine Chapel from antiquity. Back across the river, it's temples rather than tombs that dominate Luxor's cityscape in a scene often described as the world's greatest open-air museum. At one end of the city, Karnak Temple was the world's largest religious complex, sprawling across 5000 square metres. It might also have been the longest construction project: its multitude of structures were built across 2000 years. It's akin to a construction job starting around the time of Christ and finishing up only now. Inside, Karnak is a forest of columns and obelisks, including the tallest obelisk found in Egypt and the incredible Great Hypostyle Hall, with its 134 columns standing as tall as 21 metres. It's a complex so large it somehow makes the city's other great temple, Luxor Temple, look like a chapel in comparison, and yet the latter is also one of the ancient world's grandest buildings. At the end of a 2.5-kilometre-long avenue lined with 1050 sphinxes that connected the two temples, the entrance to Luxor Temple is framed by towering 14-metre statues of a seated Ramses II and a lone obelisk. A matching obelisk, gifted to France in the 19th century, now stands in Paris's Place de la Concorde. Like Karnak, it's the column-lined Great Colonnade Hall that seems to define Luxor Temple, though look at any wall in the complex and there are carvings, hieroglyphics and reliefs telling historic tales, including additions from Alexander the Great's followers and the Romans. 'They're like the National Geographic of the day,' Hassan says, bouncing with enthusiasm as he details the stone stories of gods and kings. 'Each one is a chapter.' It's late afternoon as we wander through the temple, watching the columns and architraves turn to gold in the day's last light. We're staying this night on a Nile river cruiser docked immediately across the road, and at dawn I return to the temple, somehow compelled to view it one more time, as if to affirm that something this magnificent is real. From feluccas to fancy liners The romance of long felucca journeys on the Nile might have been almost consigned to history, but the world's longest river is still the highway of choice between Luxor and Aswan. Today, three-level ships with comfortable cabins, buffet restaurants, rooftop bars and swimming pools make the voyage, travelling almost in convoy up and down the river. Loading As we set sail, the sky is hazy under the 40-degree heat, with Luxor soon fading into the smudge like a Turner watercolour. Buffaloes and donkeys graze the riverbanks, and villagers wrangle fishing nets from dugout-style boats, as Egypt morphs from a swirl of tourism to rural simplicity. Only 240 kilometres separates Luxor from Aswan, a distance that could easily be covered in a couple of days, but sailings stretch over four days, with boats rising and falling through locks and pausing to visit Egypt's second-largest temple in Edfu and a temple to the crocodile god Sobek in Kom Ombo, where about 300 mummified crocodiles have been found. Most fascinating is the moment, on the approach to Kom Ombo, when the boat squeezes through Gebel Silsila, a 350-metre-wide gorge that forms the Nile's narrowest point in Egypt. Desert dunes roll back from the edges of its low cliffs, stretching for thousands of kilometres across north Africa, and it feels like an origin story: the gorge's sandstone was quarried to build the temples in Luxor, Edfu and beyond. Thousands of years on, that work is still visible. The cliffs are shaped into blocks, resembling something built from Lego bricks. Life on the Nile 'Luxor is about monuments; Aswan is about the Nile,' Hassan says as we sail into Egypt's most southerly city. At dusk, motorless feluccas drift about the river in such numbers as to resemble the start of a Sydney-Hobart yacht race, and the hotel in which Agatha Christie penned Death on the Nile famously sits atop riverside cliffs. For all that, Aswan is still a city dominated by a distant temple and its remarkable survival story. When the Aswan High Dam was built in the 1960s to create Lake Nasser, the world's sixth-largest artificial lake, more than 100,000 people were displaced and resettled, but even more challenging was the threat the dam posed to one of Egypt's greatest temples. With its iconic 20-metre-high rock reliefs of the seated Ramses II, Abu Simbel was the original Mount Rushmore. Unlike Egypt's other temples, built from stone, Abu Simbel's two temples were carved into the slopes of a mountain. When the dam was built, the temples were doomed to flood, until the world banded together to raise them to higher ground. As Lake Nasser filled, thousands of engineers and workers cut the main temple into 807 blocks, each weighing about six or seven tonnes, piecing them back together 65 vertical metres higher up the slopes and reconstructing their interiors with their walls and ceilings filled with painted tales of Ramses II's war exploits. Dozens of buses now leave Aswan before dawn each day for the three-hour drive to Abu Simbel, and to reach this ancient wonder, you pass more new wonders. Close to Aswan, one of the world's largest solar-power plants, visible from space, opened in 2019, while the road to Abu Simbel cuts through a band of desert greenery – a vast and ever-growing area of circular, pivot-irrigated crops planted to secure Egypt's food security in response to the war in Ukraine. See it from the air and the desert looks pixellated. Back where we began In the imagination, Egypt's pyramids often start and end in Giza, but there are more than 115 pyramids across the country, including 14 alone near Sakkara and Dahshur, 20 kilometres beyond Giza. On arriving back in Cairo, our final day in Egypt is a glimpse beyond the Great Pyramid to this cluster of pyramids, which have their own distinct stories and characteristics. The six-tier Djoser Step Pyramid is the world's oldest pyramid, built a century before the Great Pyramid, while the strangely lopsided Bent Pyramid seems to fold in on itself as it rises. Loading As structures, they're overshadowed by Giza's pyramids, but that somehow only enhances their effect. 'This is my favourite pyramid,' Hassan says of the Bent Pyramid, a view that resonates across the travel group as we wander among these stepped, bent and coloured pyramids. For me, the culminating moment comes at the Red Pyramid, two kilometres across the sands from the Bent Pyramid. In their attempt to foil tomb raiders, the pyramid's makers built its entrance 28 metres above the ground. Climbing to the entrance is like ascending an unnatural mountain, with the desert falling away beneath me and other more distant pyramids rising into view. The pyramid is entered through a low, sloping corridor, its ceiling polished smooth by hats and heads to reveal the red colour in the rock. In the corridor, I make a crouching descent, almost crawling to emerge into a trio of chambers 30 metres below the Earth's surface. With their high, church-like ceilings, each chamber is like a pyramid within a pyramid. Tiers stripe the ceilings in almost mesmerising patterns that could easily be architectural features from a modern design home, and yet they were crafted 4500 years ago. If this is history, I'm a convert. Know before you go: Five dos and don'ts for Egypt Cover up There is no lack of midriffs and other body bits on display among visitors to Egypt's monuments, but this is a conservative country, so all genders, please cover up accordingly as a simple gesture of respect. The hustle Whether at monuments or in markets, you will be pestered to buy trinkets. Be polite in your refusal and try to enjoy the interaction. … but then again One of my most memorable encounters was with a felucca skipper in Luxor who followed me along the riverbank trying to entice me into a sailing, but who soon settled into a chat about our homes and families. Hands off I lost count of the number of people touching and leaning against the walls or columns of Egypt's temples and tombs. Sure, they're stone and solid, but human touch is still corrosive, and it'd be nice to think these monuments will survive tourism to still be around in another 3000 years. Mind your manners When eating in Egypt, it's considered a compliment (to the sheer abundance of food in this country) for the guest to leave a small portion on his or her plate, while it's also a compliment to accept a second serve. The details Loading Tour a-based Egypt specialist Bunnik Tours runs a 16-day Egyptian Discovery escorted journey with a maximum group size of 20. The itinerary includes visits to Cairo, Alexandria, El Alamein, Luxor and Aswan, staying in four to five-star hotels, with four nights aboard a luxury Nile river ship. Tours start at $12,295 a person twin share, with airfares included as well as gratuities. See Enter Tourist visas for a visit of 30 days can be obtained online, but it's also a simple task to organise on arrival at Cairo airport. See Fly Emirates operates direct daily flights from Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide to Dubai, with connections to Cairo, a four-hour flight from Dubai. See
ABC News
7 days ago
- ABC News
Foreign Correspondent: S2025 Japan's Last Survivors
Foreign Correspondent NEW EPISODE Documentary Informative Revealing Watch Article share options Share this on Facebook Twitter Send this by Email Copy link WhatsApp Messenger We are your passport to the world. Our stories, told through the ABC's network of foreign correspondents, will take you to incredible places where you'll meet the people and see the forces shaping our world.
Herald Sun
7 days ago
- Herald Sun
Most underrated Australian islands
1/7 Reasons to consider a winter (or summer) break on Norfolk Island, 1450km off the coast of NSW. It's got the climate of Byron Bay, as well as the surf, the swimming and the easygoing, self-sufficient vibe Byron used to have. But none of the crowds or traffic jams. It has one of the world's most southerly coral reefs, and is surrounded by a marine national park known for its diverse life. Pretty much all produce is grown organically on the island, it's great quality, and you'll absolutely taste the difference. It's wild and beautiful, with dramatic sea cliffs, placid bays, brilliant hikes in the national park and breathtaking drives that all magically end up back in the main township of Burnt Pine. Its convict history and ruins are captivating and so significant they are on the World Heritage register. It's a renowned Dark Sky zone. Being so far from any light pollution, the night skies here blaze brighter and more abundantly than you can imagine. The locals, who number around 2200, are super friendly, creative, resilient and resourceful. And they might possibly have the best work-life balance of any people anywhere. 2/7 From the northern city of Townsville it's a quick ferry ride across the Coral Sea to one of the most laid-back and beautiful of all Queensland's islands. Magnetic Island – Maggie to its fans – is a 52sq km slice of unspoilt loveliness, 80 per cent of it protected by national or conservation park and all of it surrounded by the World-Heritage wonders of the Great Barrier Reef. It's a place of simple pleasures: hiking mountain trails where koalas, rock wallabies and colourful birdlife await, and testing out the 23 beaches to find your favourite. Book a 4WD tour along the isolated west coast, chart your own adventure on an electric bike or moped or circumnavigate the island by sea with 360 Magnetic Island. There are only four main settlements, each with distinct vibe and charms. Hotels are scarce but there are plenty of holiday lettings listed at and new glamping tents handy to the restaurants and services of Nelly Bay. Go in winter for warm, sunny days, stinger-free swimming and whales galore just offshore. 3/7 Despite being one of Australia's newest – and most spectacular – national parks, the Houtman Abrolhos remain firmly off the radar of most travellers. This archipelago of 210 islands lies 60-80km west of Geraldton in Western Australia, which itself is more than a four-hour drive north of Perth. The islands' remoteness and isolation define their appeal. Like a mini Galápagos or Madagascar, they are home to unique plants and animals found nowhere else, and the surrounding ocean abounds with marine life, including rare Australian sea lions, dolphins and whales (in September to December). Expect plenty of ocean-based activities and a dramatic chapter of Australian history; the Dutch ship Batavia wrecked on the reefs here in 1629 sparking one of history's most murderous mutinies. Visit on a multi-day expedition cruise with Eco Abrolhos or Blue Juice Charters, spending your days swimming, snorkelling over shipwrecks – and the southernmost coral reef in the Indian Ocean – and collecting crays for lunch. Pushed for time? Get a gull's-eye view of the islands with Shine Aviation or Kalbarri Scenic Flights. 4/7 In the Spencer Gulf just off Port Lincoln, Louth Island was, until recently, a privately owned sheep run firmly off the tourist radar. Then tech mogul Che Metcalfe bought the 135ha Eyre Peninsula island in 2021 and began realising his vision for Rumi – a resort hotel where fine dining meets offshore adventures. Getting there is half the fun. Guests board an amphibious Sealegs craft that handles sand and sea with ease and deposits them on the island shore at Homestead Bay. Current accommodation consists of five upstairs rooms in the main building and nine compact bedrooms in the smartly renovated shearing shed, but there are plans to build 26 luxury villas and a day-spa, with construction slated to start this year. In the meantime, Louth is open to day-trippers for dining at its Samphire restaurant, where talented chef Jono Sweet puts local produce to exceptionally good use, and guided buggy tours. Catamaran cruises, beach barbecues and kayak fishing are also on the Rumi menu. 5/7 On Thursday Island, as a local once told me, 'you find a sort of peace that once upon a time used to exist in most parts of the world'. The Torres Strait's 200 or so islands, a mix of mangrove-fringed peaks and coral cays, are strewn between the tip of Cape York and Papua New Guinea. Far removed – physically, culturally and spiritually – from mainland Australia, they offer guaranteed serenity thanks to their mellow pace of life and seductive tropical scenery. Thursday's the main hub and access point to the Torres Strait's rich mix of Indigenous, Pacific and Asian cultures, military and maritime history and its endless supply of crayfish. New-ish operator Strait Experience takes the hassle out of getting there with one-, two- and three-day packages ex-Cairns taking in all the major sights and scenery including the Gab Titui Cultural Centre, traditional dance performances and World War II relics at Horn Island. They also run a two-day escape to Masig Island, a Maldives double in our own backyard. 6/7 Buffeted by the Roaring Forties and marooned in the Southern Ocean midway between mainland Australia and Tasmania, King Island is an exhilarating alternative to Australia's tropical island escapes. It's a short flight from Melbourne or northern Tasmania to this untamed land where cows outnumber residents (by about 100 to one). That explains the isle's excellent reputation for dairy and beef products, alongside super-fresh seafood and craft brews. Balance out the indulgence with vigorous hikes along the coast and interior (see for daylong guided options) and two links courses of challenging, dune-contoured golf greens. Accommodation ranges from farm stays and motels to self-contained cabins and the off-grid Kittawa Lodge. This luxurious property set on almost 40ha of coastal wilderness opened in 2019 offering two one-bedroom dwellings combining the drama of King Island's elemental scenery with interior comforts such as log fires, coffee machines and chef-catered meals. New this year, Kittawa has opened a two-bedroom lodge suited to friends, families and lovers of the great outdoors. More related stories Lifestyle Who says salads have to be boring? 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