Australia

For the best places to visit in Australia, we sit down with Australian native and experienced expert Trav Bell as we explore things to do and how to live a purpose-filled life Down Under. Travis is a self-appointed ʻBucket Listologistʼ who has designed his life around his bucket list and now helps bucket listers all over the globe create and cross off their to-do’s. Know more about Australia as our hosts share their favorite things about this exciting destination and learn from Travis’ philosophy behind his focus on Australia’s experiential opportunities.

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Andy McNeill and Todd Bludworth are travel and hospitality entrepreneurs and owners of the global meetings organization, American Meetings, Inc. From sourcing meetings in Australia, to corporate event management around the world, their team selects corporate event venues and meeting planners for a wide array of enterprise business clients, providing ideas for convention themes and strategies for running global meetings and events. Learn more at www.amiwebstaging.wpengine.com.

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Watch the episode here:

Australia

If your bucket list includes play the didgeridoo, the Great Barrier Reef, sing at the Sydney Opera House or visiting Federation Square or the Queen Victoria Market in Melbourne, this is the episode to whet your appetite. Between the Pacific and Indian Oceans is the Land Down Under, the world’s smallest continent and largest island. Whether the night life and shopping, sight-seeing or water sports, visitors come to Australia every year to explore all it offers. Explore Aboriginal heritage, history and culture and several art galleries and museums, or hike Karijini National Park’s dark red canyons to explore gorgeous waterfalls. In this episode, we will be interviewing Australia’s own Trav Bell, also known as The Bucket List Guy. He has been inspiring audiences to not let their to-do list take priority over their bucket list. In fact, he says it shouldn’t take dramatic or traumatic to live a purpose-filled life. Learn Australia’s best kept secrets, the best time to travel, the tourist must-dos, and get inspired on this episode of Destination Everywhere, Australia.

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We are traveling to Australia and we couldn’t be more excited. It’s going to be such an incredible show. We have an awesome guest who not only is from Australia, but he also is what they call The Bucket List Guy. His name is Trav Bell and we’re going to be talking about him. Before we talk to Trav, we’re going to talk a little bit about Australia, why we love it so much and the times that we have gone there. Todd, what’s your favorite thing about Australia?

I’ve always been fascinated with Australia being South of the equator. When it’s winter here, it’s summer there and then vice-versa. It’s one of those fascinating places. It’s a continent. It’s a country. It has a small population relative to the size.

It only has 23 million people in its entire continent. There are a lot of open lands and open vistas. It is one of the largest deserts in the world. Talking about beauty, the coastal towns. That’s what I remember about Australia is all the wonderful coastal towns, the beautiful beaches and the wildlife. The cities are fantastic as well, Melbourne and Sydney, the largest ones, but what is incredible is all the natural beauty. We’re going to talk a lot about that with our guest.

What I like to do also when we go to a destination is, I always like to Google what movies were filmed there. I did that and then some of them surprised me.

I haven’t heard about this yet, let’s do it.

The Matrix was filmed all around Sydney. Did you know that?

I did not know that. That’s a good one.

Mission Impossible 2, that’s more obvious. You do see the Sydney Opera House in a lot of the movie on the water scenes. Parts of Star Wars were filmed there. This one is now added to my bucket list is The Great Gatsby Movie with Leo DiCaprio. The Gatsby mansion in that movie was the International College of Management located in Manly. Other ones like Babe. There was a movie called Fool’s Gold with Matthew McConaughey and Kate Hudson. That was supposed to be filmed in the Caribbean, but because of weather they moved that to the Great Barrier Reef along the Queensland Coast. There’s like Charlotte’s Web, but there was one called Ghost Writer. That was filmed at the Telstra Dome in Melbourne, which is where the wild things are. Wolverines, I can go on, but I’ll stop there. It’s big. The background is diverse. You have beaches. You have deserts, great cities and small cities.

One thing I always thought was cool is a lot of people think that Washington DC was the only capital that was ever done as a capital city. Their capital, Canberra is the same thing. It was specifically built to serve as the capital. It has a grand feel like DC.

It has access to both Melbourne and Sydney. It’s right in the middle of the two on the East Coast. It’s not a city. If you ask most people what the capital of Australia, I don’t think there would be able to tell you.

For everyone who’s been to Australia, part of the experience is having to take that huge long flight either from Europe or from the United States. It’s part of the experience, but it’s also a long flight. It can be 15 to 24 hours depending on where you’re flying from, from the US or Canada. You have to take that into your plans and make sure that you plan for that because you plan a day ahead so you need to be prepared for that.

In retrospect, we probably should’ve made this episode or a couple of smaller episodes. We’ll probably do that on as pick it down, but Australia is fascinating. When you get into it, you realize, “I need to spend more time in this area.”

We’re putting the bucket list together for this show. We had to pair so much stuff down. We shouldn’t have time for all that. We will be back to visit our friends, the Aussies, many times to come here.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk about one particular movie. Everybody remembers it from the ‘80s. Andy, do you know what movie I’m talking about? To me, it put the Outback on the map.

Crocodile Dundee, I’m sure the Aussies loved that. I’m sure I like being compared to Crocodile Dundee all the time.

Paul Hogan, in that, gives you a feel for Australia outside of a city. They were getting into the Outback. It’s dangerous and beautiful at the same time.

I’m excited to talk to Trav Bell. He’s The Bucket List Guy. He’s going to be our first guest, but he’s also Australian. He not only looks for life-changing bucket list items to do, it’s his way of life. We’re going to talk about a bucket list of things to do in Australia with him. He’s got the best of both worlds. We can talk about both of them. We’re going to talk about other bucket list experiences he’s had around the world. I’m excited to talk to Trav Bell, The Bucket List Guy.

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We’re excited to have our next guest. We have Trav Bell, who is The Bucket-List Guy joining us from Melbourne, Australia. Welcome, Trav. We’re happy to have you.

Todd, Andy, I am excited to be here.

We are excited to have you here.

When we were going over your profile and listened to your TED Talk, I found that you are extremely entertaining and a great speaker. You have a book, My Bucketlist Blueprint. My Bucketlist is an acronym. Each one of those means something. For all intents of purpose, they’re going to have to go and watch your TED Talk to find out the entire acronym, but what’s your philosophy behind this and why did you focus on the bucket list experiences?

Thanks a lot for having me on. I’ll share as much as I possibly can. Someone called me The Bucket List Guy several years ago. In my first business, I was one of the first personal trainers running around Melbourne. I founded and franchised a chain of personal fitness training studios with 300 personal trainers working for me, tens of thousands of clients, and with nearly two million personal training sessions. I always loved helping people. I do that for many years, but things got on top of me. I had my little breakdown before the breakthrough moment. I went through a bout of depression. There’s a lot of stuff that was going on in my life at that point in time. Instead of going on heavy antidepressants, I found myself in life coaching courses, learning neuro-linguistic programming, social dynamics, Carnegie principle and positive psychology. I was trying to get to the root cause of what I was going through rather than putting a Band-Aid over the top of it in terms of medication. I knew a lot of people were on that stuff and I didn’t want to walk around like a zombie.

I wanted to get the root cause of my psychology. I found myself in these life coaching courses, walking on fire, hugging it out, high fiving strangers on weekends, breaking boards and arrows, and bending bars. You cry on my shoulder and I cry on your shoulder. You know how it goes in a personal development events. It was a friend of mine at the time said, “Why don’t you teach this stuff?” That helped compartmentalize where I was going through and I summed up the courage. It was the big domino that I had to push over in my life to gain courage. I put on an event. It was crap compared to my TED Talk and what I do now. Admittedly, I was scared, but it was the thing I saw as the speaker talk. I thought, “I fucking do that. I can do anything.” I grew up quite shy, but people would rather be in the box than give the eulogy. People are more fearful of public speaking and fricking shots.

I put on a talk. Some of them were close friends of mine, and about halfway through that talk, I shared with everyone the fact that I’d had a list to do before I die. It was written down since I was eighteen. It inspired people because it went from a crappy seminar to a not so crappy seminar. In the end, Joe, one of the participants said, “How’s all this list to-do before you die stuff? It’s like a bucket list. You’re The Bucket List Guy.” It is a light bulb moment. That night, I went home and registered TheBucketListGuy.com and I’ve been doing that ever since. I am running around the world, primarily as a speaker and inspiring others to do the same. The whole philosophy is founded on positive psychology and that is the science of happiness to help people have more meaning, more purpose, and more fulfillment in life. That’s what it’s all about. I put this cool bucket list brand over the top of it and essentially, it’s positive psychology.

One thing that you did and put it in perspective for me anyway is the grid. You said with the average age of a man in Australia was. I looked it up what it is in the United States and it’s 78. These are behind me now. What’s in front of me is small in terms of those years I have left to be active and do things that will scare me a little bit, which is always fun. When you did that, I was like, “It’s time to get real because I’m running out of time, essentially.” That was a great way of putting it. I was talking with our producer, Lauren about this, and she’s got a lot more time than I do.

What I want to know is if you’re The Bucket List Guy, how many bucket list things do you have on your list? Can you count them?

I’ve done about 300 things and I’ve got about another 350 to 400 things to do.

With your life experience and then with age, do you take off things and add things onto your bucket list? You’re like, “That’s no longer relevant. I don’t even have a passion for that anymore, but this is up there now.”

I’ll give an example. I went to the Advance Base Camp on Mount Everest. I went there with my dad. That’s a whole other story because of my bucket list, I am adopted, my dad and I weren’t the best of mates growing up. He’s a fitter and turner, a mechanic by trade, and the same job since he was sixteen to retirement. He’s a worker’s worker, a manly man. Me, a young adopted son and a serial entrepreneur. He still doesn’t understand what I do. Since his retirement, he came on a lot of my adventures with me, and now we’re best friends. The cool thing is we went to Mount Everest Base Camp. It was the first thing that I ever wrote on that list to do before I die.

We found ourselves as part of an expedition team with people who were going to the summit. We could tag along, peel off at base camp or go to Advanced Base Camp and peel off. Dad and I went along to that, but I’d got to Advanced Base Camp at 5,500 meters. At 6,500 meters, in between Camps 2 and 3 on the Nepalese side, I had always shocking. My head was struck. I had altitude sickness badly, but my dad was fine. I quickly scrubbed summit Mount Everest off my bucket list. We’ve got three bucket lists. We’ve all got a reverse bucket list, which is our done list.

When you cross it off, you get that overwhelming sense of gratitude. What do I get people to start? How do I start people writing a bucket list? Think of all the cool stuff they’ve already done in their life. They’re on a bucket list all the way along and get them to recognize that. It gives people a good, solid, grateful foundation in order to plan and design going forward. We’ve got the reverse bucket list. We’ve got the future bucket list, which is what people refer to as the bucket list. We also got a fuck-it list. That’s all the stuff that was on another list and you’ve gone, “Not that.” Summiting Mount Everest is on that list for me now.

That’s incredible that you got up to the Advanced Base Camp. That in itself is a huge bucket list. I know a lot of people are scared to do that. A lot of people want to do it, but it’s not all fun and games is it? You have to be in great shape. You have to be physically active and ready to take on the elements.

Even mountaineers get balanced so much. I went up with a full-on expedition team, we’re on the Tibetans inside. Tibet is a polar opposite to Australia and the US. If you’ve never been through Tibet, it’s the most amazing country ever. Spoiler alert, you can drive a bus to base camp on the Tibetan side. What they say is whatever you do when you get out of that bus and you go to set up a tent at base camp, don’t pick up your stuff because you’re at seriously high altitude. A lot of people don’t make it past base camp. What we did is we walked from base camp through the main place that comes off Mount Everest through the Interim Camp and then to Advanced Base Camp. That’s when it gets serious. That’s where all the mountaineers set up their base camps to be inclined.

What now is at the top of your list in terms of travel?

[bctt tweet=”Be a tourist in your hometown first, and do it with your family.” via=”no”]

I’ve done five of Man Made Wonders of the World and I’ve got two to go. I’ve got Petra in Jordan and Christ the Redeemer in Rio de Janeiro to go. I’ve done the Taj Mahal in India and Machu Picchu. I did that on my 40th birthday with my dad after completing the Inca Trail. That was on my bucket list for my 40th birthday. It was spiritual. That was my midlife crisis. I went to the Colosseum in Italy in 2019. The Seven Man Made Wonders of the World and the Seven Natural Wonders of the World are on my bucket list.

How many natural wonders of the world have you had?

It’s only two.

You’ve got some traveling to do.

I’ve got to hurry up.

Let’s talk a little bit about Australia and some bucket list items in Australia. What are some that you would recommend either take it by region or a city? What are some things that when people come to your beautiful country, they should think about doing?

I love this. The Australian government should be paying me to be a board of tourism here. You got to climb the Sydney Harbor Bridge. Be a tourist in your hometown first. It’s about choosing happiness and do it with your family. Everyone is reconnected with their family too. They’re exploring places around their backyard that they didn’t even seem possible. We’ve taken up full-on mountain biking in our family.

The classics, climb the Sydney Harbor Bridge, which is awesome. It’s an amazing view. American and Bondi Beach, you got to do that. For ladies and anyone else inclined, you got the Bondi lifeguards. It’s sad, but it’s a real thing. Bondi Beach is an excellent quintessential Australian beach. Where I live, I’m in South Australia in a state called Victoria on about twenty minutes away from the start of the Great Ocean Road. The Great Ocean Road winds its way across a long down the coast to a place called Warrnambool. You’ll see what we call the Twelve Apostles there. It’s sandstone carvings from the waves. It’s rough down there. We go down there to surf. There are some huge sharks and big great whales down there.

Could that be a bucket list item? Is there any way to swim with sharks?

No, it is. If you want to go to South Australia to do that, you can get in a cage. You can go to the Northern Territory, which is Darwin, Australia, and do the Cage of Death experience as well. In the Cage of Death, you’ll get into a prospect cylinder. It’s clear and a massive and a female crocodile gets in the water with you. It’s on my bucket list, but it scares the hell out of me.

What is that plastic make out of? Do you know?

The crocodile does this and you’re in there. It doesn’t help to wipe a steak in front of the thing.

You’re the chewy center of dessert.

I’ve seen how that plays out. My dog always gets to the middle of a chew toy.

I haven’t done it myself, but Uluru, the big red rock in the middle. You may want to Google it, but Australian aboriginals arguably are the oldest race, the earliest ancestors around the world. They were some of the first people reported to be walking the Earth. When you go out to the Northern Territory in a particular place called Alice Springs, which is one of our Northern states. You’ll learn about Aboriginal culture and it’s amazing. Every country has got Aboriginal culture and ours are treated with a lot of respect. There are some dodgy parts, but we do respect that culture. I am yet to fully explore that area myself.

It is the Northern Territory. You may want to fly into a place called Darwin, which is the capital of that state. You can swim with whale sharks. This is a thing on my bucket list. I’m sure you can do it down The Caribbean, Bahamas, and Mexico. That’s around Cancun and stuff. We can do it here in Australia in a place called Ningaloo Reef, which is the Northern part of Western Australia, which faces the Indian Ocean. You can also do that over in the Philippines. In Bondi Beach, if you’re a surfer, you got to surf all day. Bell Beach is where all the surf spots are and where I live as well. There’s the Great Barrier Reef. If you want to get here and dive the Barrier Reef, that is on a lot of people’s bucket lists. You want to do it in certain parts that aren’t sun-bleached.

What are the areas that are still in good shape?

The Barrier Reef is one of the Wonders of the World. It’s massive. It’s hard for me to pinpoint that, but that’s only a Google search away. You may also want to go to a place called Airlie Beach, which is where all the backpackers and where a lot of people launch off into the Great Barrier Reef from. That’s where a lot of the boats are. A place called Hamilton Island is cool if you got a little bit more money. That’s all in the Barrier Reef. One of the things that my parents have done, which is on my bucket list as well, is to hire a boat and cruise the Barrier Reef and all the beautiful islands. That’s epic. If you want to cruise, you can get a captain, your catamaran, and they can cook for you. You hire them on the boat. Get a bunch of friends, have an incredible time, don’t have a sober day for ten days.

Trav, we’re all going into winter and you guys are coming out of it. What season do you prefer best in Australia?

I’m in Melbourne. It is the most cosmopolitan city. Everyone would say this, but the other states don’t want to admit it. Melbourne is where the culture of Australia is. Sydney is a little bit more like LA, flashy. I reckon after traveling the world, Sydney is LA and Miami. The Gold Coast is like Miami. It’s like, “Look at me.” Melbourne is New York, Oregon and Austin. It’s a lot more cultured. We’ve got a lot of the Italians and the Greeks who come into Melbourne early and introduced their culture. Some of the best coffee in the world is Melbourne. If you’re a coffee snob like me, you may want to go to this place called Degraves Street. It is like Graffiti Alley. They’re licensed to do graffiti. We’ve got graffiti laneways. It’s cool and the fashion is right up there. It’s cosmopolitan and lots of weirdos. That’s exactly what you want.

That’s right up my alley. If you want to go out for a good meal in Melbourne, what’s your spot? What’s your go-to?

It depends on who I’m with, where I’m in, and what I’m up for, but there’s some amazing Japanese, Italian. As I said before, there are some amazing holes in the wall as well, where you can get random Lebanese food or there’s a whole variety of different stuff. When I travel, it’s like, “What’s Australian food?” “I don’t know.” We’re only 250 years old in Australia. That’s when Captain Cook settled here. We don’t have that atypical Australian food.

It’s international and a lot of Asian influences.

You can get everything. For me, it depends on where I’m at. One thing that we need a lot more of is Mexican food. I love Mexican food. There’s some good Mexican, but it’s not genuine. It is a little bit more Tex-Mex than real Mexican food. It’s the coffee culture, going after probably European flavors and stuff like that down here.

You talked about an amazing that you went to Mount Everest. Give us three other things outside of Australia that you’ve done as The Bucket List Guy that would pique people’s interest.

It’s funny when we talk about travel. I go to travel for adventures and experiences. You can go to a place and it is a vanilla experience. Have you ever been to Dusseldorf in Germany? It is bland. There’s a lot of socks and sandals, but I went there for the Eurovision Song Contest Final. It was madness. It was cool because this big gay rainbow advent came into Dusseldorf, which is strait-laced. A lot of automotive companies, engineers, and then come into town. That was a cool travel adventure experience to go to that.

I got to say, we don’t have your vision here in the States.

We don’t have it either.

It’s the world’s largest talent competition. If you watch it, I have friends in the UK and they’re all into it, no matter what. You’ve got to go live. That’s fun.

It was on the bucket list because it was lovely to watch it with all of our guy friends. We’d have big Eurovision parties for years and years. My partner in time, we’re like, “When we go to Europe, let’s go to Eurovision as well.” That was the impetus for doing that. You also crossed off another thing on my bucket list during that. In my first business, I didn’t travel that much. Being The Bucket List Guy, I sold off all my businesses and got out of the gyms and stuff that I had. That was around when Tim Ferris launched The 4-Hour Workweek. Another thing on my bucket is I’ve lunched with Tim Ferris when he came to Melbourne. At that time, when we were shifting to the online world and for me, freedom is one of my highest values. I’m sure you guys can appreciate that. If I don’t feel it and I’m not living true to my true values, my true potential. Me having these corporate leases and gyms and all that tied to me.

I sold them off when I got out of the personal training industry. I sold off all those gyms, got them to rebrand and all that. I went online and registered the bucket list. I was like, “How am I going to monetize this?” I don’t know. I don’t know how I’m going to do it, but it felt right. The fact is, and I didn’t do a lot of troubling until The Bucket List Guy. I went nuts as The Bucket List Guy and plus my travel was a text deduction. We research. We’ve got beyond me now. A couple of years ago, I started because of everything that I’ve taught. It’s helped a lot of people, wake up, stop Groundhog Day, get off the treadmill, design their life rather than living by default, living by design love rather than existing. I want people to live with more intention, more purpose. I’m also a Founder CEO of Certified Bucketlist Coach around the world too. Apart from being The Bucket List Guy, I’m also the Founder of this company. We’ve got a Certified Bucketlist Coach teaching my staff in 25 countries around the world.

If someone wants to reach out to you, your idea is amazing. If someone wants to find you and they want to learn a little bit more about Bucket Lists, how did they reach you? How do they find you?

They go to TheBucketListGuy.com. If you’re interested in becoming a coach, go to BucketListCoach.com. We run webinars on that every week.

We have some rapid-fire questions, but before we say that, I want to tell the readers to check out his TED Talk, check out his website. We could talk to you forever and you’re such a great person and a great speaker.

[bctt tweet=”The coolest thing about Coronavirus is that it has reconnected everyone with their family.” via=”no”]

The first question is, what has been your most impressive bucket list item? You gave us two already outside the US. Give us one more.

I’m going to jump straight to Kathmandu in Nepal.

Tell us about that.

It’s part of the old silk road. It is an eclectic bunch of backpackers and travelers and different religions and our members sitting upon this coffee shop, overlooking this bizarre and seeing the movement. It was awesome. I’m a coffee snob and you can appreciate this is discovering because discovering a local coffee sitting there watching the world go by. I remember sitting there having that appear funny moment, “This is a cool place and all the different little shops.”

That’s a bug and a lot of people don’t get to get there. It’s far out of the way.

You Americans have got to stop complaining about long plane rides. If I hear another American compliant about a long plane ride and that’s an excuse. Check this out. Australians, New Zealanders and with Saudi Arabians, believe it or not, we’ve got the largest number of passports per capita. In America, you have got the lowest number of passports per capita in the world. It’s everywhere has got to be like she put it into schools to teach people how to experience the world and how to get outside the comfort zone because it breeds tolerance.

You took the words out of my mouth. If you don’t travel, you don’t learn. It promotes ignorance if you don’t travel, without a doubt.

The next question is if you could live anywhere in the world for a year, where would it be travel?

This scares me too, but I’ll do some time in the US, more for business reasons, Thailand and Spain.

Spain is a great one. The next question is if you could travel with someone either infamous or famous, alive or dead, who would it be?

I’ll go back to the guy I mentioned before is Tim Ferris. When you meet people and what we call in Australia, he wasn’t a winker. He was a cool guy and he would get into some interesting places in the world. One thing he shares quite often is his experiences in Japan. I haven’t been to Japan yet either. Some weird and wonderful little nooks and crannies that you can get in out over there gets to the weird probably, but at the end of the day, Tim would be great. Kelly Slider, as we mentioned before, to be honest.

The last question for you when packing for a trip, what is something you pack that might surprise our readers?

Look at my AirPods. I branded my AirPods with The Bucket List Guy. I’ve been traveling and then I’ve bumped into people and I’ve said, “I’m The Bucket List Guy.” Before you know it, the next day I’m presenting. Somewhere I was presented, for instance, meetup groups, I’ll meet someone in a bar and I’ll say, “How long you’re in town for?” Half a week or something, they like, “What are you doing tomorrow afternoon?” I’m part of a meetup group or I’m part of a networking group or a business group. It doesn’t present it to a hundred people. I’m going to say, my clicker.

In the States, we say slide advancer. Trav, you are a great guest. We enjoyed this. What social media do you have? Are you on Instagram? If you’re traveling, I know you’re putting up pictures.

It is @BucketlistGuy.TravBell on Instagram. That’s probably my go-to drug of choice.

We will follow all your adventures there. Thank you, Trav. It was great to have you.

I was happy to do around two guys. We appreciate it.

We could do a whole show with you.

From Melbourne, Trav, thank you.

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I am thinking about what Trav said earlier. There was one thing that stuck out in my head and that was to create a grid. This is something that was on his YouTube channel. I mentioned it earlier was, that grid where in the US, the average male life span is 79 years old. It might even be 78. You create a grid with 78 spaces in it, and then you circle in a grid for every year that you’ve been born. When you look at that and realize that you are already past the curve on and how much time do you potentially have left, you’re like, “I’ve got to get going.”

You got to get out there and do those bucket list things.

There’s no time. Time is ticking.

Stay at those great hotels, go to those once in a lifetime destination, and do those once in lifetime things. Something that stuck out to me is his quote that, “People die at 40 and get buried at 80,” meaning that people stop living. They get sedate, they get their kids in school and they don’t do anything. You can do both. Our family tries to do that to try to have a fulfilling life experience while still having to manage all the craziness of being a family on a day-to-day basis. You get out there and see the world and Australia is a great place to do that. The things that Trav told us about, some of them, I didn’t even know that you can do in Australia. There are things we can add to our bucket lists from our conversation with him.

Let’s start talking about bucket lists. Trav had a couple of different types of bucket lists that have to do with travel and those things you’ve got to go see before your time is over. There’s much to go see and do. Andy, what are some of the things in Australia that you would add to the top of yours?

It is hard to choose because we had to pare down the list because there are many great things to do and many places to go. We had to come back, but there’s an epic road trip to Cape York in the Northeast part of Australia. It’s a journey to the Northernmost points. You drive through all these great different geological areas. It’s a great experience. You need a four-wheel-drive to do it. If you want to see what they call, “The Outback,” this is a place to go with hardly any cell service. If you want to be by yourself and get away from the rest of the world, this area to do it. The epic road trip to Cape York is a great first bucket list.

We would be remiss if we didn’t talk a little bit about the Great Barrier Reef and what an amazing destination that is. It’s so long that there’s a lot you can do. You need to pick a spot where you want to see it narrow that down and see what activities are around it. There’s scuba diving, boating, excursions, and then another great way to see it is a seaplane. If you’ve never been on a seaplane, they’re an amazing experience. You can take off and land in the water. The last time I was on was in Vancouver. You get low, you can see right through the water. You see the wildlife, but it is a major vantage point. I’ve recommend the seaplane if anybody that has the desire to do something a little different.

My next one is a place that we went to called Fraser Island. This location is beautiful. It’s 75 miles a beach. We’re in America or Europe, you see 75 miles of beautiful natural beach. It’s one of the most beautiful things about Australia is its nature is incredible. There are large limestone formations here, which make it spectacular. You can visit a shipwreck from 1935 that got shipwrecked on a cyclone, which was cool. It’s great for a day trip and you can camp there as well. If you’re in the mid-East part of Australia going to Fraser Island is a great option.

Probably one of the most photographed buildings ever would be the Sydney Opera House. Not only can you go see it by water, but we recommend doing the backstage tour of the Sydney Opera House. What’s great about this is you go beyond the exterior, you go into the orchestra pit, you go into the dressing rooms, green room, and other cool spots. You’ll learn a little bit more about the history and the performers that have been there, and then follow it with breakfast, add that to yours.

The Sydney Opera House is incredible. Almost everybody does when they go there. It’s one of those popular bucket list items, but it’s one that you got to do. You’ll see a huge archway over the bridge. You can clip-on and walk that entire thing. That’s an incredible thing to do in Sydney. We’re going to go South for my next bucket list to Tasmania, which I’d never been to, but my father has been. He said it was one of those life-changing experiences. There is a Tasmanian Devil. You remember that cartoon from we were kids. There’s a Tasmanian mammal. My bucket list is I’m staying at the luxury resort, the Saffire Freycinet, which is an old suite luxury. It offers amazing luxury experiences, not the hotel itself, but also all the activities that they do. They have trips to oyster farms, cooking demonstrations, beekeeping and visiting with Tasmanian Devil. This place is incredible. If you get to Tasmania and you want to look at it for a special place to stay, look it up online. A lot of people call it the Saffire.

I want to go to the Gold Coast, which is in the East. There is the Byron Bay Hinterland. You could travel to Nightcap National Park. It’s also known as the magic forest, which is a great name. You can do waterfalls and swim in lakes. At night, you can experience luminous glow worms as they illuminate the caves, which is cool.

Talk about a natural wonder, that’s amazing. Something that Todd and I have done in Mexico, but we didn’t do it when we were in Australia, was swimming with whale sharks. You can do that in the Midwest. Trav mentioned this. It’s the largest fish in the ocean so it’s not a shark. It’s the ones with a big open mouth. They feed on the krill and they get huge. It’s popular there from March to the end of July. If you’re there during that time, it’s a quintessential Australian experience and one thing that you should put on your list.

It is in the Ningaloo reef.

Put that on your bucket list.

You may not think of this when you’re in Australia, but you could do a sunset camel ride on Cable Beach in Broome, which is the Northwest and amazingly beautiful sunsets. Australia is known for its wildlife, the camel’s not what comes to mind, but their evening camel parades, they go across the beach. You can ride your own or enjoy the parade and watch other people on the camels and watch the camels themselves. It is a unique thing that you wouldn’t think of when you think of Australia.

[bctt tweet=”Experience the world and get outside the comfort zone because it breeds tolerance.” via=”no”]

You think of doing that somewhere in Dubai or somewhere in the Middle East. There’s another bucket list item that I didn’t get to do, but I saw this and I’m like, “We need to talk about this.” It is a helicopter ride above the fluorescent pink waters of Lake Hillier. The colors are a result of the high salinity combined with the algae species there. It’s a pink bacteria. It’s called halobacteria. While it’s safe to swim in, the lake is only accessible to researchers. The helicopter ride is a unique way to see the sight. Google this if you’re interested because it is truly a spectacular sight when you’re seeing it from above the lake.

There’s also another great area south of Melbourne and it’s the Mornington Peninsula. It is more of a leisure place to visit. It’s a low-key Australian experience, but they have winery tours, small-town shopping, golf courses, things like that. I hate to say but my parents would like Mornington. It’s not an extreme adventure, but it’s a great way to immerse yourself in another part of Australian life.

Last but not least everyone has heard of the Northern Lights, but did you know that there are Southern Lights that you can view from Australia? If you’ve already checked those off your bucket list, definitely put this on your bucket list. These lights are known as the Aurora Australis, like Aurora Borealis. That is something that you want to put on your bucket list and something that is not well known.

If you want to immerse yourself in something unique to Australia is find an amazing Aboriginal experience. The Aborigines are the indigenous people in Australia. Some say they’ve been around longer than everybody else, but there is the Laura Aboriginal Dance Festival. They strike animal forms and they do chants, but it’s supposed to be amazing and it’s only every two years. You need to plan ahead. It doesn’t happen every year. It’s held in the township of Laura, which is about 317 kilometers north of Cairns. It’s supposed to be amazing. They get about 5,000 visitors a year. I find an experience like that to check out while you’re there.

Those are our top ten bucket list items for Australia. We know we’re going to be back a lot more.

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Are you ready to book your hotel for your next company event or family adventure? Let AMI help. We have ongoing relationships with all major hotel chains and access to over 200,000 hotels. Why us? We receive special promotions before they hit the open market. We make significant cost savings to you. Go to Destination-Everywhere.com, and click the Source Now button. Let us get to work for you.

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This has been such a great show because it’s been about bucket lists. We didn’t choose a hotel destination this time. We’ll do that when we go back to Australia, but what I’d loved about this is having an expert like Trav, who made the life decision to develop a life plan around experiencing life. He calls it the bucket list plan, but it’s about getting out there and experiencing life. Not getting into the old habit of not traveling or not seeing the world and not being educated and not experiencing in and of itself. If you’re interested in that, he’s got a great book called My Bucketlist Blueprint, and we recommend it to you. it helps develop a blueprint for you of what you can do from now until you’re into retirement and how you can create a bucket list plan for yourself. I highly recommend Trav’s book.

It’s a shift in mindset. “Live for today sometimes is the easiest way to say it.” That concludes our show. We want to thank some special members of our team. Make sure you subscribe, rate and review the show on your preferred app or by going to www.Destination-Everywhere.com. We look forward to speaking with you in the next episode.

Thanks, everybody.

Important Links:

• Trav Bell
• TED Talk – Life’s way too short not to live your Bucket List
• My Bucketlist Blueprint
• TheBucketListGuy.com
• Airlie Beach
• Hamilton Island
• The 4-Hour Workweek
• Certified Bucketlist Coach
• TheBucketListGuy.com
• BucketListCoach.com
• @BucketlistGuy.TravBell – Instagram
• YouTube – The Bucket List Guy
• Cape York
• Fraser Island
• Saffire Freycinet
• Cable Beach
• Lake Hillier
• Mornington Peninsula

About Travis Bell

Trav Bell is The Bucket List Guy…The Worldʼs #1 Bucket List Expert.

As a self-appointed ʻBucket Listologistʼ, Trav has obsessively studied the Bucket List phenomenon & blended the worldʼs best Positive Psychology principles to create his own unique Bucket List Life Philosophy. He has designed his life around his Bucket List and now he helps Bucket Listers all over the globe create and cross off theirs.

A Bucket List is a tangible reason ʻWhyʼ. A Life Plan that has the power to transform every area of your life. It will help to decrease lifeʼs distractions & increase your focus on what truly makes you happy. But this is way more than just writing a simple list. This is about the journey youʼll experience in the process of achieving your list & about the person you become in the process.

Trav says he has a special super-power! His super-power is to stop people just existing, stop ʻground-hogʼ days, stop waiting for ʻsomedayʼ or ʻthe perfect timingʼ to come around. He wakes people up, gets them off the treadmill of life & helps them to start living life on purpose.

Before Trav became ʻThe Bucket List Guyʼ, he built a chain of personal training studios across Australia. Starting with 1 client, he & his team went on to do over a million personal training sessions & motivated 10’s of 1000’s clients. This is the foundation for why Trav is now regarded as one of Australiaʼs foremost Personal Development Speakers & Life Coaches.

Described as “infectiously motivating”, Trav always brings fresh stories to each seminar & event he does because heʼs out there practicing what he preaches. His ʻcrazyʼ Bucket List adventures are hilarious & truly inspirational.

Trav will show how to prevent regret & start living your list before itʼs too late!

• Here’s How »

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