A Challenge for All Globetrotters — Create a Tick List for Your Own Country

Hand your guests a bucket list of suggestions

I’m stealing this idea from my hosts.

My friends handed me a list — a tick list — but not just of places to see.

This tick list included traditional grub, beverages, seafood, iconic landmarks, snapshot-worthy locations, and animal wildlife.

This was their Australian bucket list.

I’m a savoury kinda guy — I thought it was a marvellous idea.

The list included the usual iconic landmarks, but it also had a few more unusual items, some of which needed explaining.

Once done, you could link your more specific articles to a place, event, or item of interest.

Here is a selection of their suggestions for Australia.

Traditional grub

• Lamington — an Australian cake made from squares of butter cake or sponge cake coated in an outer layer of chocolate sauce and rolled in desiccated coconut.

• Finger limes — or caviar lime, a thorny shrub with edible fruits which are under development as a commercial crop.

• Anzac biscuits —sweet and chewy, I can confirm they are very moreish.

• Chicken salt — This is Australia’s umami explosion. Australia seems to know what they’re doing when it comes to mouth-watering condiments. It’s their default seasoning. Some brands are vegan, but the real deal doesn’t contain chicken flavouring, it contains roasted, braised, dried, and salted chicken.

• Vegemite and toast — the mighty Marmite of the southern hemisphere.

Other food suggestions included:

• Chicken Parmi
• Iced Vovo
• Damper
• Hamburger with beetroot

and

• Golden Gaytime

Iconic landmarks

• Sydney Harbour Bridge

• The Twelve Apostles — on the Great Ocean Road

• Three Sisters, Blue Mountains

• Parliament House, Canberra

Animal wildlife

• Kangaroo
• Wallaby
• Wombat
• Koala
• Echidna
• Platypus
• Emu
• Possum
• Cockatoo — saw three on telephone lines
• Rainbow Lorikeet
• Lyrebird — watch it in action

The lyrebird is amazing. They’re great mimics. They can imitate car alarms, camera shutters, shooting from video games, workmen, and chainsaws.

Seafood to try

• Crocodile — tastes of chicken, the texture of fish.
• Barramundi — great in a Thai curry sauce (maybe it was all that msg)
• John Dory — not the happiest fish in the sea

• Balmain Bug
• Sydney Rock Oysters
• Snapper — out of its natural habitat, with a slice of lime

Beverages

• Lemon-lime bitters
• Bundaberg Ginger Beer
• Bundaberg Rum
• XXXX Gold — we had this in Scotland at one time. It was heavily advertised, so we all tried it (once) then it disappeared
• Lemon Myrtle — I think you put this in tea

• Milo — chocolate powder
• Kirk’s Pasito — soft drink
• Schweppes Solo

Snapshot worthy

• Bondi Iceberg pools

• Lavender Bay, North Sydney

• Flinders St Railway Station, Melbourne

• Brighton Bathing Boxes, Melbourne

• La Perouse, Sydney

• Barrenjoey Lighthouse, Sydney

• Tomaree National Park

Final thoughts

I’ll be looking to tick off more than just a few of these.

I thought it was a great idea for all globetrotters. I’ve already begun to think of a tick list for Scotland.

I’d certainly be interested in your local bucket list. Stick @ Malky McEwan on your article if you do one, please — I want to read it.

If it’s Medium you’re doing, read Malky McEwan.