26th January: Australia Day

Australia Day marks the anniversary of the 1788 arrival of the First Fleet of British Ships at Port Jackson, New South Wales, and raising of the Flag of Great Britain at that site by Governor Arthur Phillip. 10 things you might not know about the 6th largest country in the world:

1. Most of the population (over 80%) live within 100km of the coast.
2. Australia is big. It is as wide as the distance from London to Moscow. Australia has a cattle station that is bigger than Belgium - Anna Creek Station in South Australia at over 34,000 square kilometres. Australia also has the longest fence in the world, 5,614 km long, built to keep the Dingos out of the fertile land.
3. There are ten deserts in Australia, including the Great Victorian Desert in Western Australia which at 348,750 km² covers 5% of the state and is bigger than the UK.
4. Most of Australia's native animals aren't found anywhere else in the world. No native Australian animals have hooves. The animals that settlers brought with them have no natural predators and so they can multiply and cause problems. Most people have heard that Rabbits are an issue, but there are also over a million feral Camels living in the outback. In fact, Australia exports camels to Saudi Arabia.
5. The Australian nickname for the British, "Pome" comes from "Prisoners of Mother England" because Australia was once an English penal colony. Despite its history as a penal colony (meaning that a percentage of the population is descended from deported criminals) Australia has a very low homicide rate. Only 1.2 per 100,000 population compared to 6.3 per 100,000 in the United States. Australia’s first police force was made up of the most well-behaved convicts.
6. Australia is the lowest and flattest continent in the world. Mount Kosciuszko is the highest point (2228 metres above sea level) and Lake Eyre is the lowest (15 metres below sea level). Australia is the only continent in the world without an active volcano.
7. The capital is Canberra. Canberra was chosen because Sydney and Melbourne couldn't agree on which of them should be the capital.
8. The Australian coat of arms includes a Kangaroo and an emu. They were chosen not only because they are iconic Australian animals, but also because neither beast can walk backwards, and so they symbolise a nation that only moves forward. Some say that Australia is the only country in the world where the people eat the animals on their coat of arms.
9. We usually associate Australia with hot weather, but the Australian Alps actually get more snow than Switzerland.
10. For the last three years, Melbourne has held the title of the world's most liveable city. At one time Melbourne was named after one of its founders, a man called John Batman, so it used to be called Batmania.