[strken]

When I was 11 years old my (Australian) family took a trip to remote Western Australia. Because remote tourism was popular in Germany at the time, we heard a different variation of "German tourist does naive thing" in most the towns we visited. Occasionally it was American tourists instead. I think this was more reflective of the number of people from each country that came to the bush than any national trait, but the stories themselves were educational.

Highlights included going down the Tanami Track in a rental van during the wet season, taking nothing but a case of beer onto the 2000km 4wd-only Canning Stock Route[0] and getting bogged then rescued by a passing convoy, and walking down a seriously remote track for six hours with nothing but a day pack and a change of clothes then asking where "the next kiosk" was.

We were from a more built up area of Australia, so we had a good idea of what it was like in the really remote parts and prepared: two spare tires, spare bits and pieces like timing belts and radiator hoses, HF radio and an epirb, redundant water containers, checked in with the local police station to let them know our expected arrival dates, all the good stuff. It was still very strange being in a part of the world where people would stop if they saw you pulled over but not waving or signalling to them, because you might be in trouble and they knew there'd only be one or two cars a day. We were from an area of Australia where if you had a compass and followed any direction for a day or two on foot you'd eventually come to a road, but out there you could drive for a day and not see anything.

[0] The longest stock route in the world, and probably one of the worst roads in Australia, insofar as you can call it a road.