Landscape and Climate

Australia, the world’s second-driest continent after Antarctica. features a wide range of climatic zones, from the tropical regions of the north, through the arid expanses of the interior, to the temperate regions of the south.

In the Australian winter you can ski in the southern States one day and be diving in the balmy waters of the Great Barrier Reef in Queensland the next.

Australia’s seasons are:

Summer:	December to February
Autumn:	March to May
Winter:	June to August
Spring:	September to November

Australia experiences many of nature’s more extreme phenomena, including droughts, floods, tropical cyclones, severe storms, bushfires, and the occasional tornado.

The Australian landscape is distinctive and varied. In the centre and the west there are vast stony and sandy deserts; in the east, sweeping plateaus and plains flank narrow coastal slopes. Australia’s coast features broad sandy beaches and lush vegetation. These are backed by a great variety of landforms, ranging from the steep cliffs of the Blue Mountains west of Sydney, New South Wales and the eroded volcanic rock of the Glasshouse Mountains north of Brisbane, Queensland to flat plains on the southern coast west of Adelaide, South Australia.

The Murray and Darling Rivers are the two longest river systems in Australia. Together they form the Murray–Darling Basin, which covers more than one million square kilometres—14 per cent of the mainland. Lake Eyre, in the centre of the country, is a vast salt lake more than 9,000 square kilometres in area, which is dry for lengthy periods.

Approximately one-third of the mainland lies north of the Tropic of Capricorn, with the remainder stretching to 39° South. About 70 per cent of the country is arid or semi-arid, and a large part of the centre is unsuitable for settlement. Eleven principal deserts make up some 20 per cent of the mainland area. More than one-third of the continent is virtually desert owing to low rainfall.