Voice of Real Australia is a regular newsletter from ACM, which has more than 100 mastheads across Australia. Today's is written by ACM digital producer Georgia Rossiter.
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I'm surely not the only one delighted that Amazing Race Australia is back on our screens?
The locations, the drama, the challenges - it's a welcome addition to prime time TV (for me, at least).
This year, it's the celebrity edition. Host Beau Ryan is waiting at each pit stop for the likes of Olympian Jana Pittman and her 16-year-old son Cornels, Gold Logie winner Grant Denyer and his wife Chezzi, and comedian Dane Simpson and his (almost 70-year-old!) father Bo.
And I can tell you, the first two episodes have not disappointed.
The race kicked off in New Delhi this year, with racers sweltering in intense heat and delivering the ingredients for butter chicken (including 20kg of tomatoes!) to a restaurant or memorising the traditional bride and groom outfits and donning the dress themselves.
The second episode followed the racers to Agra, the home of the Taj Mahal, where they had to make fuel bricks out of cow manure by hand or wash laundry in the Yamuna River.
Truly great TV.
And while it's great to see celebrities compete in challenges that look kind of silly, which I'm sure are very difficult and stressful, the real charm of the show is the travel.
Watching the celebs pile into tuk tuks and race around the cities makes me want to get on a flight to India tomorrow to join in on the chaos.
I've been an avid watcher of the Amazing Race since it came back on our screens in 2019. The second season of which, because of that pesky pandemic, was set entirely in Australia.
I remember watching with my housemate from our couch, theorising what detour we would do if we were racing and longing to travel to the exotic locations they were filming in (I mean, they were crossing state borders for goodness sake!).
The following season was even more exciting. Back to international travel, eating weird things and navigating language barriers.
During that time, international borders weren't quite back to normal, but it still inspired the same feeling of needing to get out there and explore the world.
I know a lot of Australians got their travelling fix this winter. It felt like everyone apart from a select few unlucky souls took that long-haul flight to Europe so they could bask in the European sun.
I have my own getaway booked in a few weeks (21 days to be exact) and it's all I can do not to pack my bags, sprint to the airport and wait for my flight there.
Instead, I'll keep tuning in every Wednesday and Thursday to get my travel fix.
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Georgia Rossiter
Georgia comes to the Daily Advertiser from the Snowy Mountains via Shepparton, Victoria. You can reach her at georgia.rossiter@austcommunitymedia.com.au or 0439 364 702
Georgia comes to the Daily Advertiser from the Snowy Mountains via Shepparton, Victoria. You can reach her at georgia.rossiter@austcommunitymedia.com.au or 0439 364 702
