The allure of following in the footsteps of explorers in search of new lands and discovery is what I call a good time. Since moving to Australia learning this country’s history has been the most eye opening experience of my life.

Trevor Lipscombe’s On Austral Shores leads you through the exploration of the coasts of Victoria and New South Wales, and then adds how the modern traveller can find some of these points. It is a very in depth read through his historical material, but to a history fanatic it is wonderful.

My only major complaint was that modern maps or photos were not included for a point of reference. If you are not familiar with the areas you will be hard pressed to discover them without knowing how to study maps well (which all good travellers should learn).

Maps over the centuries are covered extensively from Matthew Flinders, Captain James Cook, John Oxley, George Bass and Dutch explorers. Interesting to note the changes as charting became more extensive and how the coastline altered. The addition of log reports and journals from these explorers is a great touch to show what they thought of the scene before them, the layout of landscape and natives interaction.

Terra Australis Incognita – the unknown southern land was a legend that many had been in search of for centuries. It was thought that the lost gold of King Solomon may lie in that continent hidden from society’s greed. It was a place of peace and gave balance to the world. Philosophers were so dramatic.

According to Australian Heritage magazine; Matthew Flinders is credited with giving Australia its name, but a 1622 Dutch navigator also gave his chart the name. There is also a German book on astronomy from 1545 with a shapeless southern land mass named Australia. Whether Flinders had known about either of the items is unknown. Regardless, they all believed the mythological land of Greek legion was found with this new country.

Although the bulk of the book is about European exploration; Lipscombe touches all the bases in the beginning with aboriginals, Portuguese, Dutch, and Chinese. Prime Minister Robert Menzies’ claims about the Chinese is not widely explained so a welcome addition to this publication. That they were the first to start mapping the land and the Portuguese followed the Chinese routes.

This country is only 200 years old and European exploration commenced only 400 years ago. Australia is the youngest nation in the entire world and so much has happened within that time. There are still new wildlife and flora being discovered in some of the remote regions.

The coastline maps were completed before any major exploration took place inland. The Blue Mountains had not even been crossed when Matthew Flinders had completed the first circumnavigation and gave his “General chart of Terra Australia or Australia” to Sir Joseph Banks while he was imprisoned in France.

Lipscombe has broken the exploration down into three ages: Age of Trade (1606-1688), Age of Science and Exploration (1688-1802), Age of Settlement (after 1788). Each age is well mapped from the different European travellers. The Age of Trade was mainly the Dutch East India Company. The Age of Science and Exploration is when seeking new knowledge and collecting specimens for study began in France and England. I think Age of Settlement is self explanatory.

In all, this is an excellent read that will have you strewing your maps across the table in search of where you can travel to next. Whether by sea or by land it will take some imagination to picture what it may have looked like in the explorer’s time. Take the book with you to read what the explorers wrote as they approached that spot.

I laughed as I read how Cook and Flinders kept passing Port Macquarie as nothing worth exploring then Oxley took to her and found the beautiful land it held. It is one of my favourite haunts today. To stand at Tacking Point Lighthouse and imagine Flinders tacking off the coast there, the age of sails would have been enchanting to behold.

“History should live and breathe, not be confined between the covers of books” says Lipscombe in his introduction. I couldn’t agree with him more.