Woop Woop (wop-wop in New Zealand) is an Australian term meaning a place that is a far distance from anything. Equivalent terms include "beyond the black stump" and "dingo woop woop" (also Australia), "the boondocks" (Southern United States) and "out in the sticks" or "the back of beyond" (UK).
The term is said to have been derived from the nickname given to men who carried fleeces in shearing sheds, after the sound they made as they ran around. "Grubba Grubba" is also another version commonly found outback in the Kimberley. It was also the name of a sawmill near the town of Wilga in South West of Western Australia that was abandoned in 1984. [1] The term was used in the early 1900s to describe a mythical outback town. [2]
The term was also used in a book about The Ghan (train), published in 2021, titled The Train to Oodna-woop-woop: The story of The Ghan. [3]
Whoop Whoop is the name of an Antarctic field camp on the ice plateau 40 km (25 miles) east of Davis Station, used as a ski landing area (SLA) in late summer [4] [5] when the early summer sea ice SLAs adjacent to Davis are unusable. [6]
Davis Station, commonly called Davis, is one of three permanent bases and research outposts in Antarctica managed by the Australian Antarctic Division (AAD). Davis is situated on the coast of Cooperation Sea in Princess Elizabeth Land, Ingrid Christensen Coast in the Australian Antarctic Territory, a territory claimed by Australia. Davis lies in an Antarctic oasis, a mostly ice-free area known as the Vestfold Hills.
Mawson Station, commonly called Mawson, is one of three permanent bases and research outposts in Antarctica managed by the Australian Antarctic Division (AAD). Mawson lies in Holme Bay in Mac. Robertson Land, East Antarctica in the Australian Antarctic Territory, a territory claimed by Australia. Established in 1954, Mawson is Australia's oldest Antarctic station and the oldest continuously inhabited Antarctic station south of the Antarctic Circle. It houses approximately 20 personnel over winter and up to 53 in summer.
The Australian Antarctic Territory (AAT) is a part of East Antarctica claimed by Australia as an external territory. It is administered by the Australian Antarctic Division, an agency of the federal Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water. The territory's history dates to a claim on Enderby Land made by the United Kingdom in 1841, which was subsequently expanded and eventually transferred to Australia in 1933. It is the largest territory of Antarctica claimed by any nation by area. In 1961, the Antarctic Treaty came into force. Article 4 deals with territorial claims, and although it does not renounce or diminish any pre-existing claims to sovereignty, it also does not prejudice the position of Contracting Parties in their recognition or non-recognition of territorial sovereignty. As a result, only four other countries — New Zealand, the United Kingdom, France, and Norway — recognise Australia's claim to sovereignty in Antarctica.
Waikikamukau is a generic name for a small rural town or locality in New Zealand. New Zealanders use the name as a placeholder name for "any town" or to denote a non-specific but remote rural town. It has a similar connotation to the New Zealand slang Wop Wops and the Australian term Woop Woop and other appellations such as the "Boondocks" or "Timbuktu". The name is a joking reference to the frequency of New Zealand place names starting with "Wai".
The boondocks is an American expression from the Tagalog (Filipino) word bundók ("mountain"). It originally referred to a remote rural area, but now, is often applied to an out-of-the-way area considered backward and unsophisticated by city-folk. It can also occasionally refer to a mountain in both Filipino and American context.
The Ghan is an experiential tourism-oriented passenger train service that operates between the northern and southern coasts of Australia, through the cities of Adelaide, Alice Springs and Darwin on the Adelaide–Darwin rail corridor. Operated by Journey Beyond Rail Expeditions, its scheduled travelling time, including extended stops for passengers to do off-train tours, is 53 hours 15 minutes to travel the 2,979 kilometres (1,851 mi). The Ghan has been described as one of the world's great passenger trains.
Bush flying refers to aircraft operations carried out in the bush. Bush flying involves operations in rough terrain where there are often no prepared landing strips or runways, frequently necessitating that bush planes be equipped with abnormally large tires, floats, skis or any other equipment necessary for unpaved runway operation. It is the only viable way of delivering people and supplies into more difficult to reach, remote locations.
Oodnadatta is a small, remote outback town and locality in the Australian state of South Australia, located 1043 kilometres north-north-west of the state capital of Adelaide by road or 873 km (542 mi) direct, at an altitude of 112 metres. The unsealed Oodnadatta Track, an outback road popular with tourists, runs through the town.
The former Central Australia Railway, which was built between 1878 and 1929 and closed in 1980, was a 1241 km (771 mi) 1067 mm narrow gauge railway between Port Augusta and Alice Springs. A standard gauge line duplicated the southern section from Port Augusta to Maree in 1957 on a new nearby alignment. The entire Central Australia Railway was superseded in 1980 after the standard gauge Tarcoola–Alice Springs Railway was opened, using a new route up to 200 km to the west. A small southern section of the original line between Port Augusta and Quorn has been preserved as the Pichi Richi Tourist Railway.
Placeholder names are intentionally overly generic and ambiguous terms referring to things, places, or people, the names of which or of whom do not actually exist; are temporarily forgotten, or are unimportant; or in order to avoid stigmatization, or because they are unknowable and/or unpredictable given the context of their discussion; to de-emphasize in which event the precise specification thereof is otherwise impossible, or to deliberately expunge.
Journey Beyond is the business name of Experience Australia Group Pty Ltd, a private-equity-owned company, known mainly for operating Australian interstate experiential tourism trains. As of December 2021, the company was a diversified tourism business based in Adelaide, South Australia, with interests in cruise and air tourism in addition to rail. In January 2022, the United States travel company the Hornblower Group acquired the business from Quadrant Private Equity, which had owned it since 2016.
The North Australia Railway was a 509 km (316 mi) 1,067 mm narrow gauge railway in the Northern Territory of Australia which ran from the territory capital of Darwin, once known as Palmerston, to Birdum, just south of Larrimah. Initially its name was the Palmerston and Pine Creek Railway. The first section was opened 1889, the last in 1929. The railway closed in 1976.
Williams Field or Willy Field is a United States Antarctic Program airfield in Antarctica. Williams Field consists of two snow runways located on approximately 8 meters (25 ft) of compacted snow, lying on top of 8–10 ft of ice, floating over 550 meters (1,800 ft) of water. The airport, which is approximately seven miles from Ross Island, serves McMurdo Station and New Zealand's Scott Base. Until the 2009–10 summer season, Williams was the major airfield for on-continent aircraft operations in Antarctica.
Farthest South refers to the most southerly latitude reached by explorers before the first successful expedition to the South Pole in 1911.
Rumdoodle Peak, elevation 875 m ASL, is a small but prominent mountain in the north-western part of the North Masson Range of the Framnes Mountains in Antarctica, near Mawson Station.
The South Pole, also known as the Geographic South Pole, Terrestrial South Pole or 90th Parallel South, is the southernmost point on Earth and lies antipodally on the opposite side of Earth from the North Pole, at a distance of 12,430 miles in all directions. It is one of the two points where Earth's axis of rotation intersects its surface.
Many Antarctic research stations support satellite field camps which are, in general, seasonal camps. The type of field camp can vary – some are permanent structures used during the annual Antarctic summer, whereas others are little more than tents used to support short term activities. Field camps are used for many things, from logistics to dedicated scientific research.
Tourism started in Antarctica by the sea in the 1960s. Air overflights started in the 1970s with sightseeing flights by airliners from Australia and New Zealand, and were resumed in the 1990s. The (summer) tour season lasts from November to March. Most of the estimated 14,762 visitors to Antarctica from 1999–2000 were on sea cruises. During the 2009 to 2010 tourist season, over 37,000 people visited Antarctica.
When the Trans-Australian Railway was completed in 1917 from Kalgoorlie to Port Augusta, about 50 settlements of various sizes were established along the line, from which maintenance workers kept the track in operational condition. They and their families led an isolated life, although they were supplied with provisions by a weekly special train, which also provided banking and postal facilities. Passenger trains were hauled by steam locomotives, which needed to take on water at various stopping places. The 1930s to 1940s services required regular stops on the traverse.
woop woop.
