When Travel Is Your Paycheck
They’ve conducted studies about us backpacking hippies, or “experience seekers,” which is the current politically correct term.
We’re travelers who have our working holiday visas. They know who we are, why we come, and, most important, how much we spend and how much we pay them in taxes. Make no mistake: Working holidays function economically by providing a cheap labor force and a source of public and private revenue. That is why we’re allowed to go to Australia.
And when we’re there? Finding the one wave that’s going off can be maddening when there are so many options. At the same time it’s sort of awesome. How often do you pull up to overhead reef waves and go, “Nah, let’s check somewhere else…?”
