"Live the Cover!" Contest: Thailand

Great Travel Moment

When I slam on the brakes, swerving the car onto the shoulder of the road, I haven't encountered a single living creature in the five days I've been driving along the Tasmanian coast. Tasmania, the island off the tip of Australia, is a wilderness state: brittle burnt fields smack up against pristine turquoise ocean, and pervading all, emptiness. But as I step out of the car and approach a field filled with sheep, one of the creatures lifts a cautious head to peer at me, and then, suddenly, they all do. Hundreds of wide moist eyes hover before me, as if expecting my arrival.The next instant, they turn away, moving into the shadows as quickly as they had come. Yet, in a terrain of solitude so complete that every living thing scuttles away from every other living thing, I have briefly encountered an intense moment of connection.