Western Australia, Australia

Western Australia is a third of the continent with a tenth of the population, and the isolation is the defining fact of life — Perth is closer to Singapore than to Sydney, and the state has spent its entire existence being left out of national conversations. Perth is the sunniest capital in the country with beaches that locals genuinely consider the best anywhere; Margaret River is the wine and surf region three hours south that produces a disproportionate amount of the country's best wine; Broome is the pearling town in the tropical north with the Cable Beach sunset that people fly across the world for; the Kimberley is the ancient, genuinely enormous wilderness in the far north that most Australians will never see; and Ningaloo is the reef you can swim right off the beach onto.

The state's character is mining money, isolation and a genuine self-sufficiency. The Pilbara has the iron ore that built the country's economy and the fly-in-fly-out workers who rotate through it.

Expect real isolation confidence, genuine beach content, and a state that has never needed the east coast's opinion.

Nearby: Perth Darwin Adelaide Brisbane