David’s next big adventure

After a stint in Vietnam and Malaysia, Australia’s favourite gay reality TV star David Graham has clocked up 50 countries. Not bad for a salt-of-the-earth bloke who loves his farm.

Soon he’ll be setting off on a two-month South American adventure, one of the trips he won as a Big Brother contestant.

Graham’s love of travel extends back to a youthful search for meaning as he began to accept his sexuality.

The whole reason for me to do 12 months of backpacking to dodgy places in my early days was to ask the question: is it natural to be gay? And I wanted to visit all these different cultures, and they are everywhere, he said.

Since leaving Big Brother Graham’s star has risen. A spate of guest appearances and a stint on Channel Seven’s Dancing With The Stars followed. Rumours are wild that he has been asked to host a travel show, but he says that’s a dream job that hasn’t yet come his way.

I would love to do a travel show but at the minute I am caught up on the farm. But, after two months in South America I might be crying out for another few pages to fill in my passport, he said.

It’s not all been foxtrots and fluffy TV spots: Graham has returned to the land to make a fist of what he does best -“ farming. And he’s had an innovative way to make a living through the drought.

His four-month-old business, Farmer Dave’s Free Range Lamb, is introducing premium, organic meat to south-east Queensland tables thanks to a drought-tolerant breed of African sheep. These animals grow no wool and can survive on briars and bark as well as grass.

It’s a venture inspired not just from a desire to beat the drought, but also his travels.

When I was travelling in the Middle East back in 1999 and 2000 I saw all these different breeds of sheep that live off absolutely nothing, he said.

I thought we have that many droughts here, we may as well have a sheep that can tolerate them.

Graham’s friends and family will be picking up the slack with the business while he heads overseas, accompanied by one of his best mates. He says this next trip won’t be a romantic one -“ there’s no boyfriend on the scene.

I wish, I wish. I don’t have time to, um, fraternise, he said.

Maybe I’ll meet a beautiful, handsome Peruvian. I do like the dark ones and apparently there’s a whole continent of them over there.

From bnews -“ www.bnews.net.