Why Travel Guides Stack and Mel nearly missed out on the show

Identical twin cowgirls Stack and Mel are one of the highlights of Nine’s hit TV show Travel Guides.

The sisters are willing to give anything a crack and their dry sense of humour has won over thousands of viewers.

But Stack said told Holidays with Kids, they were worried they had blown their chance to be on the hit show after their application went disastrously wrong.

“I saw the ad come up and I’d never had a passport, never on been on a holiday and I thought, ‘why not?’,” Stack said.

She took a screenshot of the Travel Guides advertisement, Googled the show to check that it was real and then filled out the application.

Stack named her twin Mel as a co-applicant but she didn’t tell her about it.

“The next day they called me and said that they were interested,” Stack said.

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Taken by surprise

The Travel Guides producer also called Mel and her reaction was… interesting.

“I had a producer called Tom call me and I was at the sale yard and we had about 5000 weiners, so I was flat out, and I thought it was a joke,” Mel said.

“I was like ‘yeah right, I might ring you back tomorrow when I’m not busy’.

“I thought it was all a hoax but he rang me back the next day and he goes ‘nah like I’m actually serious’.”

Mel called her sister soon after to tell her about the weird prank call. But quickly realised that Stack had actually applied.

“I got talking to Stacy and I was like, ‘there’s no way we’re gonna get it sorry because I just hung up on him’.”

Redemption

The twins thought their chances were over. But after a few Skype interviews, Stack and Mel managed to score an invitation to the Travel Guides auditions in Melbourne.

As the producers were showing them cars, the girls started to fight.

“It was a proper argument, punching me in the arm and everything,” Stack said.

But they made it through, and we’re glad they did.

Travel Guides Stack and Mel take on Australia

In 2020, the Travel Guides have been confined to Australia. Stack and Mel say that’s given them an appreciation for Australia’s diversity.

“We don’t have to worry about different languages, different money or what we can do, we can do everything and anything,” Stack said.

“You want to be hot, you can go to the desert, you want beach, we’ve got stacks, we’ve got snow, doesn’t matter what you like, Australia has it.”

In order to keep the show going, all the contestants were regularly swabbed for COVID-19.

“Oh, it’s brutal,” Mel said of her nine COVID-19 tests.

“I really struggle with them. It makes me gag. I’m the worst person ever.”

In the latest episode (now on catch up) Stack and Mel travelled to the Northern Territory, sleeping on camp beds and exploring Kings Canyon and Uluru.

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