Joe contrived an apple pie from the dried apples I had scrounged from the Wandana last Sunday. He had garnished it with a flag cut from the label on a jam tin and written "Happy Returns" in flour but misjudged his lettering and the S of returns fell off. However it was a very fine birthday party and I venture to say that not many people reach their half century on the spurs of Mount Tozer. It was a pity that George could not be with us but I saved a nip of brandy for him when he comes down tomorrow - he will need it, birthday or not. Friday, 9 July 1948. This morning Willie Somerset and I went up again to the 1,300 foot camp to help George and Roy with the closing of that hospitable place. Van and Don, during their stay up there, had put up signs reading "Hotel Tozer", "Drive slowly" and such things. As on the Marine Phoenix we make our own fun, feeble though it may be, as we go along here. Willie and I made the trip up in good time and the camp was quickly de- molished and the return journey completed. We were back in the main camp at 400 feet before lunch time. George and Roy were hungry and suffering a bit from leech bites, of which I had a couple on Wednesday. My leeches are now in alcohol as specimens and I trust they form a new species. I spent the afternoon getting mail ready for next week's plane since we shall start packing tomorrow, leave here on Monday and probably have no other chance of getting mail out except by the truck returning to Iron Range after depositing us at Brown's Creek. Owing to the happy existence of the international date line and the fact that I saved a little of my brandy for George, my birthday is still going on in a rather weak sort of way, though it was very far from being rowdy at any time. Actually I can hardly recall such a quiet fiftieth anniversary for anybody. Last night and today were a little drier and the trail was not quite so greasy as it usually has been. We really are in bad need of a complete drying out as everything is damp and mildewed, even the covers of our journals and cata- logues, and almost all the envelopes I have with me have sealed themselves up tightly. In the stationery box at Iron Range there are plenty, with a bag of drying compound in the box, so we shall not be short. Brown's will be away from the mountains too, and we should be able to get ourselves somewhat less moist. Saturday, 10 July 1948. For a change, this morning dawned bright and sunny, waking me from a sleep which had been rather troubled because my bed had been invaded by myriads of tiny black ants. I think I got them at Portland Roads last Sunday and they have been multiplying every since. They have no bite but tickle excruciatingly. In the morning I went over to the Claudie River Gorge, had a bath and washed my shirt there. Our water supply in camp, although adequate for cook- ing and that sort of thing, is too scanty and its puddles too small and full of vegetation to allow a decent job of laundering to be done. My shirt and I dried out nicely in the hot sun and before going over there I had put out all my bedding and hope to sleep tonight untroubled. Packing is starting and the main part of it, including the taking-up of traps, will be finished tomorrow. We hope that our supplies on the Lei sha, which should have been on the Wandana, will be in this evening, and that the Main Roads truck will be here early on Monday.