Wednesday, 1 September 1948. This has been one of my busiest days; checking of stores, writing of letters, packing of equipment all had to be done somehow but has. Van has been too sick to do very much though it seems that an upset stomach is the trouble. Joe has been drunk all day, Len had to go and meet Marie, his wife, at 2 P.M. and of course we have seen little of them since. Don has been running around about his own business, the three blacks prudently kept out of sight completely, so that leaves George and myself. The laundry we sent out this morning came back in time to be packed but was far from clean. However, at least it was a job that we could have some- body else do, for a change, and was that much of a help. As a consequence of the above, I have not been able to see much of Cook- town by daylight yet and we shall leave fairly early tomorrow morning. I do have to walk down to the post office and air freight station so shall be able to form some impressions then, I hope, but I cannot do much about describing the place just yet. As for our outward journey, there will not be much time and we shall probably land here in the afternoon of the 28th and leave that night for Cairns. There is a weekly boat but that of the following week would not give us time to do the jobs that have to be done in Cairns. All in all this last month promises to be about the most hectic of the lot. I don't quite know what Marie's destiny is - Len has spoken of taking her up to Shipton's Flat with us, which might serve to put Joe on his mettle a bit. Joe was so far gone that he burst into tears on being presented to Marie, overcome with the pathos of it all. He then had a short sleep and went back to the bar. But, getting back to Marie, I shall simply have to write on that subject later also. I found time this morning to have my hair cut, the first since Thursday Island on May 31st; most of it fell down my neck and I shall now go and have a shower to get rid of it. Thursday, 2 September 1948. It is appropriate, since this is the last camp save for subsidiaries, that it should be the best, and it is. We left Cooktown about 11 A.M. in the truck of a lad names Norman Watkin, who lives at a place called Helenvale, about nine miles north of the Flat. It should be understood, with these named places, that there is usually only one house there, and at Helenvale there is only the house of the Watkin's. It is a bush hotel and also bears the name of "The Lion's Den Hotel". Itinerant bushmen can get lodging for the night there and really it is a very comfortable place - we had lunch there. After lunch we moved on up to Shipton's Flat, nestling under the shadow of Mount Finnegan, which looms high above and looks something of a climb. But when we got to the Flat we found a small village of abandoned huts, clean, white large and divided into cubicles so that we have private bedrooms. It is just about as luxurious as the Commercial Hotel, Cooktown. We moved in with prompt- ness and pleasure, Len and Marie having one of the huts, the blacks having another and the rest of us sharing the largest of the lot. I am not sure when work was finished by the lumber people who erected and used to occupy the huts, but they are in excellent condition. Joe had had a very large night last night and had been in the bar from 8 A.M. until we left, with the result that he slept precariously on top of the truck and its load, to which the rest of us also clung. At some stage in his Cooktown visit he had bought himself a pseudo-Panama hat; that went and was retrieved but at a later stage got between some parts of the cargo which were shifting and became more pseudo. Poor old Joe is a sad case; it is a reason- [illegible] that instead of going prospecti