Iron Range will be a splendid area for us. Much rain-forest on the Claudie River, and on ridges of the coastal plain, as well as on the eastern face of the mountains. Doug Fisher, agent for ANA, invites me to stay with him at Portland Roads on my return trip and he will have his son drive me through the country. The tip of the Peninsula also looks good. Our course took us several miles west of Higgins Field and right over Red Island Point ("RIP"). Extensive patches of rain-forest on low hills south and east of RIP, and continuous rain-forest on the same line of hills toward the NE. Horn Island, where we landed on an old military strip, is sep- arated from Thursday Island by a strait about a mile wide. A flat- tish big island covered with savanna-forest of Eucalyptus and other low trees. For further notes on flight see small notebook. Although our plane landed on Horn Island about 3:00 PM, and actual travel time from there to Thursday Island was but thirty minutes, it was 4:30 before I got settled in the Torres Strait Hotel. The plane had to be fuelled before we climbed aboard a decrepit old Army truck to drive to the almost equally decrepit old military wharf. Upon arrival at T.I. we had to wait on the pier until someone found a truck to take cargo and ourselves to the Agent's office. George Assange, the agent, is a half Malay, half white, who also keeps a small store. Through ANA of Cairns, I had an advance reservation at the Torres Strait, but I had first to awake the barman, who woke the proprietor- ess, who had the colored maid make up a bed for me. It was a few minutes before five before I got down to the B. P. establishment on the waterfront, to find the manager, Charlie Mills, about to close up and join the evening beer session. Went along with him to Kelleher's Federal Hotel next door, and met practically all the civil servants and business men of the town. Beer is scarce. Each of the four hotels puts on a nine-gallon keg at five o'clock five days a week. The beer disappears in a few minutes, leaving the really thirsty ones no choice but to carry on on hard liquor. Thursday, Feb. 5 Have met about everyone in town, have spent one evening at the house of Tom Loney, the government official who functions as mayor while war damages are being repaired, and another evening in the house of Percy Jensen, Protector of Islanders. Arrangements for our work on the tip are as complete as they can be made in advance. Tom Holland came to T.I. today to have some teeth fixed and I have talked with him. He will do our transport with a 4x4 truck at a charge of £6 per day including fuel and driver. We will probably be able to hire a jeep from Tom's brother Stan. Our first base camp will be at Holland's sawmill, on the Somerset road about two miles NE of Lockerbie. The sawmill is in an open pocket in the best rain-forest on the Tip. Our next camp will most likely be on the east coast about a mile SE of Lake Bronto, three miles S. of Somerset, and six miles E. of Camp #1. Camp #2 will give us coastal sand dunes, freshwater lakes rising and falling with the tides, turkey bush, rain-forest and savanna-forest. Mutee Head, near the mouth of the Jardine River, about 18 miles SW of Camp #1, will probably be a good locality in which to spend any spare time we have.