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had made this damper a feast. Bill and Mat were sitting shoulder to shoulder under the overhang. They were near the fire and looking out onto the clear, fresh day. Feeling warm on the outside and warm on the inside, the two friends decided the world was a good place to be in. In fact, the camping expedition was now an experience they would never have wanted to miss.
    It was just at this moment of comfort and wellbeing that Bill absentmindedly started running his right hand in circular motions on the rock shelf floor. His fingers connected with some ribbony grooves. He wiped away a bit of gravel and dirt.
    â€˜What are you looking at?’ asked Mat.
    â€˜Dunno,’ said Bill examining the lines. ‘But it looks like someone’s got a carving knife into this.’
    Mat leaned across to get a better look. ‘Crikey! It’s Tiddalick!’
    â€˜It’s what?’ asked Bill.
    â€˜Nan’s frog!’
    Bill peered more closely. Sure enough, someone had used the natural curves, rises and irregularities of the rock floor to form a fat, rather cheerful frog.
    â€˜Look how they’ve used this bumpy bit of rock to give him a beer gut!’ said Bill.
    â€˜Yeah. It’s Bas Relief,’ explained Mat. ‘The Ancient Greeks used to do sculptures that sort of stuck out like that.’
    Bill was used to Mat being a bottomless pit of general knowledge, but this information seemed outside her normal areas of interest.
    â€˜Now, where would you pick up something like that?’ he asked.
    â€˜Tom, naturally. When he was doing his Art Diploma.’
    â€˜Well, whether the sculptor who did this frog knew about Ancient Greece or not, he was clever. Maybe he was saying this place was special.’ He remembered Nan saying the frog she’d painted on the Grubs’ combi was her ‘totem’. He wasn’t sure what ‘totem’ meant, but he guessed it was something like your footy team’s colour or your club symbol.
    â€˜I reckon Nan’s Tiddlywinks has kept an eye on us,’ smiled Bill.
    â€˜Tiddalick, you mean!’
    Bill made some frog croaks. Mat answered back. Somewhere out in the rain-soaked grasses below the rockshelf, a real frog gave a contented, yawny sort of croak in a deep baritone. Mat and Bill started giggling. Their lightheartedness coloured the rest of the day. Even the bird calls sounded especially chirpy – as fresh, energetic and noisy as kids mucking round in the playground before school starts. Matty and Bill built up the fire, and turned their clothes over, like toast, to dry on the other side. After this, Mat suggested they go fishing; she produced two small hand reels from the backpack. Mat and Bill raced to the creek that was now much higher and faster than the day before.
    â€˜So Matty, what do we use as bait?’ asked Bill.
    â€˜Damper,’ said Mat, handing Bill a small piece.
    They sat there, side-by-side, their lines taut in the hurtling waters. The morning sun was warm on their backs. They had survived two night-time ordeals. They were dry and full of good food. It didn’t botherBill if they caught a fish or not. But at that moment, Mat pulled in a fish. It was small, too small to eat. Bill gently released the hook from its mouth and Mat threw it back in.
    â€˜We can still tell the kids at school you caught a fish,’ said Bill.
    â€˜Yep,’ said Mat. ‘We don’t have to say how big.’
    And just as she said this, Bill felt an almighty tug on his line. He pulled quickly. Out onto the grass beside them flopped a brown fish – just short of a foot long, a bigger version of the one Mat had caught.
    Lunch was fish baked in foil and more hot damper. With full bellies, life had never seemed so good. The rest of the day was slow and easy. Keeping the fire going with regular hunts for wood was the most important job. But Mat and Bill also did a bit of exploring. The roof of the overhang was part of a