NOT being a connoisseur of Bill Bryson, I attended the adaptation of his number one best-seller - Down Under - with an open mind.

From the size of the audience it was evident that the author has a strong following, or perhaps the success of the previous tours - The Lost Continent and Notes from a Small Island - had fanned the fire.

Coincidentally a friend from Sydney called me as I had one foot out the door for the theatre, and was not pleased to hear where I was headed.

"It'll be all snakes, spiders and bush," he said, which wasn't strictly true.

There was talk of jellyfish, flies and surf, too.

Credit to Steve Steen for maintaining the pace of the one-man show, although you couldn't help but think there was meant to be more laughter oiling the joints.

As we travelled east from Perth to Sydney and north to Alice Springs, there was a flavour of the magnificent continent, and it definitely started my wanderlust tingling.

While there does seem a tradition of parodying, simplifying and belittling Oz, safe to say, 12,000 miles off, who's having the louder laugh.

Julie Harries