High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Walkabout is a novel written by James Vance Marshall, first published in 1959. It is about two children who get lost in the Australian Outback and are helped by an Aborigine on his walkabout. A film based on the book came out in 1971, but deviated from the original plot.The book opens with two siblings, Mary and Peter, in a gully with diminishing food supplies. They are lost as a result of a plane crash and after swimming, and eating the last of their food, they decide to walk to their destination in Adelaide which, unknown to them, is across the continent.They leave and start walking across the desert. They climb some hills and Peter sees what he thinks is the ocean. Mary looks and realises it is nothing more than salt in the desert. To keep this knowledge from Peter, she tells him they will rest below the hill.