Tom Hayllar is a teacher, writer, bushwalker, caver, and adventurer. He has climbed inaccessible mountains in New Guinea, explored remote cave systems in New Guinea and the Philippines, walked across isolated Himalayan and Nepalese high country, and trekked lonely stretches of Alaska. In 1975 he was the first person to walk the 11,829 kilometer journey around Australia, and three years later he became the first person to traverse Australia on foot along its widest point from Cape Byron to Steep Point.

Tom Hayllar just loves to walk, but the journeys are enriched by the characters, landscapes, and even the hardships experienced along the way.

Here is how and why it was a long way walkin' in 1985 when he made the diagonal journey walking from Wilson's Promontory by the Tasman to where the Timor Sea laps the cliffs of the Northern Kimberley.

This walk, like his other long distance walks in Australia, is authenticated by the Guiness Book of Records.