A British backpacker has been complimented on her English speaking skills and told that she “almost” sounds like she is fluent in the language. 

The incident occurred in room three at the Mission Beach Retreat backpacking hostel in Queensland, Australia when 37 year old Caroline Gough from North Devon entered into a conversation with her two newest roommates.

Caroline explained “When you meet new roommates, the conversation is pretty predictable, everyone talks about where they’ve been and where they’re going, and these girls were going to Magnetic Island next, which is where I’ve just come from. They hadn’t booked a hostel yet, and they wanted to know what the koala park was like, so I was telling them all about my experiences, although I did leave out the bit about doing an science experiment to test if the island really was magnetic because that’s not really the sort of thing you share in the first conversation with a new person.”

But instead of thanking Caroline for her advice or asking any further questions, the girls who come from Ludwigsburg near Stuttgart in Germany instead honed in on the way she had delivered the information.

“One of the girls said that she was really impressed with my English skills and that I sounded as if I was almost fluent,” said Caroline. “She asked how long I’d been learning English and when I said I’d been learning it all my life she said it was really great that I’d had the opportunity to start at such a young age.”

It then emerged that the girls believed Caroline was from Sweden.

“When I explained that I was actually from England, both girls insisted quite vehemently that they had both assumed I was Swedish, as if a simple two-against-one scenario meant that I was outvoted and they knew more about my ancestry and upbringing than I did.”

Caroline who spent five days in Gothenburg in 2011 said “As far as I know, this is the first time that I have been mistaken for a Scandinavian.”

Caroline admits that during her travels her hair has become much longer and blonder than usual which might fit the stereotypical Swedish look. “However, I would have thought that as soon as I started speaking, it would be obvious that I’m not from Sweden,” she said.

Caroline who scored a grade A for her English Language A level and went on to gain an honours degree in English Language and Linguistics at university said “Obviously I’m going to need to work a bit harder on my speaking skills if I want other backpackers to believe that I am truly fluent in my native tongue.”

She added “Luckily I can also speak very rusty German, so I think I’ll just use that if the girls from Ludwigsburg speak to me again. I don’t think they will though. It seems that me not being Swedish has really annoyed them.”

An island has been living under a false name for 248 years and 14 days it has been announced.

The island which lies 8km east of Townsville in Queensland, Australia was christened Magnetic Island on 6th June 1770 by Captain Cook who recorded a magnetic effect upon the ship’s compass when sailing near the island.

But British backpacker Caroline Gough who is currently staying on the island has today carried out a series of conclusive tests which confirmed that the island is in fact not magnetic.

Caroline who got a C in GCSE Science told our reporter: “I remember several lessons involving magnets at Georgeham Primary School back in the eighties, and I have also supported students to explore magnets during my career as a special needs teacher. So I thought I was suitably qualified to conduct my own magnetic experiments on the island.”

Caroline carefully selected a range of utensils from the youth hostel kitchen and borrowed some stationery items from reception before setting off to conduct her experiments.

“I took all of the objects to various places around the island” she said “but at no time was there any scientific evidence that the island was having any sort of magnetic effect upon any of the objects.”

Caroline believes her results were conclusive and that no further tests are required.

“During the experiment I learnt that Australian coins are not magnetic and that restaurants use magnetic cutlery so that they can retrieve accidentally discarded cutlery from the bin,” she told us. “So it’s been a particularly educational day.”

Caroline said “I suppose I will now submit my findings to the Queensland Board of all things Scientific. And they can start the process of changing the name to

something more accurate. Like Not Magnetic Island maybe.”

Have you got a great idea for Magnetic Island’s new name? Tell us today and if Queensland votes for your name suggestion, you could be in with the chance of winning an extra special prize (or possibly a fridge magnet).

A Queensland waitress has spent her evening shift demonstrating that she knows all the words to each and every song played in the pub restaurant, but cannot name a single vegetable that comes with the Sunday roast dinner.

The waitress loudly sang her way through Ed Sheeran’s “Perfect”, Take That’s “Greatest Day” and Billy Joel’s “Piano Man” putting far more enthusiasm into her singing than her table wiping or customer service skills.

Caroline Gough who was dining at the restaurant in Horseshoe Bay on Magnetic Island had initially considered ordering the Sunday roast but first wanted to clarify exactly which vegetables would accompany it.

“The waitress seemed a bit stunned by my question and spent several seconds blinking and stumbling for what to say before giving her answer.”

The waitress explained to Caroline that all the vegetables were seasonal ones. Caroline asked what sort of seasonal vegetables and the waitress said “ones that have grown this season.”

“Obviously at this point I played the tourist card,” said Caroline “And explained that as I come from England, I don’t know what’s seasonal in Queensland in June. Clearly the waitress doesn’t know what’s seasonal in Queensland in June either, because she just looked blank and said ‘potatoes’ in an unconvincing voice.”

The waitress did not appear to think  it was her responsibility to take any further steps to confirm what the seasonal vegetables might be, and Caroline who suffers from colitis and can’t tolerate certain vegetables decided she did not want to risk a blind date with a plate of seasonal vegetables that might make her unwell, so she ordered a chicken parmigiana and chips instead. “You know where you are with that,” she told us.

Once Caroline had made her decision, the waitress decided there was no need for any further conversation and instead threw herself lustily into a heartfelt rendition of “You don’t have to say you love me” by Dusty Springfield.

Hoards of pedestrians attending the Vivid light display in Sydney have been demonstrating their road safety skills by waiting for the green man, despite all the roads being closed to vehicles for the duration of the evening.

This is the tenth year that Vivid has lit up the skies of Sydney, and with so many people flocking to Circular Quay to see the iconic Sydney Harbour Bridge and Opera House light up, all surrounding roads are closed to vehicles each evening at 5pm and do not reopen until midnight.

Nevertheless hundreds of Australians and international tourists demonstrated that none of them were prepared to go and see the spectacular lights of Vivid until they had first seen that everyday green light lead them safely across the road at a series of zebra crossings close to Circular Quay.

Caroline Gough who was attending Vivid for the first time said “At first, you automatically follow the crowd, and when they all stop at the zebra crossing, so do you. But then it dawned on me that the roads were clear all of the time, so I’m not sure exactly what we were waiting for. If there were lots of parents and children around I’d understand them wanting to practise waiting for the green man, but these were hoards of adults, and there were so many of us streaming towards Circular Quay that we barely all fitted onto the pavement.”

As a visitor to the country Caroline felt unsure about being the one to break the rules and cross the road without waiting for the green man. “I did it once,” she said “and looked over my shoulder to see if anyone was going to follow me, but nobody did.”

Caroline spent several hours enjoying the Vivid light display both at Circular Quay and the following evening at Taronga Zoo. “The animals at the zoo were very bright and very large,” she said. “I suspect they may have had some extra E numbers added to their daily feed.”

A British backpacker has spoken of the possibility that she may bring a lifesize wombat home to England despite admitting that it would be a financial and logistical nightmare.

Caroline Gough first saw the lifesize wombats for sale several months ago at a souvenir shop near the Opera House at Sydney’s Circular Quay.

“Lots of people take home koala or kangaroo memorabilia,” she said. “But wombats don’t seem to be as popular. And these ones are particularly cute. I can definitely picture one of them sitting beside my fireplace at home.”

The wombats come in the sizes of large and even larger and retail at the prices of AU$99 (£56.32) and AU$175 (£99.56) respectively.

“Obviously I don’t want one now,” said Caroline. “He would be far too cumbersome to lug around Australia and I’d rather be spending my money on seeing real animals than buying fake ones. But I can just imagine that when it’s my last night in Australia and I’m walking around Sydney wishing the adventure wasn’t about to be over, I may well convince myself that buying a lifesize wombat is exactly what I need to help myself feel better about leaving.”

Caroline has contacted her airline to find out how feasible it would be to bring a lifesize wombat onto the plane. “I wouldn’t say they were exactly thrilled about it,” she said. “But I don’t think he’s any bigger than those giant wheelable suitcases that qualify for hand luggage. I’m sure I could fit him in an overhead locker.”

A water bottle has spoken of how he feels used and broken after being sensationally dumped by British backpacker Caroline Gough this morning.

The water bottle explained “Caroline picked me up on a night out in Queenstown soon after she arrived in New Zealand and from that moment on we were pretty much inseparable. Even on that very first night, Caroline took me to bed with her. We never needed to talk about our relationship because it was just so natural. Wherever she went, so did I. We never spent a night or day apart.”

Caroline and the water bottle spent two months travelling around New Zealand together before flying on to Sydney, Australia in April.

“Caroline was so excited about returning to Australia,” said the water bottle. “We didn’t even discuss whether or not I’d be coming travelling with her, we both instinctively knew that I would.”

At first Caroline and the water bottle continued to follow a similar routine to the one they’d had in New Zealand, spending every day and night together.

“Then this morning Caroline needed to condense her luggage ahead of the next train journey and started to gather up the things she didn’t need anymore. We walked over to the recycle bin to throw away an empty strawberry punnet and some tatty maps and leaflets from places we’d recently visited. I couldn’t believe it when she threw me in there as well.

Yesterday she did sniff my neck and told me it was a bit smelly, but that’s the only negative thing she said about me in the whole time we were together. This has been a huge shock. I can see now that she has used me, and that I am just one insignificant bottle in a whole string of water bottles that she picks up and dumps at her convenience. She’s probably already moved on to the next one. Meanwhile I have to lie here with a crumpled map of Dunedin, a boarding pass from our flight to Kerikeri and a leaflet for the aquarium. I am literally surrounded by memories of when we were together.”

Miss Gough was unavailable for comment but was seen leaving a convenience store in Moorabool Street Geelong looking happy and relaxed with a 500ml Mount Franklin water bottle.

A British backpacker has found herself starring in a collection of scenic photographs taken by previously unknown German photographer Natascha Zimmermann.

The photographs were taken in a variety of locations during an organised two day tour of the Great Ocean Road in Victoria, Australia.

Caroline Gough from North Devon explained “Natascha was travelling alone and so was I. When we got to the first beach, she offered to take my photo and I did the same for her. As a solo traveller you don’t often get to appear in your own photographs, so this seemed like a mutually beneficial arrangement.”

The situation quickly escalated however, as it emerged that Natascha had quite a controlling personality and was also very much a perfectionist.

Caroline explained “At every location I had to take five photographs of Natascha with this huge heavy camera of hers that I was terrified of breaking. One photo of Natascha with sunglasses on, one with sunglasses off, one of her with her facing away from me looking at the view, one of her with her back to me and her arms outstretched in what she called her ‘flying’ pose and another of her facing the camera with her arms in a letter Y position, which she called the ‘sunworshipper’. Then because her super-duper camera doesn’t have wifi, I had to take at least one, but often three, more photo of her with my phone, so that I could What’sApp them to her and she could instantly put them on Facebook. Then we’d walk about six steps, see the same view from a slightly different angle and the whole process would start all over again.”

After Caroline had taken the photographs, Natascha would scrutinize them, and often order for them to be retaken if Caroline hadn’t taken the perfect photo.

Natascha was equally controlling when it was her turn to take photographs of Caroline. Caroline explained “Really I would have been happy with just a couple of photos here and there, but Natascha took things to a completely different level, ordering me to turn and look at the view, look at the camera, stand on one leg, it was a nightmare.”

Caroline had also made the unwitting mistake of wearing clothes that sparked Natascha’s artistic imagination. “Because I was swimming at each location we visited I ended up just throwing on my sarong when I got out of the sea, and wearing it over my bikini for a lot of the day. Then in the evening I was wearing my cardigan that thinks it’s a rug. Both of these items are long and flowing which really excited Natascha and she was keen to photograph me in a variety of weird poses which apparently brought my clothes to life. It didn’t help that there was a guy from America who kept nodding in agreement and saying unhelpful things like ‘ethereal baby.’ ”

Possibly the most ironic part of the story, is that Natascha herself is in fact not a very good photographer. “There’s this rock formation called the Grotto” Caroline explained. “And it’s quite a famous location along the Great Ocean Road because if you stand right in the centre of it and the photographer aligns it correctly, it looks like you are in a huge rocky photo frame. I’ve seen other people’s photos in the past and they always look really cool. This  was one photo of myself I really did want to get and I was totally going to be uploading my photo onto Facebook as my new profile picture as soon as I got some wifi.”

However when Caroline looked at her photo of herself at The Grotto, she realised that Natascha had missed the point completely and not placed Caroline in the photo frame at all. “I was very disappointed,” admitted Caroline.

Things came to a head on the final day of the tour when the group stopped for lunch in the seaside town of Apollo Bay. Caroline said “I could foresee that it was going to be a painful hour of wandering from café to café waiting for Natascha to find an appropriate vegan dish. Then she’d want to have a photoshoot of whatever she was eating, another photoshoot of me and her in different poses on the beach and then it would be time to get back on the bus. None of that really appealed to me so I announced that I wasn’t very hungry and was going to spend the whole hour in the sea.”

Witnesses confirmed that Natascha was seen sadly roaming the town, before picking at a cold bean and rice salad.

A group of backpackers have been left baffled after their tour guide left them at a disused quarantine station for two hours, the Cazmanian Times can reveal.

The 14 backpackers who hail from a range of countries including China, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom joined the two day tour in Melbourne yesterday morning.

British backpacker Caroline Gough explained “the itinerary was packed full of beaches and the opportunity to see Australian wildlife all over the Bellarine and Mornington Peninsulas, before heading to Phillip Island on the final evening to see the penguins come out of the water at bedtime. I love beaches and I love wildlife, so it seemed like the perfect tour for me.”

However with so many places to visit, the time spent at each location was fairly fleeting. “It was the height of the Australian summer,” said Caroline “and I was wearing my bikini under my clothes in the hope that I would get the chance to swim at some of the beaches. But every time we stopped, our tour guide barely gave us chance to take a photo before herding everyone back on the bus to go to the next destination.

Therefore you can imagine our surprise the next morning when he ordered us all off the bus and said he’d see us in two hours.”

The quarantine station, located at Point Napean near Sorrento, Victoria began operations in 1852 when many passengers travelling from Liverpool to Australia on the ship Ticonderoga got Typhus during the voyage. Many died and were buried on site at the quarantine hospital whilst others had a period of quarantine at the station. It has since closed but lives on as a tourist attraction, with parts of the station set up as it would have originally looked.

” I’m not saying I didn’t enjoy it,” said Caroline. “It was interesting to have a bit of a history lesson and to see some of the objects and documents from back then. I just think it’s incredibly bizarre that the one place that wasn’t even on the itinerary, is the place we spent the longest amount of time.”

Initially the backpackers had split off to explore independently or in natural groups. “After about half an hour when we were fairly sure there was nothing left to see, we all congregated together on a grassy hill and compared notes incase anyone in the group had stumbled upon anything that might warrant spending two whole hours there,” said Caroline.

“We can only assume he dumped us there because his secret lover lives nearby. Especially as he was 20 minutes late picking us up.”

A British backpacker has been left furious after her bunk mate unplugged her phone and battery pack in favour of charging his own.

The incident happened at the King Street backpackers in Melbourne late last night.

Caroline Gough explained: “both my phone and my portable charger were running low on juice so I plugged them into the electrical socket just before I went to bed. About 15 minutes later, the guy who had the bunk beneath me came in and went to bed. At the time I thought nothing of it.”

However it has now emerged that soon after the bunk mate entered the room, he unplugged Miss Gough’s electrical equipment, causing her phone battery to dwindle to 9%

Miss Gough said “I’m lucky the phone lived long enough for the alarm to go off. If I’d known he was going to do this, I definitely wouldn’t have wasted so much phone battery playing Boggle last night.”

Miss Gough who would usually show consideration for her sleeping room mates when checking out of a shared room early in the morning instead stropped about noisily, muttering words like “selfish” and “inconsiderate” in combination with several of her most favourite Great British expletives in the general direction of her sleeping bunk mate.

A British backpacker was treated to some unexpected in flight entertainment when she boarded the flight from Perth to Melbourne this evening.

Caroline Gough who had intended to spend the three hour flight catching up on her diary and looking out of the window instead found herself sitting next to Jason, a 34 year old night security guard who was travelling out of Western Australia for the first time.

Caroline explained “It began before I even sat down. When I arrived at seat 29A it looked as though someone was already sitting there. But it transpired that it was just Jason’s sleeping bag and huge anorak, arranged on the seat to look like a person. Jason initially asked if I could find a different seat as he had so much luggage but I explained that I had to sit in the one allocated to me.”

Once seated, Caroline tried very hard not to mind as Jason’s elbow, sleeping bag and anorak continuously protruded into her personal space. “I was really hoping the air hostess would come along and insist he put his things in the overhead locker, but he managed to squash them all down flat when she walked by, and she didn’t notice.”

Jason who was on his way to Melbourne for a stag party had already had several alcoholic beverages before boarding the plane. After the cabin crew had sat down for takeoff, Jason turned around and asked very loudly if they could please bring him a vodka and some pear cider,  but he was told that as the plane was currently taking off he would have to wait. “I don’t think Jason has travelled on many planes,” Caroline told us.

Jason was disappointed that the drinks trolley started at the other end of the plane and pressed his call button several times to try and hurry the proceedings, however this was unsuccessful.

When the trolley arrived at row 29, Jason wasted no time putting in his order for two pear ciders and a mini bottle of vodka. Caroline then attempted to order a hot chocolate at which point the cabin crew realised that Caroline and Jason weren’t a couple and that all the alcohol he had bought was for his own consumption. “We’re not supposed to serve more than two alcoholic drinks per person per hour,” said the air hostess worriedly.

Jason had several friends dotted around the plane, including one who was sitting behind him. “He turned on his phone to take a picture of his mate who had fallen asleep, and then casually commented that he didn’t think you were supposed to use phones on aeroplanes, but it must be okay because he’d seen me using mine. Trying not to panic, I asked him if he had it in flight mode and he said no. I quickly helped him to find flight mode, but he didn’t seem to understand the importance of it. He was too busy lamenting the fact that the plane didn’t have wifi and this was when he suggested a game of I Spy instead.”

Jason’s first offering was “I Spy with my little eye something that sounds like Can Fun”. After quite some time, Caroline successfully realised that the answer was “Man Bun” and hoped the man with the bun sitting directly in front of her hadn’t heard their conversation.

Jason’s sleeping mate woke up to join in the next round which Caroline had announced was something beginning with D. Jason’s mate randomly guessed detention, dementia, and defencer, none of which were visible on the plane.  Jason asked if it was a verb or a noun. “I told him it was an abstract noun, but that confused him so I simplified it by telling him it was outside. Jason triumphantly shouted ‘air’ but I reminded him it began with a D. His mate chimed in with “devil” before Jason successfully guessed “darkness”.

Next Jason had D for dreadlocks, but as nobody on the plane had dreadlocks, Caroline had to rely on Jason’s clues  (“a bit like a man bun but not” and “rastafarian”) before she could guess correctly.

The conversation then turned to England and Caroline attempted to dispel Jason’s belief that everyone has to go to the pub in England because there’s nothing else to do.

Then the drinks trolley came past again and Jason attempted to buy two more pear ciders and another mini bottle of vodka. Caroline told us: “the cabin crew refused to serve him because he’d already had his three drinks. He said that they were for his mate who had gone back to sleep behind us. The cabin crew told Jason to press the call button when his mate woke up and then he could buy the drinks. Jason stood up, whacked his mate in the belly and told the cabin crew that his mate was now awake.”

As a passenger is only allowed two drinks per hour Jason could only purchase a cider and a vodka for his companion. His companion promptly went back to sleep and Jason drank both drinks himself, complaining about the alcohol purchasing restrictions.

“It’s so stupid that we can’t drink as much as we want. We’re not children,” he said to Caroline, then proceeded to draw male genitalia all over the sick bag before placing it back into the pocket in front of him.

“He told me it will cheer up the next person who feels sick” said Caroline.

A British backpacker has been left baffled after browsing the selection of books at her latest hostel.

Caroline Gough, who has been travelling around Australia and New Zealand for the past six months explained “Most hostels have a book swap shelf. It’s great for leaving behind the book you’ve just finished and choosing a new one. I’ve read some brilliant books by authors I would never have heard of if I hadn’t come backpacking.”

However when Caroline began the search for a new book at the Ocean Beach Backpackers in Cottesloe, she was somewhat surprised by the selection available.

“Most people can probably get by in life without ever needing one copy of ‘The World of Carpets’, yet this hostel has two copies available. And I’d love to meet the backpacker who has the strength to add ‘Adam’s Empire’ to his or her backpack and trek round Australia with it.”

The bookshelf also appears to have  specialist section about women, featuring titles such as ‘Bra Gift’ and ‘The Wild Genie – the Healing Power of Menstruation’ as well as books about beach houses, English country houses and things that bogans like.

Caroline said “There were some books by authors I like, including Jojo Moyes and Harlen Coben, but unfortunately they were written in other languages. I am currently on a 184 day streak of learning Dutch with the Duo Lingo App on my phone, but as I’m still learning fairly basic phrases such as ‘the cat has a tail’ and ‘the man is eating a sandwich’ I’m probably not yet fluent enough to tackle a gritty thriller written in anything other than English.”

Caroline will depart to the Billabong Hostel in Perth later this evening where she hopes to find a more mainstream selection of books to choose from.

A desperate backpacker reportedly went to extraordinary lengths to try and block out a snoring roommate at a hostel in Perth yesterday evening.

Caroline Gough who was the last to go to bed in the six bed dormitory explained: “The room was dark when I went in, and smelt like a thousand farts. Plus somebody was snoring really loudly. It was a real sensory experience.”

Caroline who usually ensures that essential items such as her sleeping mask, toothbrush and earplugs are placed under her pillow so that she can find them in the dark admits she made a rookie mistake. “The mask and toothbrush were there, but there was no sign of the earplugs. I couldn’t believe it.”

Whilst Caroline’s quiet rustling in her bag was enough to briefly stop the roommate from snoring, ultimately she was unsuccessful in locating the earplugs, and this is when she resorted to desperate measures.

“When I’m in Australia, I only buy confectionary that isn’t available in England,” she said. “And although I couldn’t find my  earplugs, I did find a packet of sweets, or lollies as they call them here in Australia.”

The sweets, made by the Australian confectionary company Allen’s are designed to look like drumstick ice creams, similar to a British Cornetto.  “They are very foamy in texture.” explained Caroline “In fact they are quite similar to an earplug in terms of size and squishiness.”

Caroline said “There was no way I was going to be able to sleep with the unrelentless noise of Dora the Snorer, so I decided to experiment with the foamy sweets.”

The sweets come in a variety of three flavours. “The chocolate ones and boysenberry ones are delicious,” said Caroline. “But the vanilla ones don’t have a lot of flavour, so I decided they could be sacrificed so that I could get a good night’s sleep.”

Caroline first attempted to put the cone end into her ear canal. “It’s sort of the right shape,” she explained. “But it didn’t bounce into place the way that an earplug does.” Caroline then attempted to put the ice cream end into her ear, and when that didn’t work, she bit it in half and tried to nibble it into a suitable shape to work as an earplug. “Sadly I couldn’t make it work,” she told us. “Foam sweets are clearly not designed to be substitute earplugs. All that really happened was I got a bit of an earache.”

The next morning after a dreadful night’s sleep, Caroline discovered a full packet of earplugs in her pajama pocket. “I had obviously put them there so that they would be easy to find” she told us.

The Cazmanian Times does not recommend that readers should attempt to insert any type of confectionary into their ear canals.

They are well known for swimming around in circles and having a 7 second memory but a group of spangled emperors up at the Ningaloo Reef in Western Australia claim that they are far more intelligent than people give them credit for.

“We encounter a range of different people swimming in our sea,” said the fish. “And none of them do it as well as we can. They have to wear additional equipment to help them breathe under the water, and if they want to have a meal or a nap they actually have to leave the water, whereas we can live our whole lives under the sea without needing to quickly pop onto dry land to wolf down a sandwich.

If we’re feeling peckish we know where to go to find a tasty mollusk or crustacean and we don’t need to go to the great expense of buying sunscreen because we create our own UV protecting chemical called Gadusol.”

The fish claim that they are also very accurate when it comes to telling the time. “Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday afternoon at 3:30 a large group of legs congregate in the water at Coral Bay with the sole intention of feeding us.”

British backpacker Caroline Gough who turned up to participate in the most recent feeding of the fish said “The fish are amazing. They turned up on the dot of three thirty. You could set your watch by them.”

The fish said “that’s another area where we are superior to humans. They need all those smart phones, smart watches and sat navs to tell them where to go, how far they’ve travelled and what the time is. We don’t need any of that stuff. We already know all that we need to know.”

A British backpacker who loves snorkelling has announced that she will no longer be eating fish, following her most recent adventures under the sea.

Caroline Gough made the announcement soon after her arrival at the Ningaloo Reef in Western Australia.

Caroline who spends more time in the water than she does on land told us: “There’s an amazing underwater community down there. Just like us, the fish have their own homes and their own favourite places to hang out, and I love revisiting certain parts of the reef to check-in on some of my favourite fish. We were very happy swimming about together and the thought of those fish no longer being there because they’ve been hauled out of the sea to make my dinner is horrific.”

It is understood that Caroline has been making friends with fish in various Western Australia snorkelling hotspots, including Coral Bay on the Ningaloo Reef, Little Salmon Bay on Rottnest Island, and Trigg, near Scarborough in Perth. 

But a source close to Miss Gough claims that this is nothing new. “Every year Caroline goes on holiday to Lanzarote or some Greek Island and she comes back telling us how she’s made friends with all these fish and therefore won’t be eating them anymore. It always lasts a couple of months, but as soon as she goes back to North Devon, it’s game over. Everyone knows she can’t drive through Braunton without popping into Squires fish and chip shop for a piece of cod or a fishcake.”

A well spoken lady from Australia is of the mistaken belief that she is sharing her holiday accomodation with a bunch of criminals.

The female, who is booked into a private room at the Ningaloo Club in Coral Bay, has been openly horrified to discover that she is sharing bathroom and kitchen facilities with a number of backpackers.

Fellow guest Caroline Gough explained: “I first met her in the bathroom. It’s actually one of the nicer, cleaner bathrooms I’ve seen on my travels, but she was having some sort of meltdown about dust and remnants of other people’s toothpaste. It kind of reminded me of that Shakespeare scene where Lady Macbeth goes a bit crazy over a spot of blood.”

Caroline later encountered the lady in the kitchen. “She was just standing there, looking a bit shell shocked, opening and closing her mouth a bit like a goldfish. I said hello, but she was in too much of a state to hear me, so I just started putting my leftover food back into the fridge. This snapped the lady out of her trance and she said to me in her poshest voice: ‘Surely you’re not going to leave your things in there? Not with these sort of people around?’ ”

At this point Caroline, who enjoys speaking in a range of accents, decided to have a bit of fun. “I put on my best broad Yorkshire accent and asked the lady what sort of people she was talking about. The lady lowered her voice and said ‘you know…. backpackers’ as if it was the most vulgar word in existence in the English language.”

Caroline said “I went on to explain in Broad Yorkshire that I’ve been travelling for six months and I’ve never had nowt stolen. I used the old idiom about everyone being int same boat and so we all respect each other’s things. Then for good measure I added an ‘innit?’ on the end. The woman seemed slightly reassured by this but still looked at me like I had two heads.”

Caroline added “Later on I noticed that someone had helped themselves to some of my Coke which had been in one of the communal fridges. Obviously I didn’t tell the posh lady because that would fuel her argument that you can’t trust backpackers. Although it did occur to me that she could have been the one who had taken it.”

A British backpacker has found herself inadvertently acting out scenes from the well known children’s fairy tale ‘Goldilocks’ at a dodgy hostel in Perth tonight.

It all began when Caroline Gough was given the wrong key and had to trek back to the reception a further two times before she was given the correct key. Caroline explained: “the first key didn’t fit the lock at all. It was too big. The second key fitted the lock but didn’t turn. It was too stiff. But the third key went in straight away. It was just right.”

It was dark when Caroline entered the room and she had to use her phone torch to see which bed was available. The first set of bunks had people in them. “Someone was sleeping in those beds,” said Caroline. The second set of bunks housed a couple, both on the bottom bunk, eating something from a bowl and watching a laptop screen together. “Someone was eating in those beds” said Caroline. But the third bed was just right.

Next Caroline went to find a bathroom. “The first bathroom was locked” explained Caroline “and from the sound of it, there were people behind the door doing the sort of thing that doesn’t usually get spoken of in children’s fairy tales. The second bathroom contained only a urinal. So I moved on to the third bathroom expecting it to be just right.”

Unfortunately Caroline found that fairy tales seldom come true as the next bathroom contained no toilet paper, a toilet full of vomit that couldn’t be flushed and large black hairs on the floor of the shower.

Caroline said “It won’t be necessary for the three bears to chase me out of bed in the morning. I will be more than happy to leave of my own accord.”

A British backpacker has spoken of her disappointment of returning to her microfibre towel after three weeks without it.

Caroline Gough, who is currently on an eight month backpacking tour of Australia and New Zealand, explained “The microfibre towel is great in many respects because it doesn’t take up much room in my case and also dries really quickly which is important when you are staying in a dorm room that lacks drying space.

However the one fundamental thing that it doesn’t do is dry you properly. When you pat yourself with it, it does initially transfer water from your body to the towel, but that then makes the towel too wet to dry the rest of you, which just leaves you feeling damp.”

For the past three weeks Caroline has been able to leave the towel at the bottom of her suitcase and ignore it completely.

“The Australians now believe it’s winter,” Caroline explained “Whilst in fact we are still experiencing temperatures that in England would qualify for a heatwave. Therefore I have been able to find some excellent cheap deals staying at beachside hotels and apartments, all of which come with incredibly luxurious and fluffy towels. It has been wonderful.”

Tomorrow however Caroline will fly to Perth to embark on a Western Australia adventure that will see her staying in a string of backpacking hostels up and down the coast.

Caroline said “here in my current hotel room, I can get out of the shower and have one towel to wrap around me and another to dry my hair. And if I get sick of them I can leave them in the bath and the housekeeper brings me new ones. It’s a world away from traipsing around with the same old towel that’s been failing to dry me properly ever since I  landed in Sydney in November.”

The towel told us “I can’t do everything. I have stripes, I’m compact, I squash into any space without any complaints, what more does she want?”

A British tourist is reluctant to put on her new waterproof jacket for fear that she may never be able to pack it back into the special pocket it came in.

Caroline Gough explained “I’ve basically spent the last 3 months touring Australia in a pair of flip flops, a bikini and a kind of beach sarong thing that almost passes for a dress, but now I’m in New Zealand it looks like I’m going to have to start wearing proper clothes again.”

Caroline bought the waterproof jacket in Queenstown where the shop assistant helpfully repacked the jacket back into the special bag-that’s-also-a-pocket after Caroline tried it on.

Caroline said “To be honest, I just bought the jacket as a precaution, I never thought I’d actually have to use it. But now Cyclone Gita is about to hit Christchurch and it’s raining more than it does in England. My main concern is storage. I’m less than halfway through my travels and if I can’t work out how to compactly pack the jacket away again I might just have to keep  wearing it until next July when I get back to England.”

A 6 year old boy has been hit in the face by some flying lettuce leaves at a popular open air Mooloolaba restaurant.

The incident occurred just before 7 o’clock this evening when a gust of wind blew through the restaurant, sending menus, beer mats and the bowl of lettuce flying through the air.

The lettuce, consisting mainly of cos, lollo rosso and spinach leaves, had been served in a little salad bowl along with Caroline Gough’s chicken parmigiana and chips.

Caroline explained “Now that I’ve got colitis, I can’t eat that sort of lettuce anymore because my body doesn’t digest it properly. I had picked through the bowl and found the miniscule amount of tomato and thimbleful of grated carrot, but there wasn’t much there besides the lettuce. I was thinking what a waste of food, little did I know it was gearing itself up to be used for entertainment purposes.”

The boy who was watching an animated cartoon on his iPad whilst dining with his parents seemed unscathed by the drama.

Caroline added “As I was leaving, I noticed there was a lettuce leaf stuck to his Father’s leg, but I decided not to mention it. I’m sure he’ll find it later.”

A British tourist spent at least five seconds believing she had lost some weight, before realising that the extra space in her bikini bottoms had in fact been created by some loose elastic.

The misunderstanding happened at the Mooloolaba Beach Club Resort this evening, when British tourist Caroline Gough dived into the swimming pool and felt her bikini bottoms trying to make a bid for freedom.

Caroline explained “Maths and Science were never my best subjects, but I do remember learning about forces and resistance and angles. I’m sure a group of GCSE students could draw a nice diagram to show how the force of me hitting the water at a specific angle in bikini bottoms that are no longer snug would cause them to attempt to leave my body.”

Fortunately it was dark, and although the pool is lit up in Caroline’s favourite colour of turquoise, it is believed that nobody was around to witness the incident.

Since her arrival in Australia last November, Caroline has enjoyed sampling all of the jelly flavours and different types of chocolate that aren’t available in the UK, and also enjoys regular milkshakes.

“It’s unlikely that I’ve lost any weight recently” Caroline said. “But I am an optimist, so I was more than happy to believe that maybe somehow I had shifted a few pounds. Then reality kicked in and I realised it was just a case of loose elastic.”

Caroline commiserated her false weight loss hopes with a limited edition Kit Kat that is not available in the UK.

It has been confirmed that the girl sharing a tent with Caroline Gough tonight is going to be a complete pain in the backside for the duration of the two day Doubtful Sound camping and kayaking excursion.

When Caroline woke up in the early hours of this morning, she had not yet met her future tent mate, but had high hopes that she would be sharing her camping experience with a like-minded, fun-loving adventurous soul. Instead Caroline will be bedding down next to an annoying tourist who began displaying her annoying habits within three minutes of the trip commencing.

In an exclusive interview, Caroline told us: “This happens to me all the time. Because I’m friendly and smile at everyone, I attract a string of misfits who think I’m going to be their best friend. I’m travelling on my own because I want to and of course it’s nice to make friends along the way, but every time I go on a tour, other single travellers gravitate towards me and assume we’ll be spending the duration of the tour in each other’s pockets. After the disaster of Natascha on the Great Ocean Road, I promised myself that the next time an annoying person attached themselves to me, I would simply walk away from them, but that’s not possible when you have to share a tent.”

Caroline continued “There are sixteen people on this tour and we all quickly identified who the annoying one was going to be just from the way she said hello. Unfortunately her name is also Karoline, but with a K, so naturally everyone’s going to call us the two Carolines and assume that we are a pair. Nobody will realise that I find her just as annoying as they do and people may even believe that I am annoying just by association which will isolate me futher from the group.”

In a further blow, it emerged that Caroline would not only be spending her nights with Karoline, but also her days as Karoline had signed the two of them up to share a double kayak. Caroline said: ” It’s not fair. There are so many hot single men on this trip and I was really hoping to be paired with one of them. When the guide was pairing people up, I purposely stood far away from Karoline and was having a really nice chat with Todd from Oregan, so that it looked like we were together, but as soon as the guide started pairing people up, Karoline told him that she wanted to share with me.”

Karoline has proved herself to be as annoying on the water as she is on the shore. “We take it in turns to sit in the front and back,” Caroline explained. “This morning she sat in the front and thanks to the wind direction, I couldn’t hear what she was saying, so I could largely ignore her and enjoy my surroundings. But this afternoon she sat in the back where I’m sure she didn’t do any paddling and left it all to me. If you sit in the back you’re also in charge of steering the boat and every time we were paddling alongside another pair, I would be having a nice conversation with them and Karoline would suddenly change direction and we would veer off into the middle of the fjord so that we could no longer hear what the other pair were saying.”

Karoline with a K said “I was so happy to meet Caroline. It is just perfect that we have the same name and could share the tent and the kayak. Also what’s amazing is that in two weeks we will both be in Kaikoura so we can meet up again and have some more fun.
Caroline said “There’s no way I’ll be meeting up with Karoline when I’m in Kaikoura. It was a very rooky backpacker’s error to have disclosed the details of my itiniery to her.”

A British backpacker has recently decided that she doesn’t mind having to sleep in the top bunk, but only because the novelty of her new Fit Bit hasn’t worn off yet.

Caroline Gough, who bought the Fit Bit Charge in Adelaide on Monday explained “I have always been happy with those pedometers that clip onto the top of your trousers, but I keep losing them, because as well as counting my steps, they also like to work their way free of my trousers and fall onto the floor without me noticing. I couldn’t find any pedometers in Adelaide so I decided to buy a FitBit instead.”

Caroline has enjoyed exploring the new features of her FitBit and even went to a gym just so that she could try out the treadmill setting. But the FitBit really came into its own with the setting that counts how many stairs a person can climb.

Caroline told us “usually when I go into a backpackers dormitory and see that there are only top bunks available, my heart sinks. Climbing down from the top bunk in the dark to go to the loo is never exciting and sometimes the person below you might have put something like a towel on one of the rungs which makes it slippery and even more precarious. But now that I’ve got a FitBit, every time I go up another rung, that adds to my total stair count.”

The excitement ended very quickly when Caroline climbed down from the ladder at 3am yesterday morning and painfully stepped on a three pin phone charger that the person sleeping below had left in her path.

A British teenager was so thrilled to get the all clear after a recent test for sexually transmitted diseases that he shared the news with a complete stranger.

19 year old Ollie from Hartlepool explained: “I went to the clinic just before I left England, and they said they’d text me the result but that was weeks ago. Everyone else out here has got cheap travel sims but I’ve had to keep using my UK phone contract because I was waiting for this text. It’s been a nightmare.”

Caroline Gough who is sharing a dorm room with Ollie at a backpackers in Melbourne told us: “I only met Ollie last night. We had a brief chat and discovered that the guide who took me to the Bellarine Peninsula was the same guy that took him to the Grampians. We were able to confirm that the guide had told  the same bad jokes on both trips, so we’d had a bit of a laugh over that. All the same I really didn’t think I’d known Ollie long enough for him to share his STD results with me.”

The text came in at 3:37am waking everyone in the 6 bed dormitory, and it was early next morning as Caroline returned from a shower that Ollie awoke from his slumber and shared the news with her.

“He was beaming from ear to ear,” said Caroline. “I don’t know if he was more delighted about not having an STD, or the fact that he could now cancel his UK phone contract. He did seem quite surprised to get the all-clear, I think he had been expecting a different result.”

Ollie said “I’m so excited! I’m going straight to the shop to sort out an Australian sim. One of my mates gets unlimited data, texts and calls to the UK for $29 a month. I definitely want a piece of that!”

A baby’s first time in the sea has been well and truly documented as a group of people gathered around the baby, each taking several identical photos.

The baby was taken into the sea by his father, who crouched down and dangled the baby’s legs into the water. Meanwhile a selection of the man’s closest friends crouched down around the baby, simultaneously taking photographs as the baby was lowered into the water at the popular New Zealand beach location.

The group then headed up the beach and got into their vehicles, leaving as quickly as they arrived.

Onlooker Caroline Gough said “I’ve never seen anything quite like it. That baby will look at that photo in years to come and assume that it was taken during a wonderful day at the beach. He’ll have no idea that he was quickly marched down to the water, dipped in the sea and then strapped back up in his car seat within five minutes.”

A mother of two has been a complete nightmare from start to finish on the Jetstar flight from Melbourne to Sydney, the Cazmanian Times can reveal.

Whilst her teenage children were plugged into their technology and causing no issues to the passengers around them, the mother, whose identity is still unknown, spent the one hour and five minute flight constantly berating her children who didn’t appear to be doing anything wrong.

Fellow passenger Caroline Gough who was sitting across the aisle in seat 9B said: “the woman was a total nightmare. At one point she pulled the earphones out of her son’s ears and told him she was still furious with him for not telling her he’d finished the milk last Thursday. The poor kid mumbled that he was sorry, but the furious mother told him he wasn’t allowed to have his iPad for a week. The boy tried to protest but this just resulted in his iPad ban being increased to three weeks.”

Whilst the boy silently began to cry, the mother announced that she could no longer bear to sit next to him, unclipped his seatbelt and pushed him to get up and swap places with the man in 9C.

Caroline explained: “At first I thought how appalling it was that she was making random passengers swap seats with her children but then it transpired that this man was actually her husband. It was a bit awkward because I had remarked to him earlier that I thought she was really annoying and that I felt sorry for her kids. I guess I shouldn’t feel too awkward though because he did nod and agree with me.”

The tearful boy sat next to Caroline for the remainder of the flight. Caroline shared a packet of Cheezels and a Kit Kat with him and he cheered up considerably and told her intricate details about the world he’s building in Minecraft. “I literally didn’t understand a word of it,” said Caroline. “But I’m fairly sure I smiled and nodded in all the right places.”

A British tourist remembered a little bit too late that she is hopeless at finding her way and giving directions.

Minutes after volunteering to help an American backpacker find his hostel, Caroline Gough remembered that she can barely find her own hostels, let alone other people’s.

Caroline explained: “He had just got off the bus and I heard him ask the driver where the i-site was. The driver didn’t know, but I did, so I helpfully stepped in and gave him directions.”

The situation escalated however when the boy went on to ask if Caroline knew where Swaggers Backpackers was. “I should have just said no,” Caroline said. “But he didn’t have Internet on his phone and I did, so I decided to look it up for him. I’ve got a really old phone and the maps app is no longer calibrated, so it always puts me at least two streets from where I actually am. Coupled with my amazing ability to instinctively always go in exactly the opposite direction of where I should be, I should know by now not to ever help anyone who needs directions.”

The backpackers was nowhere near any part of the town that Caroline had visited. “I just smiled a lot and tried to sound knowledgeable whilst zooming in and out of maps on my ancient phone and pointing randomly in the direction that I thought his hostel might be in. The poor guy is probably still walking around Oamaru with that giant heavy backpack on his back.”

A British man on holiday with his family in New Zealand has adopted a different voice which he uses whenever he needs to address a family member.

Onlookers at the popular beach spot of Kaiteriteri had no choice but to listen as the man followed his toddler up and down the shoreline phrasing all instructions as questions such as “shall we take our shoes off?” and “shall we roll up our trousers?”

Caroline Gough who was sunbathing nearby told us: “You don’t need to have a degree in English Language and Linguistics to find a million things wrong with his sentences. The only person having their trousers rolled up or taking their shoes off was the kid. The Dad hovered awkwardly behind. It was clear that he isn’t used to spending much time with his son.”

Caroline explained “Then his wife appeared in hysterics and he said to her ‘let’s all calm down shall we?’ until she managed to explain that she’d lost Maggie, and then he freaked out too. I thought maybe Maggie was a dog or another child, particularly when the wife said that Maggie is always running off, but it turned out that Maggie is the man’s mother.”

When Maggie appeared 7 minutes later, it transpired that she had not “run off” but had instead gone to the tourist kiosk to find out about boat trips. Caroline explained “although Maggie already had the information, the man grabbed the leaflet and spent several minutes deciphering it. He told his mother that ‘we don’t want anything too strenuous for you now, do we?’ even though she looks fitter than he is.”

The man spent a further few minutes looking at the leaflet before using his patronising voice to explain to his family that they would catch the boat at 12:40 to go on a nice relaxing cruise. Several onlookers at the beach immediately started looking at their watches and phones to see how far away 12:40 was.

The wife then became hysterical once more upon the realisation that they had lost Teddy. Caroline told us “I just assumed Teddy would be a soft toy, but in fact Teddy is their son. He had wandered along the beach a little bit, probably seeking a bit of quiet away from his parents.”

Once reunited with Teddy, the man said to his family “Shall we have a wee wee?” and then without waiting for a reply, he herded everyone off towards the toilets.

It was a severe case of mistaken identity as two female British tourists repeatedly pointed excitedly at blobs of seaweed, incorrectly declaring them to be penguins.

The errors occurred at the Blue Penguin Colony in Oamaru, New Zealand this evening as a group of 420 people congregated to watch the penguins make their daily journey out of the sea and into their burrows at bedtime.

Caroline Gough, a 36 year old tourist from North Devon, England was sitting beside the two ladies. She told us: “I had arrived at 8pm to get a good seat but I had been informed that the penguins wouldn’t start to come ashore until at least ten to nine. I was happily enjoying the scenery and flicking through my New Zealand Lonely Planet to pass the time, but these women kept tapping me excitedly and pointing at things in the sea that were very clearly blobs of seaweed and not penguins.”

Despite continuously getting it wrong, the ladies remained undeterred and frequently nudged complete strangers and pointed out various blobs of seaweed to them whilst providing an enthusiastic and inaccurate commentary about the non-existent penguins.

The real penguins finally began emerging from the sea and make their way up the shore at 8:56pm. At 9:04pm after seeing only 19 real penguins, the two British tourists stood up and bid a loud farewell to everyone around them.

Caroline said: “I stayed for at least another hour watching hundreds of  penguins make their way up the beach. It was magical to sit under the stars and see the penguins in such close proximity. Some of the penguins ducked under the railings and stood really close to my feet, and I also saw a sealion. The ladies left before the magic really started, but maybe they think seaweed is more magical than penguins.”

A 36 year old has hidden inside a wheelbarrow for at least half an hour during a game of hide and seek, it has emerged.

The game took place in a back garden in Methven New Zealand where British backpacker Caroline Gough has been staying with her university friend Helen.

Caroline explained “I was playing hide and seek with Helen’s children Lola and Max. Max was the best at hiding because he’s only 4 and quite small. But he kept making chicken noises from his hiding place which rather gave the game away.”

Caroline hid in a variety of different places, including behind a hedge and under the picnic bench. But it was when she crawled inside the upturned wheelbarrow that she finally struck gold.

“The children searched all over the garden, shouting my name, then when they couldn’t find me, they pretended that the game was over, so that I would come out and reveal myself, but I stayed where I was, even when I realised I was sharing the space with a spider. At one point they came really close to the wheelbarrow and I had to stifle a giggle, but they still didn’t find me.”

Eventually it went quiet and Caroline emerged from her hiding place to discover that the children had stopped looking for her in favour of playing with the Lego. “They never found out where I was hiding,” Caroline explained. “I’m going to hide there again tomorrow, but I might take a book with me to pass the time.”