No-one knows for sure how Aboriginal people came to Australia.

Some believe the Old testament story about Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden is based in Australia. There are ancient Aboriginal stories about humans being carried here on the backs of birds.

The scientific evidence is that some Aboriginal people came to Australia about 50,000 years ago by island hopping through the Indonesian archipelago.

However, despite what all these scientists believe Aboriginal people say, "we were always here in this country"

At this time the sea was much lower than today. Australia and Papua New Guinea were part of the same continent. Although there was not at this time a clear land bridge between Asia and Australia, the distance between the islands would have been small, an easy journey for the canoe.

The sea was also much lower about 110,000 years ago and again 20,000 years ago when Rottnest and Tasmania were part of the mainland.

There may have been separate migrations at that time, and at some other times. Perhaps these people were driven by adventure, to explore distant lands, lured by the smudge of smoke on the horizon; maybe they were exiles, forced to flee from their homelands, or fishers blown off course to make a chance landfall.