This book is the first in a series of 4 relatively short children's bedtime stories featuring Smarty Pants the Fox. Always getting himself out of tricky situations, Smarty is a cheeky, cool, adolescent fox living in a Secret Valley near Donnybrook, in the South West of Australia. With authentic sound effects for added interest and excitement, this book is narrated by the author. Smarty is so clever he can talk, stand, read, sing, play guitar, surf and even swim. In this book The Great Journey, Smarty finds some unusual round rocks under the roots of a tree which has been hit by lightning in a wild storm. Smarty wonders how the washed round rocks under the tree got to the top of a hill and, why was blue grass growing near the uprooted tree. Later, Smarty falls into a flooding creek where he is swept all the way to the Indian Ocean before finally climbing an anchor chain to board a ship which takes him to Africa. In this amazing adventure, the ship begins to sink in a violent storm and, as the captain and crew abandon the vessel, Smarty is washed overboard. Luckily, he finds a log to cling to, and is eventually washed up on an island. Here, Smarty meets the last surviving giant Dodo bird who happens to be eating blue grass. When Smarty discovers the secret of the blue grass, he hatches a plan to save the Dodo bird from loneliness. Late at night, the two of them sneak onto another ship going back to Australia, where the Dodo bird lives happily ever after in the Secret Valley with Smarty and all the other Australian animals.