Bush backpacker leaves hospital

A backpacker from London who was missing in the Australian bush for 12 days has been discharged from hospital.

As he left, Jamie Neale, 19, told reporters: "I'd like to thank everyone for their support, especially the staff at Blue Mountains Hospital."

Some Australian news organisations have suggested that Mr Neale, from Muswell Hill, staged his own disappearance.

But Australian police said Mr Neale's descriptions of areas he walked through and slept in made the story credible.

Mr Neale went missing in the Blue Mountains, west of Sydney, after setting off by himself for a hike without his mobile phone on 3 July before apparently becoming disorientated.

Commander Tony McWhirter, from New South Wales Police, denied the backpacker, who has since signed with a celebrity agent, had played an elaborate hoax.

He said: "There is nothing, nothing at all to suggest that this is anything other than the greatest tale of survival that we've seen in the mountains."

Meanwhile more details have emerged about Mr Neale's ordeal.

He told police at night he tore strips of bark from native paperbark trees and wrapped them around himself to keep warm in sub-zero temperatures.

When helicopters stopped flying overhead Mr Neale said he went into "survival mode".

Commander McWhirter said: "He thought he was in dire straits. He said, 'At that stage I thought they'd given up searching for me'."

Mr Neale, due to start a degree at Exeter University in October, was found when he stumbled across two soldiers hiking in the bush.

His mother Jean Neale said: "He'll have one hell of a story to tell when he starts university - let's just hope he doesn't repeat it."

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