COMFORT FOR TRAVELLERS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 206, 1 September 1933, Page 6

COMFORT FOR TRAVELLERS.

Our visitor from Chicago, Mr. Wright, who is so plen-ed with New Zealand's natural beauties, has done tho country a service by suggesting sundry improvements in the accommodation provided for travellers. Here lie has called attention to some matters of comfort which have exercised many New Zealandcrs as well as their passing guests. The poor heating of many places of public accommodation is a subject of frequent complaint. This docs not apply so much to city hotels and boardinghouses as to those in the smaller towns and the country districts. Many of these places are far behind the times in their provision for travellers' convenience. There is a strange indifference to the little things which go to make or mar the comfort of a holiday. A good lire in cold or wet. weather is one of those necessary things in one's place of stay, and if there is a fireplace in the bedroom there is no excuse for neglect. Steam-heating can scarcely bo expected in the country places, but there is no shortage of fuel anywhere. But some accommo-dation-place keepers, even in the towns, appear to have, an objection to using up good coal and firewood for the convenience of a mere boarder. I remember a heated argument with a Wanganui hotelkeeper because I happened, one bleak winter day, to put a match to the inviting pile of kindlers and coal in a sitting room fireplace. It appeared that I had recklessly consumed a fire which had been carefully made up for a really cold day. The wanderer in the poem who received bis warmest welcome at an inn could never have spent a winter day and night at that public-house. There was another place, on a popular tourist run. where two of us arrived by the usual night train. It was late. but_ as it was the customary time for guests' arrival it was natural to expect some little comfort on a freezing winter night.. But there was not a fire in the place, no hot water, not a hot drink to be had, or, indeed, any drink but icy water, for which we did not crave.

Another defect in many of these places is the primitive sanitary conditions. "Requirements have advanced beyond the ways which -were accepted as a matter of course by the. New Zealandcr accustomed to simple living and by the bushman down.on a spree. Here the fault lies largely with the licensing committees and the local bodies which deal with accommodation houses. If members of these bodies travelled more they would probably be less ready to approve of places which do not modernise their provision for the public. Perhaps American ideas as to the degree of heat necessary in a building would not appeal to all travellers. Our friends from the U.S.A. appear to be able to endure a suner-heated atmosphere, while they absorb unlimited quantities of ice watpr. Possibly the blend of the two produces the ideal condition of bodilv comfort. When the American fleet visited Wellington some years ago townsfolk who went aboard the steam-heated ships found the. below-decks temperature more th«n they could suffer for Ion"-, and they marvelled that the crews were able in sleen and priMs in f-"li warm qurrtprs. Tr-o super-hen t--d ]iviT"» conditions were r«fl« n t"1 in the unnaturally white faces of the sailor lads, at any rate, such was the local impression. Ta?tes differ; but we can tn'fely war»i up our welcome fo the stranger a trifle and satisfy our own travellers, too. —J.C.