32,000 km by bike without a puncture

Press, 14 December 1982, Page 22

32,000 km by bike without a puncture

On July 25. 1957. Louise Sutherland, a slightly-built New Zealand woman pedalled a bicycle through London. On the small trailer behind were proudly printed the names of countries she had passed through on her cycling journey. Louise, after six years of hard travelling had cycled alone around the world — well over 32,000 km. and she did not have a single puncture. Born in Dunedin in 1929, Louise trained as a nurse. She went to Britain on a

working holiday, but it was on French soil that she first got the idea of cycling round the world. Off she went. She toured Europe from Lapland to Yugoslavia, and encountered many adventures. In’ Trieste a bomb exploded nearby, and she gave first aid to the injured. In Nazareth she worked in a hospital, then moved on until she arrived in India by boat. Here she had her only really unpleasant experience, when two robbers attacked her on a lonely road. Luckily a bus came along and she

was rescued. In New Zealand Louise caught up with her family again, and then travelled by boat to Canada, from where she cycled through the United States. At one stage she lost nearly all her possessions in a flood. Another time when cycling over the Rockies, she found herself in the middle of some grizzly bears. Louise cycled quickly in one . direction while luckily the bears ran off in the other. Louise's amazing journey finally ended in England.