NEW ZEALANDERS IN BOLIVIA.

Evening Post, Volume LXXIX, Issue 71, 26 March 1910, Page 15

NEW ZEALANDERS IN BOLIVIA.

The party of New Zealandcrs who left there bhores in April last under the leadership of Mr. George Allan, followed by Mr. Horace Grocott and his wife and child in tbe following July, reached their destination, a town called San Pedro de Buena Vista, in the department of Potosi,, in Bolivia, after one of the mo.«t trying journeys it is perhaps possible to take in these days of hixunous travelling On arrival at llonte Video, .Mr. Allan's party ewayed to journey overland by train, along the route northward to the Argentine terminus of La Q u » 3 <. a » on the border of Southern Bolivia, and 1000 miles from Buenos Aires. Writing from Han Pedro, Mr. Allan states that the party had just reached there and were resting. After leaving La Quiaca they had been twenty day<* on mule-back, and at times the ladies suffered great fatigue. Mr. Allan's two children got \ on well — both on oiie mule without a saddle, with their logs dangling. They rode each day in this way, except when they were lifted off for a little walk. | At places on the route great cold wan experienced, and at others food could not be got for love or money. No amount of persuasion would induce the Indians to give what was arked. When they reached San Pedro a great festival wa* being held, and Mr. Allan, after much difficulty, secured the use of two rooms, in which the party lived until better arrangements could t>e made Mr. Grorott and his family, on reaching the Argentine, decided, on the advice of Mr. Allan, to proceed via Chili to their deitina-tion. Owing to the transAndean railway traffic being suspended on account of the line being snowbound at Mendoza (12,000 ft) for the winter, a hteamer journey was taken, via Magellan Straits, lasting three weeks v Calls were made at Punta Arenas, Talcahuano (Conception), Valparaisd, and on to Antofagasta. Here a start was made on a threo-days' train journey, northeastward to Oruro/the centro of the tinmining industry of Bolivia. Describing this journey, Mr. Grocott states : "Leaving at 6 p.m., we soon retired to our narrow and poky sleeping-car. Dawn found us up in the mountains. Such dreary mountains, too, absolutely bare of vegetation, but highly coloured with red, yellow, grey, etc., on account of the volcanic nature of the earth. Soon we passed a great lake of borax, many miles in length, looking like a sea of salt except that here and there columns of steam showed that the calcinous properties of the stuff were at work. Later \vi» htopped for a tew minutes at a corrugated iron shed, which seived as a railway station, and looked at an active volcano close by, known as San Pedro. We ware now fairly high up, 13,000 ft or more. I retired to my cabin, and began to feel oppiession iv breathing. From that time until I reached Oruro I suffered intense hepJache and nausea on account of the rarified air. From Oruro down to San Pedro the distance of 80 miles was covered on mule-back and occupied five days.. This road is described as marvellous, in that in places the passage along the mountain •lanes is extremely perilous, liv November the rainy seat-on sets in, and will last until this month. The party, which is destined for mission work among the Indians, has been occupying the tune ii t studying the Quechua language and people, and whert the season changes they will separate among the valleys of the Andes in preparation for their future operations. There are siid to be a million and a half Quechua Indians in Bolivia, and already so much interest and friendly feeling'have been shown that deputations had, according Ito a lettlar just to hind dated 14th 1 December, waited on the missionaries urging that they nhould establish schools in the Indian villages. The outlook for the future of the enterprise is legarded as particularly promising among a race of people which have been greatly neglected and oppressed since the time of the Inca conquest by tho Spaniards, in the sixteenth century