A GREAT JOURNEY

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 47, 23 August 1930, Page 15

A GREAT JOURNEY

THE HEART OF AFRICA MOMBASSA TO ALGIERS M. Charles 'E. Bedaux, of Irauce, with four guests and a group of twenty native guides and servants, recently completed a journey from Mombassa through Kenya Colony, llio Sudan, French Equatorial Africa, Nigeria, and north through the Sahara Desert to Algiers and along Ihe coast, to Casablanca, Morocco, covering- a distance of 9500 miles in five months. The trip took three months and a week. A touring car and six trucks, carrying provisions for the long trek, were shipped to the starting point, from whence tho party made a three weeks' detour into- the dense jungles of southern Kenya and northern Tanganyika. This part of the trip was ostensibly a hunting expedition, but in reality it was to test the cars, for if they could stand the hazards of that wilderness they were reasonably sure to be able to cop« with anything they might encounter the rest of the way. The party got several lions and fine specimens of hippopotami. The real journey then began. M. Bedaux made a map of tho entire routo and kept a table showing the average speed wade on various sections of tho route. Starting from Nairobi at fifteen miles an hour, they were soon travelling comfortably along over good roads at fifty. That was not for long, however. Difficulties are reflected on the map in. a speed of ten miles as the party jieared the marsh lands of Central Africa. A short distance more and the red Hue, which indicates that the vehicles were proceeding under their own power, give's place to tho only blue line on the route, indicating a section where tho cars had to bo transferred to barges. INTO THE JUNGLE. Into tho heart of the jungle the party pushed its way unfaltering. They came upon sections where no white man, let alone any motor-cars, had ever gone before. The natives reacted strangely to the phenomenon. They displayed neither fright nor curiosity, but were so slow to make an}- sense- of tho situation that they would not even get out of the way. Staring with uncomprehending eyes, it seemed as though they would have allowed themselves to bo run over rather than step aside. Much of the travelling was done by night, because, of the intense heat, and lin the day time, tents were pitched and tho party camped and rested. One day they had a bitter experience with a cloud of millions of wild bees attracted to the food spread out for luncheon. Nothing happened until a lemon was cut for the tea. Immediately the bees were on them. Everyone fled to the cars except M. Bedaux and a nativ-e guide, who remained to salvage what food he could. M. Bedaux was protected by a mask and gloves, but these did not prevent his being severely stung. The native guide was found unconscious from stings. His mask had slipped, allowing the insects to got to his face. M. Bedaux said the bees were attracted by the smell of lemon. Reaching Equatorial Africa, the route led through a section whero sleeping sickness is so prevalent that travellers are warned to avoid tho district. A detour would have meant a long delay, and so the party, well dosed with quinine, took its chances with the malady and came through ia good health. The red lino through all this section shows a fairly uniform speed," ranging from thirty-five- to forty miles an hour, indicative of comparatively good roads, with occasional lapses to ton and fifteen miles an hour where no roads existed. By Bth February the expedition had reached French territory. In one section the Government had rushed work on a road so that it would bo passable by the time the Bedaux party wanted to get'through. In other sections where there were no roads they had to be made —crude iniprovisions of reeds and brush —before the party could advance. Pushing through elephant grass, with no new scenes to refresh the eye, tho travellers saw day after day dawn just like its predecessor. They lost all .sense of time and season. Ono bright spot was encountered, however, in the form of 600 miles of marvellous road in northern Nigeria. Along this stretch of macadam the cars whipped it up to sixty miles an hour. Soon they approached tho silent vastness of the great Sahara Desert. Tho trip through the Desert was epochal, in that they were the largest party ever to attempt that sea of sand. Never before h;nl ,sUmd;ivd cars made the journey. Such vehicles as had

traversed those treacherous miles before were specially equipped with caterpillor wheels and travelled in relays. Fortified with 700 liters of, water against Hie arid wastes, and knowing well that if anything unforeseen, happened there was not much hope of rescue, the parly entered the last long stage of their trip. Guided by the sun, the cars had to keep close to each other because tlio trackless sands were so deceiving that there was always great danger of a car's getting off the trail. In fact, one did get lost, and several hours were spent in a frenzied search before it was found driving peacefully in a course diametrically opposed to the one. that would take it to Algiers. I Night driving in the desert, according to M. Bedaux, is fraught with greater dangers than night driving in the jungle. For thirty-two hours at a. stretch ho remained at the wheel in a dogged fight against sleop that threatened to overpower him. The path of light made by the headlights, contrasting vividly with the darkness, produced the effect of snow against pine woods. The nights are very cold in the desert, and the sensation of banked snow and pine woods was so realistic that M. Bedaux said he would often have to hit the top of the car to give himself assurance against this dangerous hallucination. Day and night they went, encountering nothing but sand and sky, and an occasional skeleton —mute testimony that some unfortunate had been conquered by the desert. Finally Algiers was reached, and with it the return to comparatively normal travelling conditions. The trip from Algiers to Casablanee was easy and was covered at an average speed of fifty-five miles an hour.