AMERICAN TOURIST

Greymouth Evening Star, 7 August 1946, Page 8

AMERICAN TOURIST

TREATMENT IN NEW zZEALAND.

SYDNEY, Aug. 6.

The statement by a millionaire Californian businessman, Mr. Pat McDonough, who is now in Honolulu, that, though ail he had wanted was the chance to spend money, he curtailed the recent visit to Australia from, four weeks to one, is current in Sydney to-day. Mr. McDonough is now returning home, after visiting Australia and New Zealand, with his daughter. Mr. McDonough said that the average Australian business man treated an American visitor with complete indifference. He claimed that no help was offered to him in Australia in obtaining place tickets or hotel accommodation.

“We found that, if we wanted any little amenity in New Zealand, the answer usually was ‘yes,’ ” he said. “In Australia, it usually was a gruff ‘no.’ ”

Mr. McDonough was enthusiastic about New Zealand, where he found that everything possible was done to make a tourist welcome. Like most visiting Americans, he had missed central heating in both Australia and New Zealand. He remarked that, if both of those countries wanted winter tourists from the United States, they would have to instal central heating—not only in the hotels, but alsq in the trains, restaurants, and other places.