WANDERLUST.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19278, 16 September 1924, Page 8

WANDERLUST.

ROMANTIC JOURNEYS

UNDERTAKEN' BY GOVERNORS. (From Our Own Correspondent.) SYDNEY, September 4. Wanderlust seems to have seized hold of Australia's Vice-regal personages. While Admiral Sir Dudley de Chair still contents himself with penetrating the far west of his domains in New South Wales and turning up in remote townships where a Governor has never been seen before, longer residence bus encouraged Victoria’s Governor, Lord Stradbroke, to go further afield, and ho has just completed an overland journey with the Countess of Stradbroke and a few others through the heart of the continent from Adelaide to Da ravin, whilst the GovernorGeneral, with the spirit of adventure born of still longer residence here, has gone off to New Guinea. A picturesque description of the overland trip, and the experience with the blacks and others en route was given by the Countess of Stradbroke on the arrival of the party at Darwin. “We have,” she told the interviewer, “very much enjoyed our trip through your land of eternal sunshine. We have indeed enjoyed a glorious sunbath after the oold weather experienced in the south. I know of lots of women who would enjoy this experience. It is the sort of life I love, and then your wonderful country is overflowering with real hospitality. We roughed it a bit, slept on the ground every night, and rose before 6 every morning, sometimes earlier. There wene lovely moonlight nights, and we eat at water-holes for hours at night watching for dingoes and wild horses. The stillness of the nights was profound, and we could bear the footsteps ol horses more than- a mile distant, but the hoi see instinctively avoided us. Not so the dingoes, which frequently came right up to our camp, and one big fierce animal came up within a yard of us, but he did not attack. “I would recommend this journey to the most delicate woman. We had no cook, but the pleasure of the journey mad© up for this, and other little deficiences. We stayed at Alice Springs a week waiting for the earl. Despite the absence of telegraph communication the people everywhere were quite conversant with our movements by means of aboriginal smoke signals. Earl Stradbroke was not surprised at that, for during the late war he was in East Africa, and the natives told him long before he was advised by telegram of’ the defeat of the Germans in West Africa, probably a thousand miles away. From Alice Springs north the smoke signals followed regularly, and occasionally aboriginals assembled in force along the route, gaily decked with corroboree war paint. Evidently the smoke man had given us a good charter to his brothers ahead. One native said he had received a message that the ‘big feller gubment come along.’ The corroboree at Alice Springs was a gorgeous spectacular, affair, in which a real fight took place between two natives. The hospital at Alice Springs is only half-erected. I think this building shpuld be completed and equipped with a nursing staff and mediciries immediately.” “I was astounded to learn that between Alice Springs and Oodnadatta, a distance of hundreds ol miles, there is no such thing as medical aid, and no means of getting it. There are a lot of women and children in that vast region. They arc thoroughly happy and enjoy the best of health, but picture the misery of a woman seriously ill being compelled to travel 500 miles on the back of a camel to got medical assistance. Peop'e there got their supplies once a year. They are happy people, and said they Would like to see a railway or some quicker means of communication, hut there was never a grumble heard. I sincerely hope that such fine people will immediately receive some substantial encouragement to continue their pioneering work. I would like to see a motor service run to Alice Springs once a month, with preference to women desiring medical aid.”