ROUND THE ISLAND ON FOOT

Timaru Herald, Volume CL, Issue 22063, 9 September 1941, Page 4

ROUND THE ISLAND ON FOOT

Immigrant Sees The

Country

(P.A.) CHRISTCHURCH, Sept. 8 Braving rain, snow, frost and bitter winds an English immigrant of 10 years’ standing, has just completed a thousand-mlle winter walk round the South Island. He is Mr J. E. Nicolaus, formerly of Wellington, who undertook this feat of endurance and hardihood with the object of getting to know the country of his adoption. Four years ago he made a similar tramp round the North Island, on that occasion in summer. In weather that invited most New Zealanders to huddle over their fires, Mr Nicolaus tramped from Nelson. through the nibuntain passes to the West Coast, down the West Coast to Paringa. across the Haast Pass to Central Otago, then to the southernmost point of New Zealand beyond Bluff, and finally up the East Coast to Timaru. He carried “his house on his back” in a rucksack that seldom weighed less than 501 b. and which included a waterproof sleeping bag and a tiny tent six feet long by three feet wide and three feet high. His clothing, apart from waterproofs, was of the lightest and even crossing the snow covered mountain passes he wore shorts. The trip took nearly four months and cost him only £2O.