NEW ZEALAND MOTORISTS TRAVEL ROUND WORLD.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 193, 15 August 1931, Page 1

NEW ZEALAND MOTORISTS TRAVEL ROUND WORLD.

Adventurous Trip Concludes After Fifteen Months’ Tour. (United Press Association.—By Electric Telegraph.—Copyright.) (Received August 15, 9.25 a.m.) SYDNEY, August 15. Having motored 22,000 miles in the course of a journey round the world, two New Zealanders, Messrs Hector MacQuarrie and R. B. Matthews, have returned to Sydney, which they left on May 30 of last year. The trip was full of adventure. It had hardly begun when they were ship-wrecked in mid-ocean. They were the Victims of a drunken driver in “ dry ” America, they were fired at by a Turkish soldier and were charged by an infuriated camel and by an elephant in India. Mr MacQuarrie’s greatest impression of the trip is: " The British Empire is a very living and a very efficient thing.”

Messrs MacQuarrie and Matthews began their tour in Sydney early in 1930, motoring first to Cape York, the most northern part of Australia. The return to Sydney was made by boat, and they crossed the Tasman to Auckland, where they arrived in July. After visiting the northern and southern extremities of the Dominion they arrived in Christchurch on July 31, having travelled 30,000 miles. On August 12 they took passage on board the ill-fated Tahiti, which sank in the Pacific. The tour thus far had been made in an Austin Seven, which the motorists had named Emily. This car was lost in the Tahiti, and they returned to New

Zealand, where they purchased another, named Emily 11. While they were on board the Tahiti awaiting rescue they took cinematograph pictures of the scenes on board and of the rescue operations, which were later shown here.

With Emily 11. the motorists toured the length and breadth of Canada and the United States, eventually crossing to England, which they reached early in January, 1931. They then had their car reconditioned at the Austin works preparatory to setting out on the second half of their tour. It was announced then that they would travel through Europe to Russia and on to China, finally landing at Darwin.