3000-MILE TOUR

Waikato Times, Volume 124, Issue 20853, 11 July 1939, Page 8

3000-MILE TOUR

TAXI RIDE IN BRITAIN MRS JOLLY AND DAUGHTER* CYNOSURE OK RUSTIC EYES (Times Air Mail Service) DON DON, June 19 Some of niv taxirnen friends have been complaining lately that business is very bad. writes “The Man in the Street" in the London Star. I wonder if they will be feeling encouraged to-day, or just envious, at the news of the good fortune which has befallen one of their fellow*. Mr George Owen, who wag a bus driver before he bought a taxi, la starting out from Bays water on a 3000-mile tour of Britain, which will take three weeks to complete. Anyway, I am sure they are hoping this sort of thing will become the fashion. The trip sounds as if it ought to be great fun. To begin with the “fare *” name is Jolly. Mrs P. Jolly and the two Misses Jolly have come over from Hamilton, New Zealand, and this it their original idea of seeing the country. 1 doubt if the Jollys have any idea of the sensation they are going to cause. The London taxi, half impressive, half ludicrous with its high roof and snub nose, is as characteristic an item in the London scene as any we have, but put it down in the country, and it becomes a most remarkable sight. Surprise for the Rustics Everybody who lias bad occasion to take a taxi uut of London in an emergency must know how surprised people are at its inelegant shape and lumbering gait, on the highways and byways, the Jollys are guing to be the cynosure of all eyes. The rustics will stop and stare. Inquisitive children will want to poke about in the dark interior. (Actually, of course, tiie taxi is, to put it mildly, not built l’or sightseeing, unless you have the hood down.) I expect they will get many a cheer to speed them on their way. A Rolls-Royce would have been much less inconspicuous than Mr Owen's cab, but 1 am 6ure it would not have been anything like so amusing. What surprised me most when I heard about this tour was that it ift possible to do 3000 miles inside these small islands, one has heard of eccentric American millionaires vho have driven from New York to Los Angeles I in a taxi, which is about the distance 1 the Jollys propose to cover, but we all I know how big the United states are, ! and the total coastline of England and [ Wales, according to the Encyclopaedia j Britannica, is only just over two thousand miles. Variety of Bcenery It is fascinating to speculate what route they will take. This much at least is certain, that if they go up to Scotland (plenty of bottom gear there!; and down to Cornwall, aud across from the Broads to the ’Welsh Marches, they will see as great a variety of scenery as if they were going from the Atlantic seaboard to the Pacific . . . infinite riches in a little room. I hope they will see the Chlltern beeches and York Minster, the "dark Satanic mills” of Lancashire and the "Wakes" at Blackpool, the granite towers of Aberdeen, the Rows at Chester, the white cottages of Clovelly, and the rich, soft green of the fields in Dorset. J hope Mr Owen will remember that policemen iri Glasgow have whistles, and use them frequently. And 1 hope he will not find it too “draughty in front" on the mountain tops!