BY AIR FROM ENGLAND

Wairarapa Times-Age, 5 October 1938, Page 8

BY AIR FROM ENGLAND

DR GRAHAM COWIE AND MRS COWIE RETURN. JOURNEY TAKES SIXTEEN DAYS. Dr Graham Cowie and Mrs Cowie, who have been in England for the past two years, returned to Masterton yesterday. As an indication of the speed of air travel, it is interesting to note that they left Southampton on September 18 and arrived in Masterton yesterday, October 4, the final stage of the journey across the Tasman having been made on the Maunganui. Dr Cowie and Mrs Cowie found the journey rather strenuous, though they are enthusiastic about the comforts of air travel. They consider it much more comfortable than travelling by train and there is enough room in the Imperial Airways liners to enable quoits to be played on the journey. Excellent weather was experienced throughout the trip, which proved uneventful. Captain Burgess and another New Zealander were in charge of one of the three flying boats in which the journey was made. Making some reference to the actual journey, Dr Cowie said the air fare included everything from the time of leaving London, such as the train fare to Southampton and hotel costs at Southampton pending the departure of the flying boat, which left at 4 o’clock in the morning. After the journey across France via Macon (on the Rhone) and Marseilles, then to Rome and Brindisi (a well-fortified place), the first night was spent at Corfu, an island off the Greek coast. During the passage over Greece on the following day, an interesting feature was the Corinth Canal, a narrow cut in the hills. After calls at Alexandria and the Sea of Galilee, for refuelling, a stop for the night was made at Basra. As Arabs had been shooting at passing planes, the machine was flown rather high over Palestine. From Basra the plane proceeded down the Persian Gulf to Bahrein, thence across the ocean, with the coast of Baluchistan in sight, to Karachi, where the night was spent. During the journey across India to Calcutta an interesting stopping place for refuelling was Raj Samand, a sacred lake set amid very pretty surroundings, with the Maharajaha’s palace on one side of it. Passing over Burma a view was obtained of the Shive Dagon pagoda, with its goldplated roof. There were vast acres of forest and extensive tracts of flooded rice ground on the way to Bangkok, in Siam, where a night was spent. The next stop for a night was at Singapore, where there were no signs of any fortifications or warships, possibly because the area where these were located was a prohibited one for flying craft. The Dutch possession of Batavia, in which a night was passed at Sourabaya, impressed the travellers as being well run, wealthy and clean. Between Sourabaya and Darwin a rather interesting refuelling station was an island which had not been opened up to tourist traffic, where the natives were unspoilt by contact with Europeans. Dr Cowie was able to purchase here two splendid examples of a native kris. Darwin he found a most unattractive place. Leaving there the next morning they proceeded across Australia to Karumba, on the Gulf of Carpentaria, where barracks were being constructed, and thence to Townsville, where a stay was made for the night. The next day saw the final stage of the journey by air. down the coast via Gladstone and Brisbane to Sydney. During the two years he spent in

England Dr Cowie gained experience at clinics and hospitals in many parts of the country. He was for six months at the Royal Infirmary, Edinburgh and spent some time at King’s College Medical School, London, and the PostGraduate Medical School at Hammersmith. At the time he left England there was a certain amount of anxiety about the European situation and special intimations were being issued to deal with contingencies in the event of air raids. Many hospital patients had been discharged in order to make room for possible casualties. Some months before the Nazi occupation of Austria he and his wife spent six weeks on the Continent, including three weeks in Austria. It is Dr Cowie’s intention to enter into practice in Masterton.