To those who are able to travel in summer, New Zealand presents a store of attractions that are becoming increasingly recognised both by our own people and by visitors from overseas.

Although our native trees and shrubs have the happy habit of keeping their foliage all the year round, it is in the summer that their richest foliage is seen. It is then that the warm, scented breezes of cultivated valley and forest-clad hilltop cast their spell, telling the story of Nature's rich treasures spilled from the overflowing cornucopia of this much-favoured land. Here is the time, and here the place where it is bliss to be alive.

Winter has its own special appeal—the healthy rugged life and merriment of alpine sports in mountain resorts or the attractiveness of towns, where football fields draw their multitudes by day and the cabaret makes its syncopated call to less strenuous, but more tuneful, activity by night. But it is in the summer that the people like to scatter and weave about through the country, where every place has its own particular charm, where every prospect pleases, and where man finds his mind stimulated and his health renewed for the work of the opening year.

Then it is that the facilities for comfort in travel may be enjoyed to the fullest extent. Then it is that the biggest fish in the sea show their willingness to come out of it, the green fields ripen in the sun, the pickers of hops and raspberries migrate from field to field and the milking machine is heard through the land, singing its morning and evening lullaby while it makes for the people their most certain additions from the wealth of the land.

Now is the season when holidays may be taken with the best prospect of their full enjoyment, when schools and colleges, factories and warehouses, shops and offices organise their combined outings for rail trips to distant fields and beaches, forgetting for a day any irksomeness they find in work in the purple patch of liberty and the bird-like freedom brought by association with their fellows in the open spaces of the great out-of-doors.

Those overseas agents who know their job plan itineraries carefully for their clients, so that the main harvest of tourists arrives in New Zealand in Nature's own harvest time. Greater interest is being taken by these in the Department's touring tickets, which allow for unrestricted travel through either or both the Islands of New Zealand for a definite period. These tickets are of particular use for summer travel, as every way lies open then from the North Cape to the Bluff for completely visiting the pleasure resorts of the Dominion. Except in summer, certain places do not appeal to the page 6 average traveller, but at this time of the year every variety may be sampled with pleasure and all accommodation, whether for travel or rest, is at its best.

Summer travel has developed greatly in New Zealand in recent years, thanks to the improved transport facilities and the greater capacity for appreciating its advantages. It helps to keep people well-informed, although at times a plethora of travel information may prove embarrassing. An instance of this is recalled of the late Lord Bryce, who was an inveterate traveller. His biographer tells that one day Sir H. Campbell-Banner-man was found chuckling after a Cabinet meeting. He said:—

“We had a very all-round discussion —Morocco, the near-East, Armenia, and constant talk about places not marked on the map. But Bryce was always ready. He knew every place, how to get there, how long it took to get to the railroad, how to cross the desert by camels, and the rest of it. Just as we were rising, the Home Secretary told us of a peculiar case just reported in Regent Street. Bryce cleared his throat and began, ‘When I leave the House at night I often walk home by Regent Street.’ Here I put my hand on his shoulder and said, ‘My dear Bryce, you must allow us to know something about Regent Street'.”

But as the world is ours for the using, so travel through it, particularly in the summer time of the temperate zone, is a particularly pleasing way by which it may be made to serve our educative ends.

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Empire Farmers on Tour

Already the Empire Farmers, who are making a world tour from the United Kingdom, Canada, South Africa, and Australia, are on the sea, converging towards New Zealand for a five weeks’ tour through this country.

The whole of the transport organisation of this important delegation is in the hands of the Railway Commercial Branch, which is working in close co-operation with the New Zealand Farmers’ Union.

The tour is of a most comprehensive nature, and should afford facilities for the visitors to note and understand farming conditions throughout the Dominion. The visitors, naturally, are not making farming their sole objective, opportunity being taken to view the principal scenic attractions which the Dominion has to offer.

After the South African party of nineteen, arriving at Auckland about the 18th or 19th of February, have made a preliminary run into the north, visiting Whangarei and Russell, they will join up with the British and Canadian parties arriving at Auckland on the 24th February. The combined group, totalling between eighty and ninety, a number of whom are ladies, will visit Hamilton, Morrinsville, Cambridge, Matangi, Ruakura, Rotorua, National Park, the Taupo area, the Waitomo Caves, New Plymouth, Stratford, Hawera, and Wanganui. They will then proceed to Palmerston North and through the Manawatu Gorge to Hawkes Bay, returning via the Wairarapa, after visiting the principal places in these districts, and reaching Wellington on Sunday, 9th March.

Their tour in the South Island will include Blenheim, Havelock, and a run down the East Coast to Christchurch, thence to Palmerston and Dunedin. The Southern Lake District will be visited, and then Invercargill, Mataura, and Gore. After visiting points of interest adjacent to Dunedin, Timaru, Oamaru, Methven, and Ashburton will be visited before returning to Wellington.

The party is due to leave New Zealand by the “Niagara” on Tuesday, 25th March.

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The Recent Commerce Train Tour

This issue of the Magazine is arranged to specially feature the recent tour of the members of the Auckland Chamber of Commerce and their associates through the northern portion of New Zealand.

Some remarkable tributes to the value of the tour have since been received. These include comments by the British Trade Commissioner (Mr. L. A. Paish), the United States Trade Commissioner (Mr. Julian B. Foster), the Canadian Government Trade Commissioner (Mr. C. M. Croft), the Secretary of the Department of Industries and Commerce (Mr. J. W. Collins), and the Secretary of the Auckland Chamber of Commerce (Dr. E. P. Neale). These letters will be featured in our next issue.