Globetrotters meeting Saturday 2nd November 2002 By Padmassana
Our first talk was from James Greenwood and was entitled Globetrot on Horseback. James’ round the world journey took him ten years to complete. His slides began in Argentina and then north into Bolivia, where hostel (or should that be hostile?) owners lock their guests in their rooms at night, not to protect them, but to ensure that they pay for their accommodation the next morning. And in James’ case without shooing out the various sheep, chickens and cats that were already in the room. James was introduced to Horse soup that is actually made of beef, but which gets its name from the way the meat is transported and preserved. James’ photos of Potosi included stalls selling dynamite and other explosives, he told us how he had bought some and gone up the hill to “blow up” a rock, which resulted in the taxi that had taken him up there being showered with rock from his explosion!
Fitting such a long journey into a 45-minute talk is not easy so we jumped across the Pacific to Japan. The Japanese authorities had actively tried to discourage James’ project, but with some help from a local Mr Big James obtained a horse in the shadow of Mt Fuji and was able to explore Japan. We crossed to India where James’ bought a black horse with an even blacker temperament. The horse spent the first 3 days trying to injure James, but once it worked out James was on his side he became very protective of James, to the extent that when James was struck down with heat stroke, the horse wouldn’t let anyone through the door to attend to him and resulted in his rescuers having to break into to the back of the building. After India it was into Pakistan and into munition strewn Afghanistan, where he had to travel with a Kalashnikov carrying guard. The fantastic mountain views making up for the inconvenience. James’ Iranian visa was only for 2 days, but he managed to string this out to 6 months! James’ story continued westwards into Turkey and southern Europe. His ride through the Champagne region of France was reminiscent of Afghanistan, but this time he and his horse were trying to avoid munitions from the first world war, that had been unearthed by local farmers and dumped on roadside verges. After ten years James arrived back to Gloucester and his waiting family.
Our second speaker was Peter Hutchison whose talk was entitled– Across the great South American watershed. Peter’s journey to the previously unexplored Parapeti river in southern Bolivia was funded by a grant from the Winston Churchill Trust. When Peter and his group reached the river they found large areas of it were only navigable by pulling the canoes along. It was too shallow to paddle; on day one disaster struck as one canoe hit a tree stump and was so badly damaged they had to return to the nearest town for repairs. To compound the early bad luck their expedition medic became ill and had to return home. But they battled on, having to rely on a GPS for navigation as the maps they had were found to be wildly inaccurate. The river wound its way in places through deep undergrowth, hard work chopping their way though. They also had to contend with mosquitoes and tarantulas; they were forced to dress as for a winter trip covering every piece of exposed flesh to avoid being bitten.
Peter and his team managed to paddle their canoes to the to the Kaa Iya del Gran Chaco National Park and to their final destination of Quimome. The trip took two months to complete and they were the first people to descend the Parapeti river, a tributary of the Amazon. While in Quimome Peter hired a light aircraft to get an aerial view of the trip they had just completed. A hard trip that won’t be featuring in any travel agents’ brochures in the near future!
London meetings are held at The Church of Scotland, Crown Court, behind the Fortune Theatre in Covent Garden at 2.30 pm the first Saturday of each month. There is no London meeting in August. For more information, you can contact the Globetrotter Info line on +44 (0) 20 8674 6229, or visit the website: www.globetrotters.co.uk
