CHAPTER XVII 



DificuUy of Cross-country Travel — Expedition moves towards the 

 Mountains— Arrival at the Iwaka River— Changing Scenery— The 

 Impassable Iwaka— A Plucky Gurkha— Building a Bridge— We 

 start into the Mountains— Fording Rivers— Flowers— Lack of Water 

 on Hillside— Curious Vegetation— Otir highest Point— A wide 

 View— Rare Birds— Coal— Uninhabitable Country— Dreary Jungle 

 —Rarely any Beauty— Remarkable Trees— Occasional Compensa- 

 tions. 



When our third and last batch of forty-eight coohes 

 reached the Mimika towards the end of December, it 

 was at once evident from their appearance that the 

 majority of them would not last very long, and as we 

 had ourselves been already for a year in the country, 

 it was agreed that we should make a final effort to pene- 

 trate as far as possible towards the mountains, and 

 that when our means of transport came to an end we 

 should take our departure from New Guinea. 



We had long realised the impossibility of reaching 

 the Snow Mountains from our present base. If we 

 had possessed an efficient steam-launch or motor boat, 

 the Mimika was still too small a river and too frequently 

 unnavigable to be useful as a route for water transport. 

 Another consideration even more important than this 

 was the fact that had the Mimika been ten times the 

 size it was, it would still have taken us in a direction 

 many miles to the West of the mountains we hoped 



