After receiving the "permit" news, precious time elapsed before all arrangements were made, but on Wednesday, July 27, 1966 Travers boarded his flight in Lethbridge, Alberta bound for France and Switzerland. He didn’t even have his passport yet, but felt confident he could pick it up during his 5-hour stopover in Ottawa (reduced to 3 hours because of delays). He got his passport without undue complications (crediting his God for “softening the heart of the customs man”) and by Thursday, July 28 at 6:30 P.M., he was waiting in Montreal for his flight to France. In the space of little more than one day, his flight had stopped in Calgary, Winnipeg, Toronto, Ottawa, and Montreal.
This was Travers’ first air flight, and mixed in with the thrill of this new experience, he felt a drive that would not let him rest. It was as though his life had been building for this purpose, and that no obstacle could stand against his conviction.
All along his way to Europe, he felt that through God’s providence, he met people who helped him: Dr. Sumption in Lethbridge who “gave me some good advice on Genetics”; a Mr. Russell from Lethbridge travelling to a new government assignment in Charlottetown who, “helped me out a lot”; and “some good leads” for French contacts from the Vets, and from Trades & Commerce in Ottawa. He wrote:
Vets say we may if France cooperates bring cattle from swiss. to calve in France. I'll see if France OKs this.1Travers’ first oceanic flight was
… a most beautiful sight. Billowy mass of cloud below in all shapes high and low like mountains and miles & miles of rolling like pillow cloud[s] … Something I’ve never seen and hard to describe. Has to be seen.2He was like an awe-filled explorer into an unseen, never-imagined world.
He arrived in Paris, France early Friday morning (July 29, 1966), but only as a stopover. His push was to get to Switzerland.
After a 6-hour unexpected delay in Paris (airline overbooking of flights), he flew on to Zurich and took the train to Bern, arriving Friday night, July 29 at 9 P.M., seven hours later than planned. His determined purpose—to first see the cattle that looked so impressive in the brochures sent by the Swiss Cattle Commission “so that I could compare the animals in France to them.”
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1. Letter to colleague, B.Y. Williams, July 28, 1966: (BYW-1)
2. Letter to his wife, Belle, July 29, 1966: (BFS-4)
