QQC #3 Bryson Reading 4

Quote: "Everywhere the dwindling party went it was met with the deepest suspicions from officials who found it difficult to believe that a group of French scientists would travel halfway around the world to measure the world."

Question: Why did they have to go to Peru just to measure the world? couldn't they have done it where they are from or somewhere closer to France?

Comment: The thing that got me about this quote was the fact that they even went to Peru. Everything went wrong with their group and it was crumbling, people getting killed and others running off with little girls. All of that happened just because they went halfway around the world to do something that they could have done close to home!