On the waterfront

In a few weeks time, it will be the 40th anniversary of the coming of the container ship age to Port Chalmers. Hamburg Sud's Columbus New Zealand introduced this concept of cargo handling to the port when it berthed on June 26, 1971, while on its maiden voyage.

A month has passed since the cruise-ship season, one not always blessed with good weather, came to an end. Despite two vessels' visits being cancelled due to weather conditions and a third because of machinery problems, it was a record season.

Listed as coming from Bluff, the 19,882gt carrier Carl Oldendorff berths at Dunedin today to load logs.

The name Bahia has enjoyed a long history with ships of the Hamburg South America Line (Hamburg-Sud) since 1872. Yesterday, the sixth ship of the name made its first appearance at Port Chalmers.

Well in the case of MSC Brianna, due on its first visit this week, its former and current names bring back memories of earlier visitors to this harbour.

An interesting week at Port Chalmers with a visit from Stellar Eagle, the largest ship to load logs, and a record cruise ship season ending with visits from Pacific Pearl yesterday, and consort Pacific Dawn today.

In the past we used to see quite a lot of them, fully refrigerated vessels (reefers). They called here to load for overseas markets, fish, meat and apples when the export apple season was in full swing. These cargoes now go by container ships.

Now operated by foreign-owned container ship companies, regular transtasman services were once the domain of Australian and New Zealand lines.

Sunny conditions added to the pleasure of watching the cruise ship Saga Ruby arriving at Port Chalmers last week.

The annual summer cruise ship season is starting to wind down. After today only five more visits are scheduled before it ends early next month.