Since making its first appearance here on December 31, 2000, NYK's 35,309gt, 1786TEU container ship Hakone has become a regular visitor.
But time has now run out for this vessel on the Japan-New Zealand route and yesterday the ship made its 68th and final visit to Port Chalmers.
The ship is to be phased out of this service following its arrival at Hong Kong on February 28.
Its replacement in the NYK service will be the 29,093gt, 2858TEU, Singapore-flag, ACX Diamond, completed at Jinhae last May by the STX Shipbuilding Company Ltd.
Built and engined at the Kobe yard of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd, Hakone was laid down on August 20, 1982, and launched as Hakone Maru on December 24, 1982.
The ship was delivered on March 24, 1983, to Nippon Yusen Kaisha and Showa Kaiun K.
K. Powered by a 7-cylinder Sulzer diesel, having an ouput of 26,647hp, the 211.6m long ship was designed to operate at a service speed of 20.9 knots and on trials attained 24.2 knots.
Hakone Maru was registered at Tokyo until 1990.
During that year, the "Maru" portion of its name was dropped when it was flagged-out to Panama under the ownership of Odyssey Shipholding S.A.
Until transferred to the New Zealand trade in 2000, the ship had spent most of its career on NYK's Japan-Southeast Asia-North America east coast service via the Suez Canal.
Also due to be phased-out in April is the 1979-built MOL Wellington, which first appeared here in July 1987, under the name Wellington Maru.
Its replacement is reported to be the 17-year-old, 41,495gt, 2996TEU MOL Miracle.
So, while Hakone left here for the last time yesterday, MSC Kiwi made its debut here on Tuesday.
The ship is another of the open top category container ships where some holds have no hatch covers.
It is one of several such ships built for Ganymed Shipping, of Bremen, in the late 1990s.
Orders for these vessels were placed with the Jiangnan Shipyard (Group) Co Ltd, Shanghai, and Howaldtswerke Deutsche-Werft AG, of Kiel. One of the Shanghai-built ships, MSC Kiwi was delivered in September 1999.
Another of this type is 25,219gt MSC Edith, completed at Kiel in July 1998. This vessel made 45 calls here from June 25, 2006, to October 18, 2008.
Last week's newcomer is now being employed in the same transtasman trade.
Although these two ships are basically of the same design and were designed for a service speed of 25 knots, there are noticeable differences in their profiles.
MSC Kiwi has a blue hull, similar to the colour of the port's two ZPMC container cranes, and is one of the few London-registered ships we now see here.
Owned by Allocean Charters 2 Ltd, the ship received its current name after being chartered by MSC following its arrival at Fremantle in February 2008, under the name Ocean Producer.
The ship is also another example of the often-renamed visitors that call here these days.
Starting its career as Norasia Sultana, it was renamed ADCL Sultana in 2000, Perth (2001), before being chartered by the CP Ships group as Lykes Master in 2004.
The company renamed it CP Master a year later.
The company-owned MSC Edith followed a similar pattern early in its career with the names Norasia Samantha, ADCL Samantha and Ayrshire.
