THE HARBOUR.

Press, Volume LXVII, Issue 20415, 9 December 1931, Page 15

THE HARBOUR.

A VISIT OF INSPECTION. OUTER BAYS AND SIGNAL STATION. Members of the Lyttelton Harbour Board yesterday paid a visit of inspection to the outer harbour and Port Levy, which is the boundary of the coast-line under the control of tho Board. Tho party left Lyttelton at 10.30 a.m. in the tug, and outside the moles transhipped to the dredge Canetrbury. To several of tho country members the visit was a new experience, and they watched with interest the huge suction-pumps 'draw up 1200 tons of thick silt, which was taken down to Little Port Cooper and dumped. Transferring back to tho tug, the members next visited 1 Port Levy, where repairs recently effected to the two jetties were inspected. A return was made to Littlo Port Cooper, where the party landed at the littlo settlement peopled by the signalmen and thoir families. A strenuous Climb. A proposal that the party should walk to the signal-station at the top met with a ready response. Coats and even collars were doffed and all but two of the members started on the half-hour's climb. On the steep hill track, in the biasing heat, the party found the going far more strenuous than they expected. It was a red-.faced and perspiring party that finally straggled to the little lookout station. One of the Board members, well-known for his patronage of sports, timid the party, thoso who "clocked in" under the half-hour being H. M. Chrystal], 22min SOsec; F. E. Sutton, W. J. Walter, and B. O'Neil, 22min.45sec; W. Miller, 24 min 45sce. The remainder, 32 in number, were well over the half-hour. The strenuousncss of the climb evidently made an impression on the mem® bers, for when a request came before the Board at a meeting later in the day for a pack-horse for the use of the signalmen in conveying coal atrd stores up to the signal-station, it was unanimously gra'nted. At the commencement of the same meeting the chairman (Captain H. Monro) said that, in view of tho strenuous time they had had, members would be excused from standing whilst speaking. It had been intended that an inspection should be made of the jetties a t Purau, Charteris Bay, and Governor's Bay, but the visits were postponed.