Reporter’s diary

Press, 28 June 1983, Page 2

Reporter’s diary

Long trek WALKING for Telethon, Mr Stuart Strand sets out from Christchurch tomorrow ori the last leg of his New Zealand trek. Mr Strand started from North Cape on April 14 to walk to Bluff to raise money for Telethon. So far he has collected $l4OO, well in excess of the $lOOO he hoped to raise. “I have had 15 days off since starting out and have been soaked’ only once in that time. People have been so kind,” he said yesterday. Mr Strand, aged 65, estimates he will be in Bluff in three weeks time when he hopes to have collected nearly $2OOO. Newsmen galore INTERNATIONAL rugby encounters almost match Royal tours in the size of the accompanying media contingent. Today’s game at Lancaster Park will be watched by 51 newspaper journalists, six television reporters and four from radio, plus 16 photographers. On top of this are television cameramen and sound technicians, producers and Post Office copy runners. The 51 newspaper journalists are made up to 30 British representatives, 20 from New Zealand, and a freelance

Dutchman who is covering the game for European papers. Focus on rivers DISPLAYS focusing on the recreational value of our rivers are to be shown in a week-long display at the Merivale Mall starting on July 4. The purpose is to illustrate recreational uses which will be lost if proposed hydro-electric power generation and irrigation schemes go ahead, the organiser of the week-long campaign, Mr Pat Quinn, said. Anglers, jet-boaters and forest and bird protection groups will be represented. Major exercise THE CHRISTCHURCH Transport Board has undertaken a major’ logistics exercise to ensure that 15,000 students will see “Roadshow” when it plays in Christchurch between June 30 and July 7. Twelve buses will be needed to

carry students to each of the 9.30 a.m., 11 a.m. and 1.30 p.m. shows. Several Transport Board staff have volunteered to work through their lunch breaks, and workshop schedules have been altered to ensure that enough buses are on the roads. Foreign exposure SPA POOLS designed by the Christchurch firm of Wright Spa Pools have been fitted in the cruise ship Cunard Princess. The pools were built in Guernsey by Wright Spa Pools’ European connection, Spa de la Mare. The pools were instilled while the ship was in Malta. The Cunard Princess spends most of her time cruising the Mediterranean. Under siege TAURANGA appears to be still under attack from shells fired 119 years ago. In the last few months six shells that were probably

fired during the battle of Gate Pa on April 29, 1864, have been found. Last Wednesday, a live shell was found in the suburb of Greerton by power board men who thought it was a buried paint tin. Earlier this year another one was found almost under the city council offices and two have been uncovered in the harbour. During the Battle of Gate Pa, 1100 shells were fired from British batteries. The shell found in Greerton had probably overshot the Maori fortifications on a small hill at Gate Pa whilst others could have ricocheted off the rising slopes, said Major B. L. Flint of the Army’s 6th Hauraki Batallion. Some shells found in downtown Tauranga, away from the battle site, could have fallen off supply ships, he said. Running vs beer BEER DRINKERS will be comforted by the results of a recent study in the United

States. The results suggest that drinking three glasses of beer a day might give an inactive person as much protection against heart disease as exercise gives to marathon runners and joggers, according to “Brew. News,” the Lion Breweries magazine. In the study, 16 marathon runners, 15 joggers and 13 inactive men were taken off liquor for three weeks. For the next three weeks they each drank three 12-ounce beers daily. The idea was to measure the men’s levels of high density lipoprotein cholesterol (H.D.L.C.), which studies have indicated protects against heart disease. Marathon runners had the highest levels of H.D.L.C. before the study began. After three weeks of drinking beer each day, the study found that H.D.L.C. levels had increased significantly in the inactive men. The same amount of beer drinking had no effect on the H.D.L.C. levels in either joggers or marathon runners.