HEAVY BOOKINGS

Evening Post, Volume XCVIII, Issue 147, 19 December 1919, Page 7

HEAVY BOOKINGS

HOLIDAY. TRAFFIC.

The Christmas holidays this year will be an unusual "rush" time for the various passenger steamers plying on the New\Zealand coast. The bookings up to the present ftitne have been particularly heavy, and crowds are daily endeavouring to get accommodation in steamers for the South Island. The Weliington-l>yt-tolton Ferry service promised some tune ago' to be heavy, and the Union Steam Ship Company decided to run two^niore steamers—the Monowai and theMokoia —to relieve the pressure on the Maori and the Mararoa. This arrangement has helped to cope with the traffic, which will continue over the Now, Year period, but for several nights nest week booking on all South steamers has been stopped—the accommodation being all taken up. On Tuesday and Wednesday nights it will be almost impossible to proceed from Wellington to'the South Island if a passage has not been booked. For Picton and Nelson the bookings have been heavy, but the addition of the Mapourika on that run has made tl.e position better to some extent, although space on one-or 'two dr.ys next week is full-. The Kaitoa and Ni'kau,' plying between. Wellington nnd Nelson, are full up for some time to come. For the New Year holidays a considerable number of berths havo fceen booked, but this bis niMi has not yet commenced for that period.