Saturday 26 October 2013

Tall Ships

Picton Castle at Queens Wharf, Auckland
Europa
The rigging

Spirit of New Zealand
View from RNZN- Wellington
Yesterday eight tall ships sailed into Auckland Harbour  for the 2013 Tall Ships Festival after completing the Sydney to Auckland tall ship race.  Today they  were open to the public.  Mr J and I bussed into the city (cos the trains weren't operating) and went to see them.

We had to queue for while, but were able to board the 102 year old ship Europa which won the race. The amount of rigging on these ships is amazing and seeing the crew climbing up them was too (they do wear safety harnesses).

We had planned to go aboard the Spirit of New Zealand, but then Mr J saw the naval boat  RNZN- Wellington, so we queued for about an hour to board that.  He loved it, he got to try out the high pressure hoses over the harbour and look at the guns and protective clothing.  The view from the control room was pretty great too.

Auckland turned on a beautiful day, there were lots of fun activities for kids at The Cloud, everyone was enjoying the glorious weather, the boats and a great start to Labour Weekend.

2 comments:

  1. I love the contrast in the first shot of the old wooden boat to the modern city. Sounds like a fun day!!

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  2. What a lovely photo of us in Auckland! Thanks for posting it - we've headed up to Waipu now ... from Nova Scotia to Waipu, just like Rev. McLeod in the 1850s!

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