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Timshel - To Niue or not To Niue



That was the question. Trouble was we'd been told there were 20 buoys at Niue so enough for the whole fleet, then a few days out the word was there were only 15, then 13, and however you counted it we would be too far down the order to get one, in fact 6 boats would be without. The Pilot books all say that it is not possible to anchor as there is only a small shelf and it's deep and rocky. The seamanlike thing was probably to gybe and head directly for Tonga, but we held on and luckily got a message from Cecilia at WARC Rally Control just in time to let us know that the Niue Yacht Club had given special permission for the excess boats to anchor just off the wharf where there is a small patch of sand (it should be noted though that if there was a ship at the wharf this would not be possible)or to raft up 2 boats on some of the buoys (if it was calm enough). So the last 3 boats, us, Atla and Arabela arrived almost at the same time Saturday lunchtime. Lars from Sanvita kindly came across to help us anchor as our first attempt got stuck on a rock (in fact both Sandvita and Skyelark generously offered to give us their buoy). Then we had to rush ashore to check in with Customs etc, then rush back to go for lunch at a very nice cafe on the coast further along the island, next day rush ashore first thing to join a tour of the island then after doing checking out of Customs, the supermarket and the bond (duty free) store rush back for the evening function. It was all go, we never had a quiet moment, and never finished getting the dinghy inflated, engine on etc so we are much indebted to Taistealai, Sandvita and Owl kindly giving us lifts in theirs. We are so glad that we did manage to visit this lovely island, everyone there was so welcoming and friendly. The Niue Yacht Club, who seem to exist just to look after visiting yachts, and especially Sue and Keith were absolutely great, organising moorings, anchoring, deliveries of bread and fresh vegetables, tours and transport. We had a great function on Sunday night at the Matavai resort hotel with local music and dancing and a wonderful meal (the NZ lamb was to die for and the icecream was pretty good too). We are indebted to Cecilia's tireless efforts organising all this for us, she works so hard!

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