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City of Sails

Posted on September 25, 2011 | 25 comments

“The time has come”the walrus said
to talk of many things:
Of shoes and ships and sealing wax
of cabbages and kings.”
Lewis Carrol –
from Through the Looking Glass

In New Zealand Auckland is known as the city of sails but here in Wellington we have our fair share of yachts. Large and small, we see them braving the mad winds we have in our harbour. Yesterday, when out for our walk and even though there was a brisk wind, the only activity around the marina seemed to be people cleaning and getting their yachts ready to sail.

As you can see the marina is almost in the CBD.

Having been married to a boat owner (several launches no yachts) I do know just how much work there is always waiting to be done around boats.

Laser image via Wikipedia

One Christmas when they were about 13 and 15, we bought the children a Laser. They had earlier been introduced to P-class sailing when we lived on Lake Pupuke in Auckland, but this was their first real experience of sailing and managing a yacht. We had many laughs until they got used to it, and they had many hours, weeks, months and years of fun.

But back to yesterday. It was a very good day for a walk around the harbour even though the wind did it’s best to blow Lotte’s ears inside out.

For some reason the date reverted to 1 January 2007 on the camera.

This is the main marina in the city but there are others scattered around our harbour. New Zealanders love the sea and use any excuse to get out on their boats. Children start very early with p-class yachts and if they are keen, they can always find somebody wanting a deck hand on a boat for the day.

And of course, nowhere in New Zealand are we any more than about 2.5 hours drive from the sea. So those born and/or brought up here have the sea in their blood.

These apartments converted from an office block, have uninterrupted views of the activity on the harbour. On the ground floor is a variety of cafes and restaurants where one can while away time over a good coffee or a meal. Lotte is welcome but of course, we sit outside with her to drink our coffee. This is a particularly good place for people watching – my most favourite sport.