Is anyone familiar with Auckland?

[buttonsmachine]

Hi,
My boyfriend and I thought we might like to spend a couple months living aboard in New Zealand. Does anyone know what its like to buy a boat in the Auckland area, and live aboard it? Also, what is the difficulty level for sailing the Auckland in June-August? We have been learning to sail in Hawaii for a while, but this is the only place we have sailed. Are any areas of Auckland easier/more difficult than others? Any info or advice would be appreciated.

Thanks!

[billyruffn]

I've spent a lot of time in Auckland, but none of it on a boat. It's a great city and used to be an inexpensive place to live until the USD went south. When I was there a number of years ago there were a many fine boats for sale and considerable marina space in the city, but are you going to buy a boat to live aboard for a few months? June-August is the dead of winter -- Auckland's winter is relatively mild, but can be cool and wet. Why not just rent an apartment ashore for a few months to see how you like it. My guess is you will.

[Omatako]

We live aboard in Auckland.

Marinas - There are 12 marinas in Auckland but only (I think) 3 that allow live-aboard. We have a 15 meter berth and we pay NZ$930 a month which includes a live-aboard levy and all services including ablutions, power, water, security, wi-fi, etc. There are other maiinas that are less expensive but their facilites are not as nice and the marinas are not as convenient to the city.

Sailing - The Hauraki Gulf is a very safe place to sail so if you're learning to sail you can't get a lot better. In addition, there is a very active, very good and very accommodating Coast Guard who do a fantastic job of looking after boaters.

Buying a boat - we found boats to be expensive for what you get, so much so that we bought our boat in the US and sailed it back to Auckland. I suppose it depends on what level of live-aboard you're looking at but most of the boats that I would be prepared to live on from a size perspective are not cheap. The affordable boats are too small for me to consider a suitable live aboard but then it depends on the individual.

Hope this helps

Andre

[buttonsmachine]

That does help, thanks a million.

[chris_gee]

June - August are mid winter. Expect day temps of 10-17 c. Overnight 3-10. Plenty of clear light wind days but also the opposite.

I think the area is one of the few that moorings require a coastal skipper's certificate, or equivalent before chartering.
At a guess I would say this would be because you can expect 20-30 knots about a third of the time and there are a fair amount of rocks etc although this may be less of a problem with a good chartplotter and reasonable navigation skills.

PS. Try trademe.co.nz for private boat sales and crew.org.nz for alternatives.
There are plenty of cruising spots, although it is quiet time for fishing.

Boats are relatively expensive but cash in the present climate might help. As a young couple presumably, you would not need a big boat for short-term local cruising and should be able to get something for around 30k US say a H28 or something more modern in the 26-28 range. It would not have all the electronics etc.

Buying and selling a boat within a few months could be expensive, as you won't be around to do it privately and it may take a while to recover your money.

Possibly you could lease privately but that would strictly probablly be illegal unless the boat was in survey for charter, and there could be insurance issues, although it does happen. You may be able to negotiate a purchase and buyback though that would be very unusual. Insurance would probably require a basic boating certificate.

Alternatively you might consider buying an old car and travelling around and doing casual crewing plus a brief charter.

Feb -April are perhaps the best sailing times. Most locals would not cruise in the winter but it is possible with plenty of warm gear it depends on what you want.

PS. Try trademe.co.nz for private sales and crew.org.nz for other possible deals.