Big Brother at Minerva Reef
"While anchored at North Minerva Reef, a Royal New Zealand Air Force Orion did numerous passes over the anchorage," reports Emmy Newbould, who’s cruising with her husband Eric Willbur on their Brickyard Cove-based Flying Dutchman 37 Nataraja. "They hailed each and every boat to ask the captain’s name, nationality, number of crew and their nationality, ETA to New Zealand and what port, and if there were pets on board. We were walking on the reef so did not get to chat with them, but they did tip their wing in acknowledgement when we waved.
"Minerva Reef is 775 nm away from New Zealand, so we were all pretty surprised that the airforce went to that kind of trouble. Our next military encounter was about 10 miles off the entrance to Bay of Isles, New Zealand. We were hailed by a New Zealand warship which proceeded to ask us most of the above questions, then informed us that they were going to board us. They launched their RIB and dropped off two Customs guys who were both very friendly and explained that they weren’t going to clear us in but instead were paying us a courtesy visit.
"They knew we were coming since we’d sent an email when we were 48 hours out letting them know that, due to the lighter winds, we anticipated getting in sometime late Tuesday or even early Wednesday. It was about 3 p.m. on Tuesday when the warship spotted us and one guy said, ‘You weren’t supposed to be here until tonight.’ Eric told him that it would be ‘tonight’ by the the time we got all the way in to Opua. Then they asked what boats were behind us, which ones we had been in contact with, how many were at Minerva when we left. We had a good time with them, and they were great sports for letting me take photos, but I have to say, we were really surprised at Big Brother’s interest in the boats coming to New Zealand, and the means they go to to track them.
"One thing we did note was no guns. Neither the customs guys nor the ones in the launch were armed. We mentioned that and the response was ‘Aw, we got no need for guns.’ What a great attitude! We didn’t make it to the quarantine dock before 5 p.m. but that was okay because we got a free night tied to a dock and a full night’s sleep on a completely motionless boat. The following morning, we were cleared in and we are now free to roam the country!"