Make Friends with Tax-Free Liquor

After crossing 3,000 miles of open ocean en route to French Polynesia, it’s only natural that sailors would want to get together and socialize. But as one South Pacific cruiser pointed out, “The trouble is, with all those cruiser get-togethers, you can go through your entire stash of beer, wine and liquor in short order.”

In Tahiti that’s a problem, because beer, wine and booze are very expensive. But as the crew of Seattle-based Amel Super Maramu 53 Delos found out a couple of years ago, if you know where to look and bring the right paperwork, you can buy liquor tax-free prior to leaving, because you’re aboard a yacht in transit.

Regular readers will recall the crazy antics of the Delos crew, which grew from the fact that they’d bought dozens of five-liter Heineken mini-kegs before leaving Papeete (for about $15 US each). When we ran into them at Tonga’s Regatta Vava’u in September of 2010, skipper Brian Trautman was wearing a green suit of armor constructed entirely of keg remnants. Unfortunately, by that point he couldn’t remember the name of the liquor distributor.

It took a while, but we now have that info, thanks to our Tahitian partners, Cindy and Maryline, at the yacht agency CMA-CGM in Papeete. If you’ll be heading to French Polynesia in the future, see the updates section of the Pacific Puddle Jump website for complete info. And remember, when you raise a glass in Tahiti, the proper toast is “Manuia,” as in, “Manuia to ya!”