R Tucker Thompson Tall Ship Day Sail - Bay of Islands

Has anyone done this in the Bay of Islands?

We would love to hear about it, especially the timings of the day.

We are thinking of doing the Solstice's tour so that we can get an early tender to do this tour.

Has anyone done this in the Bay of Islands? We would love to hear about it, especially the timings of the day. We are thinking of doing the Solstice's tour so that we can get an early tender to do this tour.

Yes, we did a sailing in the wonderful and scenic Bay of Islands. It was not, however, on this larger ship. We did a smaller, faster sailing ship. My thoughts, questions and reactions?

As a few of my pictures below, I am sure glad we were on a smaller, more custom tour. Why? The Thompson ship had sails, but seemed somewhat slow and crowded. From a distance, this ship does look "interesting", but I am not sure how much "fun" it was to be standing on the deck with the large group of other people. Maybe that is good enough for your interests and needs. We, however, got to be "more personal" in sharing our sailing experience, interacting with the skilled crew, having our food and drinks as we sailed, going ashore on an interesting smaller island, seeing dolphins up close and personal, exploring these fascinating areas, etc.

Much depends on what you have done in the past, seek, like, need, etc. Tell us more for what you seek, have done in the past, etc. See much more on my full live/blog for our various Bay of Islands experiences, etc. Added questions?

THANKS! Enjoy! Terry in Ohio

Enjoyed a 14-day, Jan. 20-Feb. 3, 2014, Sydney to Auckland adventure, getting a big sampling for the wonders of "down under” before and after this cruise. Go to:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1974139

for more info and many pictures of these amazing sights in this great part of the world. Now at 125,105 views for this posting.

Here are a couple of my pictures of this ship, the R Tucker Thompson Tall Ship, as it was sailing around the exciting Bay of Islands area. Nice looking ship from a distance, but with the numbers of people on this slower ship, I am not sure how well the "experience" works and matches your expectations/needs.:

From our group's Bay of Islands water fun in New Zealand, we got to do real sailing, including going out into the nearby Pacific Ocean! See the proof and success below. It was both a perfect weather day and such fun sampling this great region of northern NZ. One of the options for those in our Central Ohio group on this custom, private sailing was to help to do as much (or as little as desired) in helping make this sail experience happen. In the first picture, Captain Murray is guiding the ship from this great vantage point on the back of the Zindabar. Was this exciting and scenic?:

At Bay of Islands during our private sailing adventure, we went ashore and walked past this scenic cove with a mother and daughter enjoying this great setting. Then, we had to climb up the Motuarohia Trail to the TOP!! How tall was this challenge? Officially, it is 450 meters or 1476 feet. BUT, by the time we got back on the boat, with bragging skills learned in Australia, that "mountain" we conquered had grown greatly up to 2414' in height. Inflation? Sure! Just makes the stories better to those who stayed on the sailing craft. And the views from up, UP there? See this one example below to prove our great achievement.:

They said we might get lucky and be able to see some dolphins. Did we? Seeing is believing!! They knew these waters and how to draw these dolphins closer to our boat. We loved the results (and good luck), especially seeing multiple dolphins jumping and flipping. Plus, these cute creatures coming so close to our sailing craft. Great fun!! Our Captain Sharon was a sailor for New Zealand at both the 1996 Atlanta Olympics (where she sailed off of Savannah) and the 2004 Athens Olympics.:

Yes, we did the day trip on the R. Tucker Thompson many years ago. It was a very hot day and a perfect sailing day. The boat that day was crowded but it was still quite enjoyable. It stopped on a small island for a BBQ lunch, then set sail through the myriad islands for the afternoon cruise.

Looking back, I think I could recommend the trip. We found it enjoyable but as far as patronage goes it is hit and miss. When I mentioned to the captain how crowded it was on deck, he remarked that two days previous to our trip the total numbers had been 23 and 17 respectively.

If it is a nice day, it will be a trip to remember as you cruise the absolutely beautiful Bay Of Islands.

Having looked into doing a smaller private sailing tour, the timings don't work out with the time we are tendered. I emailed several people who do these private sails but they all set off before we could get off the tender and they are at another location. It seemed that our only option if we wanted to do a sailing tour in the Bay of Islands was to do a tour through Celebrity. We have booked on the R Tucker Thompson tall ship and hope that it will be a good day. The photos you have posted look beautiful - thank you for sharing them with us.

We really enjoyed our day on R Tucker Thompson Tall Ship on our Feb '13 Radiance cruise (ship tour, as the boat was booked by RC for the day). The crew was fun, the food was good and the scenery spectacular. The weather wasn't great, but that's beyond their control :)

I'm sure you will enjoy.