All activities / Sailing / Bay of Islands
ReasonToGo · activity-first travel discovery. Honest timing. No bookings, no commissions, no one pays to rank. How we choose →
Sailing in Bay of Islands
Sheltered cruising ground of 144 islands in Northland, and the customs port where the Pacific cruising fleet lands each spring.
Why here
Every November the Bay of Islands fills with boats that have just crossed an ocean. The Pacific cruising fleet runs south from Fiji and Tonga ahead of the tropical cyclone season, and Opua is the customs port where most of them land. For a few weeks the marina holds crews who have just finished a thousand-mile passage and are about to disperse, which is the densest supply of experienced sailors and short-handed berths anywhere in the Southern Hemisphere. The school here teaches the Yachting New Zealand and IYT ladders across a sheltered cruising ground of 144 islands, and the courses are built so the final days are sailed without an instructor aboard.
Best months
November and December are late spring and early summer, warming but not settled. The Bay is protected water with short hops between anchorages, which is why it teaches well, but the approaches are open to the east and a southerly change can arrive quickly. Water is cool enough in November that most people want a layer. The fleet arrival is the reason to come in November. By January the cruisers have scattered and the Bay switches to a domestic holiday crowd that peaks over Christmas and New Year.
Getting there & around
Fly into Auckland and drive about three hours north, or fly to Kerikeri and transfer 25 minutes. The school is on the main wharf at Opua Marina on Baffin Street, which is also where the customs dock sits. There is one credible sailing school here, so if their calendar is full there is no local fallback and the alternative is Auckland. Courses combine instructed days with independent sailing days on the same boat, so accommodation is aboard. Instruction is in English.
Skill levels: beginner, intermediate, advanced
Schools & guides (1)
Great Escape Sailing School
SchoolSailing school and yacht charter on the main wharf at Opua Marina, accredited by both Yachting New Zealand and International Yacht Training. Four course levels from a two-day Introduction to Sailing for complete novices up to Bareboat Skipper, most of them structured as instructed days followed by independent sailing on the same boat.
Also good for sailing in November:
Torn between Bay of Islands and Aswan for November?
A plan settles it for your skill and budget, same-day.