Brush with Celebrity - Laura Dekker

On Friday evening, we attended an annual Meet & Greet for "international yachties" (that's us) and some of the local vendors.  In addition to seeing some friends that we hadn't seen in ages (SV Red - Mexico 2013; SV Beguine - briefly earlier this season), we had the chance to meet the folks behind Gulf Harbour Radio, who volunteer their time to provide detailed weather analysis and forecasting to the entire cruising fleet over SSB radio.  [These folks provide an amazing service so it was nice to thank them in person - also great to have a chance to talk meteorology with a meteorologist who has also cruised worldwide for over 15 years]



We also had the chance not only to meet, but to invite to join our table, Laura Dekker, the youngest person to sail solo around the world.  Victoria absolutely glowed when she was speaking with Laura, and it was she who invited her to join us.  Laura was born in Whangarei when her parents were cruising, and she has lived here for the last two years.  I am sure that there will be more visits (perhaps using Trickle as transport) when we return in January, as Laura lives aboard her boat Guppy on a pile mooring in our marina (pile moorings are basically sets of two telephone poles with the boats tied between them).  Laura (who is now 19) has just published a book about her circumnavigation, and Victoria has already started to read it.  Not only did we have a brush with celebrity, but we had dinner with her too :)