We may not be sailing anymore, but we're still being very nautical.

For one, we're back on s/v Curious, the fantastic Oyster 56 our friends Steve and Trish have generously offered to us as crew quarters while we're in Auckland. I can't even begin to explain what this gift really means: among other things, it means we're back on board a boat, which rocks and creaks and howls. These are sounds we've come to love, to feel comfortable with. And here in Viaduct Marina, with the passing ferries and the gusty winds, the boat is very animated. When we arrived the other day the winds were strong out of the north, which moved the boat to the full extension of her lines away from the dock. It was a huge step to get aboard, and we had suitcases and groceries to pass across the gap. The mast has been howling, especially since the in-mast-furling mainsail has been removed for inspection leaving a huge vertical cave for the wind to explore. It took us days to figure out what the humming/howling sound was, but in the meantime, it was like music. Let's face it: we love life aboard.

For another, this weekend was the Anniversary Weekend for the City of Auckland, a hundred-and-eighty-something years, and Viaduct Marina and the Te Wera Island (which is a parking lot) has been the center of activity since Friday, with a Wine and Seafood festival right on our doorstep. Literally, we are in the middle of it, complete with the Main Stage right behind us (behind the row of portable potties, I should say) and a series of bands that span the gap from awful to amazing. For 3 days we've been enjoying fantastic seafoods from local restaurants and wines from all over New Zealand. It's all a charity event benefiting the effort to battle drug addiction to what they call "P" here -- what we call "Ice" or "Meth" in the States. Apparently, New Zealand has a huge problem with addiction to this awful drug. So we felt good spending our money on a worthy cause.

And next, nautically speaking, were a series of regattas which included the 2011 Americas Cup boat, the AC-45 catamaran. Fast. Really fast, and very cool. It sailed right in front of our boat, 50 feet away, twice. So we got a picture, as you can see. There were also other regattas today with old gaff-rigged boats and various historical specimens from New Zealand's rich sailing history. And a tugboat parade that looked fun -- we missed it but saw a few of the stragglers in the harbor, some very un-green boats putt-putting along with smoke spewing out of their tall stacks just like the African Queen.

Finally, to fully cover our nautical bases, we went to the Maritime Museum, which is a great place, and if you've never been, you should. It pays wonderful homage to the maritime history of the South Pacific including the early migrations in canoes and outriggers, with reproductions of boats from Niue, Tonga, Fiji and the Maori, moving on to the influx of Europeans (you can research your geneology and see if an ancestor immigrated here on a boat) and then to the era of ferries and ocean liners, ultimately to a huge and impressive tribute to Sir Peter Blake, a Kiwi hero who was big into NZ racing and set numerous world records in the sailing realm until his untimely demise in 2001.

So, we're not feeling quite ejected from the realm of the seas yet, despite the fact that we haven't actually been out on the water in a boat for about a month. As far as we're concerned, we're still boating.