When Jon and Babs Tucker and their five boys arrived at the Chatham Islands, 430 miles east of South Island, New Zealand, on board the ketch New Zealand Maid, they were delivering an emergency basket stretcher donated to the islands by their local Lions service club. In return they were offered the chance to visit the breeding programme saving the black robin from the brink of extinction.
Big swells and foul weather are a fact of life in these waters. It’s a 90-mile return trip between Waitangi and South East Island, doubling Cape L’Eveque, crossing Pitt