I know, I know. We have not posted a blog post in a month or so.
What is it that made me want to post now? Was it yet another idyllic sunset, or miles long deserted white sand beach or whales and dolphins frolicing on the bow of our boat as we glide downwind to the next island paradise?….Nope…sorry, it’s irritation, nay….RED RAGE! I had a run in with a local marina owner here in Apia, Samoa.
The title of this post probably gives you some idea of where my rage is coming from or directed at.
The main reason for this post is informational. In hopes that any other Yachties thinking of going to Apia, Samoa have a heads up about Trevor Meredith and his ways. And by extension to screw him out of even more money because he is a dickhead that pissed me off.
The story!
We left Pago Pago, American Samoa after spending an awesome two weeks there. Had a blast. And the people of Samoa and Apia Samoa are completely awesome and ridiculously friendly and welcoming….But not Trevor….Trevor is a bit of a thief.
After an easy overnight sail, we arrived on Sunday Morning July 31st, 2016. We called Port Control on VHF CH16, but never received an answer. Since we could see it was clear to enter, we proceeded in and dropped anchor in the charted small boat anchorage just off the marina entrance with three other boats already there. Great anchorage, great holding. Twenty feet of water in sand and mud. As it was Sunday we knew Customs and all the official offices would be closed, so we just chilled on the boat the rest of the day.
Monday morning we got a call on CH16 to come into the marina to begin the check in process. We thought it was Port Control.
We dinghied in and were met by a marina employee who told us that we should bring Palarran in. We told him we had no need of the marina’s services and were happy at anchor. He said Port Control did not allow anchoring unless the marina did not have enough room, or if you drew more than 2.5 meters. That it was the law.
Hrrrmmmmmmm?? We had heard these rumors before we left Pago Pago, and researched online to find out if this was in fact the law here.
We disagreed with him and told him that we had issues with our cutlass bearing and transmission when going in reverse. So we would rather not have to maneuver in tight quarters until we haul out in Fiji next month to fix the issue. He said that since we were not staying at the marina, we had to contact Port Control ourselves to handle getting Health, Quarantine, And Customs to come down and check us in to the country.
Oooookaaaay.
We headed back out to the boat and called Port Control. Not a problem they said. They would arrange it as soon as they could.
Three hours pass. We decided we could not wait any longer since it was getting past noon and we did not want to be stuck on the boat another day. I looked up the phone number for the Ministry of Health online and called them. They were a bit surprised, but said, not to worry they would send someone down right away. In fact, the guy was down at the docks right now, but busy with a commercial boat at the moment.
An hour and a half later we called again. He sounded surprised to hear from me. He said the guy had gone to the marina, but was sent away? We said we had not heard from anyone at all. He put me on hold for a second, then said the inspector would be there in two minutes. And for us to meet him at the docks.
We met the Health inspector and took him out to our boat and the two other boats in the anchorage. Inspection done, Q flags down, back to the marina to find customs, then on to immigration downtown. All very painless and easy.
The next day we went into the marina office to pay the advertised $50 Tala ($20usd) weekly fee for the use of the dinghy dock.
This is when the trouble began.
The marina employee said the fee was now,….as of today $200 tala($100 usd) a week for use of the dinghy dock!!
The employee looked sheepish and shrugged. He also apologized for being so rude to us the day we had arrived, he was just acting on orders from his boss. We understood. We also told him we understood this was a penalty price for us for not using the marina. We thanked him (all smiles) said we would just use the beach and left the office.
The next afternoon we went into the marina with some friends to go to dinner and have a bunch of beers. On the dock we were approached by a guy who asked if we had paid our dinghy fees yet. I said that we had tried, but the fees had gone up 400% overnight and we wanted find out for sure if this was true before we paid anything.
Dude absolutely popped his cork and threatened to steal/damage our dinghy if he ever saw it in the marina again, then stomped off after a bunch more yelling. By both him and me. :) I’m not completely innocent in all of this.
At first we all looked at each other like….WTF mate?? Then one of our friends had the presence of mind to ask who he was as he stormed away. Turns out this was Trevor Meredith, the owner/operator of Apia Marina. We caught up with him on the ramp and argued for a bit about the legality of his business methods, I ask him to show me the rules/regulations that proved that it was in fact illegal to anchor out. Because, if so….despite me being an asshole, I would of course follow the actual laws of the country I was visiting. He could not come up with anything, at all, nothing. I was even allowing him the use of my phone to look that shit up. He could only say that that was the law and we did not know Samoan law. We kept calling bullshit and he kept spewing it.
Homeboy is just running a scam and the Port Control seems to either not care or is in on it. Most Yachties will fold when confronted with these sorts of situations, and Trevor knows it. You are, after all, in a foreign country and most time are not sure of the rules. We just were not having it this time around. He did sorta calmed down a bit, and we were able to talk to him a little more rationally, but he still stood his ground where his scam was concerned.
Two days later we were walking down the sidewalk along the harbor in town and saw a strange boat tied alongside our boat out in the anchorage. We could tell it was the marina’s runabout. They left before we got back. But they did come back out once we got back on the boat. They wanted to give us an envelope with some paperwork in it from what seemed to be a lawyer. Not sure why? But we declined it and they left.
And by declined, I mean I laughed like I thought they were all very retarded and tossed the envelope, unopened back into their boat.
We decided to pay a visit to the Ministry of Tourism and filed a complaint against Trevor and the Apia Marina. They were most surprised and distressed to hear this and really took the complaint to heart.
After a week of checking out Samoa, we were growing tired of the harassment from the marina. The weather looked good for the 5 day crossing to Fiji, So we headed to immigration to check out of the country and get our passports stamped with our exit visas. The immigration official told us they could not allow us to leave and would not stamp our passport. We were surprised and they had us talk to a supervisor. He showed us some paperwork that was from a law firm(Kruse, Enari, & Barlow) , issued by the Supreme Court of Samoa, it was a Departure Prevention Order (DPO).
Yeah, you read that right. The dude that is leasing the marina from the Samoan Port Authority somehow has enough juice to hold people hostage till he gets his money.
We were not really sure what exactly to do, but thought, maybe the American Embassy could help out a bit.
At the embassy we talked to two very nice people. They made calls and went with us to the Port Authorities office and we had our above mentioned meeting. And while they were awesome, very helpful and more than accommodating. The bottom line was, the port captain decided that if we paid them the $100USD fee (with no real proof or reason) and $50 Tala bribe to Trevor, the owner/operator of the Apia Marina, the DPO against us would be lifted and we would be free to leave the country.
The next day we got up bright and early to start the bribe paying and clearing out process. First stop, the Port Authority. We went to pay the mythical $100USD fee. However, they had decided overnight it was now $247 Tala. I blew up. They backed down and we paid them $200. Then we went to the marina to pay Trevor his $50 Tala. Trevor saw us coming and jumped into his truck and ran. Left his employee to do his dirty work.
Next stop, immigration. However, they still would not stamp us out. They did not have any paperwork yet. We went back down to the Ministry of Tourism and the CEO there made a few, very angry phone calls and said it was all cleared up and we were to go back up to immigration and clear out. An hour later, they got an email from the marina’s lawyer, but would not accept it. It had to be a letter from the judge that issued the DPO.
So we waited in immigration for 4 more hours. 15 minutes before they closed, the paperwork showed up.
Customs was closing in 30 minutes, so I jumped in a taxi to deal with that.
Tawn went back down to Tourism office to let them know it was all done. The CEO was shocked we were still there. Could not believe this was actually happening.
As all this was going on, we had two British friends having almost the same issue with the marina, minus the DPO. They had their own meeting with their consulate/Embassy and the CEO of the SPA were able to get an official cost of anchoring. According to the documentation the cost for their 38 foot sailboat was $5.60 Tala.
Ours ended up being $7.10 Tala, due to being a heavier boat. At the last second, they tacked on $110 Tala fee for lights and buoys.
Despite the fact that we had the American Embassy involved and the CEO from the Ministry of Tourism in the meeting. The SPA would not refund the difference back to us. The CEO of Tourism actually cut us a check for the difference! She was very, very upset about the whole affair.
Bottom line, this Trevor guy is a scam artist and not to be trusted, unless you give him want he wants, which is your money.
The Port Authority after all of this tells us that we were free to us their dinghy dock, showers and toilets which are accessible inside the breakwall where the tugs are moored. Why they did not mention this on day one is annoying.
We spent over a year and a half in Mexico, El Salvador, Honduras, Belize, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama and Ecuador. No bribes(none that were not expected at least) and no need for a trip to the American Embassy in order to get out of the country. Who saw that coming? Western Samoa…more corrupt than Central America! HUH? American Samoa was chill as hell. Completely opposite of what we expected.
A very full bag indeed!
just because your dad is bald and left you lol
Gosh that is terrible. I hope that the authorities can crack down on this kind of behaviour
It would be nice. But it really felt as if some of the authorities were just turning a blind eye to it.
It sounds like I will be skipping over Western Samoa.
It sounds horrible. But I wouldn’t tell people NOT to go to Apia, Samoa. Plus stuff like this can change month to month. So people next year might find the situation changed….
maybe if you negotiated a lower “dingy” dock fee, it might have gone smoother. I bet in retrospect paying him $25 would have been better.
I know you don’t have to pay bribes but ya’ know sometimes you gotta grease the wheels.
You are completely wrong, and part of the problem. When people just “Grease the wheels” it just makes the problem more and more of an issue.
This guy Trevor is banking on people that do this.
Also, if you read the article you’d see he was forcing us to pay, even though we had no intention of using his marina at all. the only reason we went in was at the request of the customs officials and the Health ministry. We were on his dock for a total of maybe 2 hours.
And P.S. There was no negotiating with him. His initial documentation/price sheet was $50 Tala a week. He then Edited it and brought us a new one at $200 Tala a week.
End the end, the bribe we did pay was $50 Tala a day, which comes out to $350 Tala a week. All because he knows we are guest in his country and have no voice.
Fuck that.
You pay it, I’ll stand my ground.
Thanks for sharing your story!! Good for you for standing your ground. Hopefully the karma bus runs him right over!!
Greasing the wheels is ignorance. Bribes are bribes and it’s illegal almost everywhere on the planet. Except the Middle East and some Spanish speaking countries.
And a good portion of Africa, and some of Asia. So I guess that really means it’s illegal and not expected in North America, Europe, Japan, New Zealand, and Australia? I will also point out that “bribes being illegal” and “bribes not being expected” are two totally separate things. Bribes can be illegal but be an absolute (and expected) necessity for getting things done in some places, where in other places, a bribe is an insult and could possibly get you thrown into jail. And, in places where bribes are legal, they’re not generally called bribes. They’re usually called something more innocuous like “fee” or “charge” or “tip” or “service fee” in whatever the local language is.
It’s really a shame this happened, though, and ended up spoiling and almost defining the entire visit there. Wish it could have been easier and less stressful.
joo ymmarrettavaa kylla, Noora raukka kun paivitat nii usein ja lukijoita ihan alyttomasti! ei niin etta tiuhaan paivittaminen meita lukijoita haittais :Dja tuo Helmin esiintuoma kostamisjuttu on minusta aika kaaakahaettuu.
Joo, toi oli kyllä mahtava miten juttua alko tulemaan! Ja oikeestaan mun ei ois pitäny tosiaankaan olla tuolla vaan päädyin tonne kun räpläsin puhelinta enkä muistanut nousta pois metrosta oikealla pysäkillä.. (lisäsin myös tekstiin)
I have cruised extensively through Asia and Africa, and did not pay bribes. Good on you for not paying. Corruption hurts the local community.
My experience in Apia is different.
I found the owner of the marina really nice person.
50 talas/week does not looks to much for survelled dinghy dock.
Did you pay the 100 Us to Apia Marina or the Port Autority ??
You are correct. 50 talas a week is more than fair, and I would have gladly payed him that. But when he found out we were NOT going to bring our boat into the marina. He immediately increased the price of the dinghy dock to 200 talas.
All this was written in the article? How did you miss that?
I ‘ve had a really different experience. Travor asks not to much for his service. All sailing vessels in the marina are very happy with his service. The 17 dollar per night is included the service, water and they arrange the clearance for you. I think it wasn’t smart to not use his services. After all you are right, you are in an other country where the rules are unknown. Apparently you’re choice to go against them did cost you more and made your stay unpleasant. And looking to the culture of this nice people it is a logic result. When I compare the fees from Samoa to anywhere else they are acceptable. I hope you have more luck in the next country.
You are clearly not reading the post completely. See, the thing is, when you own a business, it is your job to accommodate people and treat them well. You also have to realize that your business may not offer services that are required by all people. It is sort of one of those situations where you will get some and probably most of the business, but not all of it. As a business owner, you do not strong arm people into using your services…this is not a communist country and people have the free will to make choices. Also, the boats at the marina were not exactly thrilled with Trevor’s services. Usually people fighting on the docks, beggars and bar patrons chucking glass bottles onto boats decks is not an amenity that most people are looking for. One yachtie even fixed one of the toilets themselves and then asked Trevor what was us with the showers and toilets? Trevor’s response was “what do you want for 17$ per day”. Once again, please read the post all the way through before making you judgments.
I had no idea how to approach this bef-reonow I’m locked and loaded.
I think that you don’t know what you are talking about. You should go eat balls
Have you ever thought about publishing an ebook or guest authoring on other websites?
I have a blog based upon on the same topics you discuss and would really like to have you share some stories/information. I know my
viewers would value your work. If you are even remotely interested, feel free to
shoot me an email.
tawn you’ve got such a tight arse
Hi,
I’m reaching out regarding your blog of “Trevor Meredith or the owner/operator” of the Apia Marina. I’d like to clarify that the land doesn’t belong to the Samoa Ports Authority. Instead, it’s customary land owned by the To’omalatai Family, the traditional owners of the Apia Harbour, therefore the Departure Prohibition Order should never have been issued to you illegally. In the future, if you need assistance, please seek out a member of the To’omalatai Family, and you’ll be warmly welcomed into the Apia Port.