Tokelau with children

Hello!
We are a family from Austria with 2 children (6 and 8 years old) who want to travel to Tokelau next year as part of our world trip. Is there anyone who can has been to Tokelau recently and can tell us about Tokelau in general and if it is a good idea to take children there. Especially: has anyone stayed at the new hotel Te Mahina in Nukunonu? Does anyone have their contact email address? Is there a hotel in Atafu and Fakaofo as well? How is the boat trip from Samoa? How long should we stay?
We are very happy about any kind of information. Thank you very much. L.D.

Tokelau is hardly a place for a family vacation, especially because of the quite challenging boat trip there. Unless your children are used to live on a boat, i.e. from sailing, I would not recommend to do that trip with them (24 hours just on an open deck - and it is a really small vessel only).

How long to stay? It certainly is nice there but after a few hours you know everything and everyone already. Anyway, it mainly depends on when the boat might come back. The schedule is very unreliable so you will have to plan three to four weeks in Samoa after Tokelau just to make sure that you will not miss any onward bookings on your further journey. Usually people plan their whole trip around the Tokelau part at least when their time is limited.

As to how long should you stay - you have no choice, you have to wait until the boat comes back. I work with someone who comes from there - he said it was once a month - but they may have changed the schedule in recent years.

It is also unclear for me that if you step off the boat, say, in the "first" atoll from Apia, that means you'll stay on that atoll all the time until the boat comes back, going back to Apia, right? If you want to see the other atolls, you'll have to continue with the same boat and thus spend only couple of hours on other atolls? This is information I have gathered from books and other supposedly reliable sources, not many offering plentiful information about Tokelau. The boat is 19 meters long and it's said in case of wind towards your face it's extremely rough and you get all the gasoline clouds at you, so I'd think the trip's not for "the faint hearted."

It's probably the kind of destination that the most adventurous ones can try which is the only way to see. It would be a pleasant surprise to see some "action" on this section of Thorntree, too.

Edited by: juho

Hi all!
Thanks for the information! Looks like it's a bit of a mission to get to Tokelau (and back again)... Well, we have got plenty of time, so we might try it.Unfortunately it's quite hard to find reliable information...
Thanks again. LD

There is a lot of information available, i.e. here. The LP info on Tokelau is quite alright as well.

But I think getting there and back is not really the point. The reason why you should seriously think about going there at all is the safety of your children. 24 hours on the open boat deck, wearing life-vest all the time, might be alright when the sea is calm and the sun shines. But I would never take a child on that tiny vessel in rain and storm ... I see that boat every time it comes here to Apia - wait until you have seen it too before you make the booking ;-)

And what do you do when you or your child has an accident or gets seriously ill while being in Tokelau? There is no evacuation service and it might take a week or two to get to a proper hospital ... The Tokelauans have to live with that but is going to Tokelau reason enough to take that kind of risk with your kids?

Quite frankly - I have children myself and we live in Samoa. But I would never take them to Tokelau. Staying in Manono for a while when visiting Samoa would give you a very similar experience without that challenging boat trip while being closer to all facilities. Why Tokelau? It is hard to get to - but that really is the only thing that makes it special.

I would not want to get sick in Samoa either. lol Been to the hospital there for meds.