These Kiwi Legends Built An Island To Get Around A New Year’s Eve Alcohol Ban

Those of us lucky enough to reside in the southern hemisphere get to enjoy the immense pleasure of bringing in the New Year on a warm summer’s night, and there are few places better to party on New Year’s Eve than the beach.

But there’s one problem with the modern NYE beach rager: they’re designated alcohol-free zones. Thankfully a group of mates in New Zealand have come up with the perfect way to beat the state and enjoy a breezy, coastal NYE.

They built their own goddamn island.

According to the BBC, the crew built their island out of sand during low tide in the Tairua estuary on the North Island’s Coromandel Peninsula.

The whole area had been designated an alcohol-free zone, meaning any punters hoping to celebrate with a drink would have to come up with some pretty bloody creative solutions. Which I guess is exactly what happened here.

Once the sand island was built, the group of friends then installed a picnic table and an esky (which New Zealanders adorably call “chilly bins”). According to witnesses they then proceeded to drink into the night, enjoying the fireworks from their homemade vantage point.

But how does building an island out of sand help you avoid alcohol bans? Well, the folk who built the structure claimed that they were in “international waters” and thus exempt from New Zealand laws and regulations.

It’s a cheeky idea that unfortunately doesn’t quite hold up. To actually escape the country’s jurisdiction the island would have to have been built 12 nautical miles off the coast, which it definitely wasn’t.

Thankfully the local cops were extremely chill about the whole thing, with Inspector John Kelly saying “That’s creative thinking – if I had known that I probably would have joined them”.

Onya, Inspector John.