Moving On

We are now getting ready to move on from French Polynesia. It has been two months since we arrived to Hiva Oa after crossing the Pacific. Hard to believe as the time seems to have flown by.

We were lucky to be in Bora Bora for the start of the annual Heiva festival, which is the 'celebration of life'. It is a month long festival with traditional dancing, drumming and singing; canoe races, sports matches and lots of eating and drinking. The ladies wear flowers in their hair and long flowing dresses with bright flower designs. They are really beautiful. We attended the festivities in the town square a couple of nights. It was like stepping back in time. The costumes were enchanting, the drumming furious and the dancing hypnotic. What a delightful end to our stay in French Polynesia.

With every place you go there are the sights and sounds that will always stay with you. For me it will be listening to the sound of the drums through the night to the early morning hours as we sleep in the gentle motions of the boat at anchor in the lagoon, the light of the full moon slipping by shining through the top hatches into our bed.

City Docks and Sun Rises

We are moored up to the city dock and I am sitting in the cockpit drinking my coffee watching the joggers go by. It is early morning and the sun has just risen over the reef that surrounds Ra'iatea. We moved to the dock yesterday afternoon, joining SV Ninita and SV Orkestren, boats we have met in Galapagos. We decided the anchorage we were at last night was a bit rolly and although the city dock is literally right in town, it was going to be nice to get to shore for a bit. We will soon need to get ready for a morning dive but for now I have a little time to reflect on the past few days.

Huahine
We left Mo'orea just before sunset on Friday and did an overnight sail to Huahine arriving just as the sun was coming up. Michelle kept me company for most of my night shift which was nice. She dropped out around 10pm and slept through the arrival to the pass and anchoring part but was up in time for coffee. It seems the motion of the boat is a sleep inducer for her as it is for most of us actually and of course the added issue of jet lag..

We had a couple of lazy days on Huahine, enjoying the Saturday morning market in the small town of Fare and happy hour at a seaside restaurant in the afternoon. On Sunday, we rented a car and did a self-guided island tour. It is actually two islands, Huahine Iti and Huahini Ini, joined together by a bridge and together they are small enough to get around in a half day if you don't stop too often. But we stopped and visited all the sights and view points; a pearl farm in a lagoon, the sacred blue eyed eels, a vanilla plantation which was actually a tour of the entire farm and finally we stopped to do a bit of snorkelling. The snorkeling was quite cool. Sort of like the Octopus garden under the sea (check out the Octopus photos below). Monday morning we did a couple of dives with Annie from Mahana Dive; one was a dive though the pass where we saw eagle rays swimming in formation and a few very large gray reef sharks; and the other was what is called the canyon. Great fun!

Ra'iatea and Taha'a
After our morning dives with Annie we had a quick sail across to Ra'iatea arriving just in time for a nice sunset. Ra'iatea is home to the only real wreck dive in the islands (the wrecks on Tahiti were placed there). It was to be an early morning shore dive so needless to say, we had an early night.

In the morning we took the dinghy to the Ra'iatea Pearl Resort from whose dock you get to the Nordby Wreck. This is a boat that sank on the shores of the island in August of 1900. We discovered that this famous wreck was sailing under a Danish flag and was on its way to Liverpool with a cargo of dried coconuts, bees wax, cotton, pearls and copper. It stopped in Ra'iatea to pump its ballast when a storm drove it into the reef putting a hole in the hull. As it took on more water than they could pump out, the beautiful 50 meter three-masted Nordby slowly sank to its final resting place. Captain H. Christiansen had enough time to unload its cargo and salvage as much as possible from the ship which was auctioned to the locals.

It was a bit late for a dive through the pass because of the current and that's when we decided to move to the city dock. It turned out to be a good decision cause it gave Michelle and I a little time for pearl shopping.

After dinner, as we were sitting in the cockpit sipping a little wine, we could hear the sound of drums in the distance. We decided to follow the sound and found ourselves at a rehearsal of a dance and drum troupe consisting of over 50 dancers, men and women. What a wonderful show despite the fact they were not in costume. The dance and drum troupes on all the islands are getting ready for an inter-island competition that takes place in July. I am sure that would be an event worth seeing.

After our dive today we will sail to Bora Bora, meeting up with some new friends on Moonbeam for dinner.

Note: Under water photos courtesy of Michelle.

Diving, Polynesian Dinner and Dance, Sailing, Snorkeling

So now we know what it is to be in paradise! Michelle has arrived and we have been out diving and snorkeling. A few wreck dives ... three boats, two planes; and lots of fish, coral and the usual suspects that hang around the reef. A couple of highlights were the amazing huge Titan Triggerfish that kept following us around, a sea cucumber that looked more like an alien life form, large snails, octopus and the icing on the cakes (cause there were two cakes) were the lemon sharks and the rays.

We had seen pretty much every species of shark that live in these waters except for the lemon sharks. These babies grow to be 10 feet long and I am sure these guys had been taking steroids cause they sure looked big. My new book, Reef Fish Identification, hand delivered by my sis, indicates they are 'solitary and considered dangerous'. Oh, yeah. I guess I should have read that before the dive. But being innocent and naive, we spent almost an hour cavorting with them together with a few black tip reef sharks. What an excellent dive.

Then there was the snorkeling expedition to see the Tahitian Stingray. They can be as big as 3 1/2 feet (100 cm) and are so graceful in the water as they fly along with their magnificent wings and long tails. They are a real treat to watch. There is nice sandbar just off shore opposite the Intercontinental resort on Mo'orea where the rays like to rest in the sand. Well, the tour operators have gotten them used to being fed and so now every time they hear a motor boat, they come by expecting some free nibbles. It was quite intimidating to see so many around the dinghy and we were a little reluctant to jump in. But as soon as they realized we hadn't brought the feed bag, the quickly ignored us and went about their business. There must have been 20 or more together with the ever present black tip reef sharks hovering around.

Before we left the island of Tahiti we took in a show at the Intercontinental Resort. They put on a Polynesian night with a sumptuous buffet of local foods followed by a traditional dance show with drums and singing. It was nice to get a little of the island culture even if it is solely designed for the tourists.

We have since sailed to Mo'orea and then to Huahine. We hope to visit Ra'iatea and Bora Bora before we have to say good bye to Michelle.

The underwater photos below are courtesy of Michelle.