It was sad to put our guests on the plane

last night.  It was a lot of fun to have Rosalie and Jami here for a 10-day visit.  We got to hear news from home, and got to show them our life aboard.  They got a pretty good taste of the cruising life; storms, toilet paper rationing, military showers, and unbelievable beauty everywhere they looked.

We spent most of our time in Moorea, anchored in either Cook’s Bay or Oponohu Bay.  These bays, on the north side of Moorea, are two gashes in Moorea’s landscape.  They go deep, deep into the land, where the mountains rise above us like giants’ fingers.  Even though we haven’t seen a lot of rain, every surface of Moorea is lush and green.

We found some good snorkeling spots, but the highlight was feeding the tame stingrays that hang out near a red buoy inside of the reef that surrounds Moorea.  This area is called “Stingray World”.  No sign, of course, but people seem to know where to go to meet these docile creatures.  The minute you pull up in your dinghy, you are surrounded by 15-20 stingrays.  It is wise to bring some raw fish in a baggie, otherwise they lose interest quickly.  When you jump into the waist-deep water, the stingrays circle and nudge you, begging for food like hungry puppies.  If you hold your bag of fish high, they will suck up your torso like little Hoover vacuum cleaners, reaching for the food.  Their eyes and nose are on the top of their heads, and their mouths on are on the bottom.  If you hold the food in your hand, they will snorkel around with their mouths and suck it right out of your hand.  Their skin feels like velvet, and they are very careful to keep the barbs on their tails away from the hands that feed them.

We got into some pretty rough seas while coming up the coast from south Tahiti to Moorea.  Jami and Rosie were not comfortable at all in this bucking, lurching boat, careening through the dark toward our anchorage.  They searched our eyes for signs of fear, just like I do in an airplane during times of turbulence.  I figure, if the flight attendants are calm, things must be okay.  After that adventure, we made sure the weather was behaving before we left an anchorage.

We sailed to Papeete for a change of scenery, and tied to the wharf right in the middle of town.  It was exciting to see the hustle and bustle, and visit the open-air market for last minute gifts for the family back home.  There is a big square near the wharf where every evening trucks park in a circle and open up their backs to reveal fancy cook stoves, refrigerators, and food of all kinds.  These are called “Les Roulettes”, and resemble the roach coaches that drive around Seattle and feed workers during the lunch hour.  Some of them prepare crepes, some pizza, and some Asian food.  All meals are under $10.00, and the food is excellent.  We ate there one night, and left the next morning for the marina where we would get ready to take Jami and Rosie to the airport.  All too soon, it was over.

Our visas have expired for French Polynesia.  We would have stayed a bit longer, but Americans can only stay for 90 days.  We will leave here on June 30th and sail into Bora Bora for a peak, then head for the Cook Islands.  It is much less expensive there, and everyone speaks English.  I think our experience here would have been more fulfilling if we spoke French. I guess we should have thought about that earlier…

The wind is blowing 25-30 knots today; I’m glad we are tucked into a marina and not at anchor out by the reef.  The boats out there are rolling and look very uncomfortable.  Molly and Jessie are redesigning their gecko’s cage, and missing their friend already.  We will start school with a vengeance on Monday.  It sure has been a nice break though – family, friends, and no math!

There is a new set of pictures in the media gallery.  Take a peak!  Jeanna

TAHITI

feels like a milestone for me.  After 8 months and almost 10,000 ocean miles, it feels like we have “arrived”.  Tahiti is kind of the half-way point, and by now we feel a bit like seasoned cruisers.  We have lived through Montezuma’s Revenge, the long crossings, the “low and dangerous” atolls, and the French. 

We have explored very little of Tahiti, because we have been doing boat projects since we arrived.  We are at an actual dock, which we haven’t experienced since Costa Rica.  Our boat has had many fresh water showers since we got here, and has shed her salty skin.  Our water maker now works, and Jim has invented a few more items that make Ruby Slippers more efficient and comfortable.  I’ll let him tell about them in a later update.

The large northern part of Tahiti is called Tahiti Nui, and the small southern end is called Tahiti Iti.  There are some beautiful cruising grounds along the coast and between the two parts of the island, we are told.  We plan to explore them in the next couple of days, then go to Moorea, Huahine and Bora Bora.  Our French Polynesian visa expires on June 30^th, and we have not been invited to stay longer than that, which is okay.  Although beautiful, it is very expensive here, and well, very French.

Molly and Jessie celebrated their 13^th birthday today.  They got lots of great handmade presents from their cruising friends, a big homemade breakfast, and dinner in downtown Papeete, and some nice e-mails from friends and family.  Their big present is that their friend, Rosalie, is coming for a visit in one week.  She will be escorted by my sister Jami, who is MY present!  We are all a-twitter over seeing faces from home.

On a personal note, I no longer have dreadlocks.  I felt like I had a dead, matted cat on my head, and it just wasn’t a good feeling.  My straight, fine, blonde hair is simply not conducive to the Bob Marley/Lenny Kravitz look.  So, now I have about ¼” hair on my head, and look like I am channeling Vanessa Redgrave in a concentration camp movie, or maybe Dame Judi Densch.  No more dead cats for me. 

We will write more about the Society Islands when we spend some time exploring.  In the meantime, there are some new pictures in the media gallery, of our halcyon days in the Tuamotus.  Enjoy!

             

The atoll of Toau is mostly owned by a Chinese businessman

who runs a black pearl farm there.  There is one small islet (called a motu) that is owned by one family, and is run by the formidable Valentine.

Valentine is a 40-something year-old woman, who is married to Gaston.  Her sister, mother, step-father, and various nieces, nephews and cousins live on this little motu.  There is a lovely spot to moor right in front of their compound.  Valentine and her step-father, Philippe, guided us in safely with their small boat, and helped us tie up to a mooring ball.

Valentine runs a small restaurant and small pearl farm on their motu.    She and Gaston harvest coconuts and make copra, which they take and sell in Tahiti.  They catch, clean and sell fish to the ships that come weekly to a nearby atoll.  She is the pastor of the church, whose congregation consists of about 5 family members.  She takes care of her mother, who has had breast cancer surgery and diabetes.  She takes care of the yachties who come to visit, and sends Gaston out to fish for food.  She cooks, cleans, and keeps her little part of the world in order.  She refuses to sell their motu to the Chinese businessman, because her father’s dying wish was that the family stay there together, forever.

Valentine and Gaston (sounds like a Disney movie) decide when the restaurant will open.  We were there about 4 days, and it was only open one evening.  She visited the 4 boats that were in the anchorage, and informed us that dinner was at 7:00, and the price would be $30 per person and $15 each for Molly and Jessie.  There wasn’t really a choice as to whether we would attend; I think the price of the mooring buoy was that you were expected to come to dinner at least once.

There were about 20 people for dinner, and we sat at one long table and ate family style.  Valentine had made Poisson Crue, crab, tuna sashimi, parrot fish with coconut breading, fresh lobster, coconut bread, and coconut cream pie.  Just for me, since I am not a big seafood person, she “killed the old red rooster” and made a chicken stew served over rice.

It was fun to meet the other boaters, and find out where they had come from, and where they were heading.  There was an older German couple, who left their home in Frankfurt over 7 years ago.  They were on their second tour of the South Pacific, and were able to give us a lot of information about what little islands were “must-sees”.  They must have been in their early seventies, and had no idea when they would stop cruising.  They were still having a good time, and that is what counted.

There was a French couple there who were headed toward a new career in New Caledonia.  His expertise was in ecology, and he had been hired to help some factories on that island perform their jobs in a safe and politically correct manner.  He had been doing the same job on another island in the South Pacific for the past twenty years.  His 2 children and wife had been living abroad (and aboard) for most of their lives.

There was a couple from Spain, who had been cruising for at least 5 years.  They picked up a homeless dog in Surinam, who stayed on board their boat and barked constantly.  The couple spoke 8 languages fluently.  And there was us.  Molly and Jessie charmed everyone at dinner, and we heard many comments about how polite and intelligent they were.  Most of the cruisers thought it was sad that we only had two years to cruise, and thought we should just keep on going, right through the girls’ high school years.  They thought it was terrible that we wouldn’t get to see the Mediterranean, and visit Greece and Italy by boat – “the only way to see those countries”.

Valentine sold us some of her pearls, and I traded some spices and olive oil for two very big tuna steaks.  We went to church, and doubled the size of her congregation.  The songs were in Tahitian and French, and she and her mother harmonized nicely.

If you think of an atoll as a pearl necklace shaped in an almost-closed circle, each pearl is called a motu.  About 90 boats a year visit Anse Amoyat, which is the name of the small motu we visited. In my mind, it will always be known as Valentine’s Motu.  She rules over Gaston with an iron fist, and he meekly bows to her bidding.  When she says “fish”, he jumps into his boat with various family members and doesn’t come home until he has a boat load of fish.  Jim went spear fishing with the boys twice, and said he never worked so hard in his life.  They fished outside the atoll in the ocean, in very shallow water with steep waves.  There were large sharks all around, and the fish were wiley.  They seemed to know just how long the line on the spear guns would reach, and kept their distance.  Jim came back exhausted, but glad that he went with some real pros.

We left Valentine’s world and sailed to Rangiroa, the last atoll we would visit in the Tuamotus.  Since Rangiroa is the largest of all the atolls, we thought this would be a great place to stock up on all the items we desperately need:  fuel, water, propane and food.  Unfortunately, it is a very rough anchorage with none of those amenities, so we are leaving tomorrow morning and limping our way to Tahiti, where we will fill our coffers for sure.  The winds are supposed to be favorable, so we may not need fuel, and we have plenty of bottled water for drinking.  Who needs showers, anyway?  There will be some new parts for our watermaker waiting for us in Papeete, along with a couple packages of mail and books.  Yippee!  Books!  Plus, Jim and I will get to celebrate our 35th wedding anniversary in a real restaurant.

We will post pictures to our website from Tahiti.  Happy June!