We set sail for the approximately 180 mile journey from Rangiroa (our final stop in the Tuamotus) for Tahiti at 7:30 AM on June 2. Once again, our departure was bitter sweet. There was so much more to explore and do in the Tuamotus (we easily could have spent another few weeks) but we needed to head to Tahiti for two reasons. First, Tahiti is located in the third and final island chain we planned to explore in French Polynesia, the Society Islands, and we wanted to have enough time there to enjoy the area. (Our plan had always been to spend about 2 weeks each in the Marquesas, Tuamotus and Society Islands.) The Society Islands is an archipelago of 14 islands. Like the Marquesas, they are volcanic so we would be back in the land of dramatic coastlines with towering mountains and jagged peaks. Quite a contrast to the pancake like Tuamatus with their shallow blue lagoons. Second, and very importantly, Tahiti, despite the beautiful pictures you see of the island — all those white sandy beaches with tiki bars, palm trees and beautiful blue water — is home to a large city and marine center, Papeete. By now in our journey we had an amassed a growing list of items that needed to be assessed and/or repaired on Che Figata. (We should add, nothing to do with the integrity of our boat. We continue to be so impressed with the seaworthiness of Che Figata. She is serving us well!). This included, among other items, diagnosing the issue with our engine malfunction, doing a more permanent repair to the tear in our genoa sail and inspecting it for other tears, repairing worn patches on our canvas, repairing our dinghy engine so that the engine lifts up out of the water (critical when you intend to land your dinghy on a beach), inspecting our rigging (with all the wear and tear on our rigging from our somewhat intense passages, this is a proactive “just in case” item), fixing our bent stanchion, addressing some electrical issues and troubleshooting our chart plotter to understand why it occasionally freezes and crashes while we are are using it to navigate with our electronic charts. As always, Jill created an Excel file to track each project, who was retained to do the work, the start date and the promised completion date. (It’s an incurable affliction!) We were able to work, in advance, with an amazing agent hired by our rally organizers, Laurent Bernaert (Polynesia Yacht Services), to line up experts and technicians to sort out these issues in Tahiti. There was no guarantee that they would all get done but we were hopeful that the most critical items that really shouldn’t wait until we get to Australia could be addressed.
So off we went on June 2. As always, we checked the wind, tide and weather forecasts and picked a day and time that gave us the best opportunity for a lovely sail. But with what also seems like “as always,” our reality was not close to what was predicted. Rather than the 10 – 15 knot winds from the SE we had light winds in the 5 – 9 knot range from the south which was right on our nose. So, in short, wrong wind speed and wrong direction for a sail. We ended up motoring about 28 hours straight. Despite the uncooperative wind it wasn’t a bad transit. The engine didn’t die (that’s a big yay!), no mishaps and no tricky navigational issues. (Oh, how our expectations have fallen!)
Still, those one day overnight sails can sometimes be the most grueling. You don’t adjust to new sleep patterns so you arrive to your destination very tired. That means that little annoyances have an outsized impact. And, of course, we had a series of little annoyances upon our arrival to Tahiti. When you arrive in Tahiti by boat there is basically a choice between one of two marinas. There is an anchorage near the airport but there is no easy place to take a dinghy into shore from there if you want to head into town so it’s not a great option. Plus we were scheduled to get work done and the various technicians will only come to your boat in a marina. With only two main marinas and lots of boats stopping in Tahiti to get work done, they are crowded. Worse, they don’t really take reservations. Marina Papeete is right downtown, putting you in walking distance to all the services, shops and restaurants you could possibly want or need. They absolutely do not take reservations. In fact, it is a self help marina — no dockhands to assist with lines when you arrive — where you come in and take a slip on a first come first serve basis. Marina Taino is also supposed to be lovely, with a large grocery store, pharmacy and a few nice restaurants close by, but it is out of town so not as close to all the shops and services you need. They take “reservations” as you get close if they have space available.
As they say, beggars can’t be choosers so we would have been happy with either marina but we wanted to try our preferred location, Marina Papeete, first. Though Marina Papeete is self service, and members of our fleet were in the marina reporting to us — real time — about the available slips, we called the marina directly as we approached to confirm slip availability as a courtesy. Despite having it, on very good authority, that there were a few open slips, the man who answered the phone reported that the marina was full and that we should anchor near the airport for the night. Jill started to politely say that we believe there may be some slips available but the marina office worker snapped. And we mean “snapped” as in he had a total melt-down. He started yelling loudly and angrily that there are no open spaces and that everyone challenges him and says there are spots when none are available. You could practically see his temples pulsating and his blood pressure rising over the phone. Frankly, his almost violent reaction was more than a little disturbing so, despite knowing the precise location of two open slips in the marina, we decided to head towards Marina Taina. As we approached that marina we hailed them on our VHF and were advised — by a very nice, calm, person — that the marina was full. With two strike outs we headed towards the anchorage. But just as we reached the anchorage we remembered Laurent. We had heard that he helped others secure a spot at that marina so we thought we’d see if he could use his influence with Marina Taina to help us and sent him a WhatsApp chat. Within a matter of minutes we received a response from Laurent that the marina would find us a spot or place us someplace temporary until a spot became available. So, as instructed by Laurent, back we went towards Marina Taina. Unfortunately, when we hailed Marina Taina we were informed by the marina that there were still no spaces available, temporary or otherwise. Ugh!
At this point we were getting somewhat desperate. Should we head towards the Marina Papeete with the madman and just take one of the open spots — as recommended by members of our fleet — or should we give up on a marina and just anchor near the airport. After some debate (as well as lively discussion about how we would take a spot at the marina without the office worker figuring out that we were the people he told in no uncertain terms to go away), we decided to head back towards the Marina Papeete. We entered the marina and docked in a slip right next to one of our fleet mates, Kalli. We were dreading going to the marina office to check in but there was little debate about whose job that would be. Since Jill spoke with the office worker, it would have to be Zack who handled the check in if there was any chance that we wouldn’t be recognized. Zack was surprised to be greeted by a very meek and remorseful man. He knew exactly who we were and apologized very directly for his behavior. In a conversation that verged on too much information, he said that the job was too stressful for him, he had no help in the office and people were always wanting slips when slips aren’t available. He didn’t realize that two slips were available because the transient sailboats that had been in both those slips had paid through Monday and apparently left early. (We arrived on Saturday). He then announced that he was quitting the job and that Monday would be his last day because he just couldn’t handle the stress any more. He asked Zack to apologize to his wife for his outburst. By the end of the conversation Zack felt awful for him and recognized that when we identified his reaction to Jill on the phone as a “meltdown” we had accurately — clinically and otherwise — identified what occurred. On just a few hours of sleep our tolerance threshold for getting yelled at and going back and forth between marinas and the anchorage (multiple times) was pretty low but we were very glad to be settled in Marina Papeete by mid afternoon.
We were busy from the time we arrived in Tahiti until we departed on June 12. In addition to the flurry of activity related to boat work (we had technicians coming and going every day the week of June 5), we had laundry and cleaning to do and we also needed to do a major provision. Our last major provision was in Panama City 2 months ago. As you can imagine, the cupboards were getting bare. Once we left the Society Islands it would be ~1,360 nautical miles until there would be a good place to provision again. So we needed to update our inventory of staples, identify where we were low and restock.
Though it was largely a week of preparation for our future passages, cleaning and repair work, we did find time for a little fun. We took advantage of being in a cosmopolitan city with a panoply of restaurants to dine out most evenings. We we had a few splurge meals enjoying incredible gourmet dinners at L’O A La Bouche and Restaurant Hei. Restaurant Hei (https://heirestaurant.com/), with its tasting menu, was particularly memorable. The atmosphere was beachy romantic with just a few tables and the food quality and presentation rivaled anything we have experienced at the highest end NYC restaurants. Though they don’t offer a vegan tasting menu they prepared an amazing one special for Jill. We also had some lovely casual meals with the highlight being our 2 meals at Restaurant Kim. Restaurant Kim is a very small, family owned, Chinese restaurant off the tourist beaten path. We were very clearly the only tourists in the restaurant during both of our visits. We enjoyed amazing authentic Chinese dishes and, as our added bonus, on our first evening, met Joseph Wong. Joseph was there picking up takeout for 20 people to celebrate Mothers Day in French Polynesia. As caucasians, we stuck out in this restaurant like the proverbial sore thumb and he came over to chat while he waited for his order. We talked about his trips to the United States and he ended up helping us decipher the menu and place our orders since the staff at Restaurant Kim don’t speak any English. As we were saying our good byes we handed him our boat card and were delighted when he reached out the next day to offer to take us on a tour of the island.
We weren’t sure if we were going to be able to take Joseph up on his gracious offer. We were tethered to our boat with different technicians showing up on different days to address different problems. The only time we both left the boat during prime work hours was for a 2 tank dive we had scheduled with our friends at Top Dive. We advised Laurent well in advance that we had one morning (June 8) when we would be unavailable because we would be scuba diving. (We will talk about our dives below.). Other than that, we would be around at the convenience of the technicians. As the various technicians advised when they would arrive at our boat we made — and unfortunately had to cancel — plans with Joseph. The timing of the work was just too fluid. In the end, we ended up extending our stay in Tahiti. We had hoped the work would all be complete by the end of day Friday, June 9 and planned on leaving the island the following day on June 10. In fact, the work was completed by then. It was nip and tuck, however, and not being able to leave our boat while we waited for technicians or while they performed work we did not have a chance to provision. We would have to do that on the weekend. So, we accepted the reality that we were not leaving the marina on Saturday and made plans with Joseph to tour Tahiti that day (June 10).
What a lovely day we had with Joseph! He picked us up at 10 AM and drove us around the entire perimeter of the island. During our tour we stopped for lunch at an incredible restaurant, Taumatai, and visited grottos as well as an ancient marae. A marae is a site where the indigenous people of the islands performed important ceremonial rituals including, of course, human sacrifice. The tour ended with a visit to Joseph’s home, overlooking the ocean. A true million dollar view! As much as we enjoyed the tour, the best part was getting to know Joseph. He is ethnically Chinese but the third generation to live in Tahiti. His grandparent came over from China to work the sugar cane plantations. While he was proud of his Chinese heritage he was equally proud to be French Polynesian. We learned about his close knit family and his job. Joseph owns a sign making business and creates many of the signs you see around the Tahiti announcing construction projects and tourist sites. In fact, he had produced all the signs we saw at the grottos and the marae. We teased him that he had taken us on a Joseph Wong sign tour! At age 72, Joseph still works 3 – 4 hours a day to produce signs for government sponsored construction projects. After visiting Joseph’s home, we insisted that he take a tour of our home, Che Figata. He had never been on a sailboat like ours. Watching his reaction as he explored our boat was priceless.
As mentioned above, aside from dinners out and our tour with Joseph, the only activity we planned was our 2 tank dive with Top Dive. Though we were questioning the wisdom of scheduling these dives with everything we had going on we were so glad we did. The dives were fabulous. The first dive had us visiting 3 underwater pinnacles. Picture a sandy bottom, void of any coral, with this underwater mountain, teaming with life, jutting up towards the surface. It was like a lush mountain popping up in the desert. These pinnacles were covered with healthy coral, creating a wonderful environment for reef fish and turtles with all of their crevices and deep ledges. At one point we came across a turtle sleeping in one of these covered ledges. With GoPro in hand, Zack started filming and, just as he pressed the start button, the turtle awoke and emerged from its den, ever so gracefully swimming off into the blue. (You can watch that video on our Instagram account.). Our second dive was along a wall. It was a sheer rock face covered with coral that dropped down precipitously about 200 feet. You could not see the bottom so you had the true sensation of flying as you swam along the wall.
Aside from the beautiful coral and interesting formations that were really the feature on both dives, the first dive was notable for the behavior of one of the guests diving in our small group of 4. This guest was a retired pilot with a major airline. He was vacationing in Tahiti and this dive would be his last dive before flying back home the next day. His dive started on a bad note. Unbeknownst to the dive master he had brought a bag of bacon left over from his breakfast with him. While underwater, he took it out to feed the reef fish. The dive master quickly motioned him not to feed the fish. The ocean is not a petting zoo and feeding the fish is prohibited because it can upset the natural feeding behaviors of the fish. This diver was not happy that he could not feed the fish and, eventually — about half way through the dive — he turned around and just swam off. The dive master took off after him, motioning to us to stay put. The diver refused to return so the dive master eventually swam back to us and we completed our dive. We later learned that when the dive master caught up with the wayward diver, he gave the dive master the finger and motioned that he was going back to the boat. Indeed when we all got back to the boat, the “runaway” diver was in there and was complaining bitterly about the dive. Specifically, he was not happy about all the “dead coral” he had to dive over and the lack of turtles. Interestingly, we actually didn’t swim over any dead coral. We did briefly swim across a fairly barren patch of white sand to get from one pinnacle to another. As for the turtles, they seemed quite abundant to us but, regardless, as mentioned above, this is not a petting zoo and marine life doesn’t appear on demand. It is beyond foolish to swim off by yourself when on a dive for any number of reasons. We have never experienced that before and neither had our dive master. All we will say is that everyone who witnessed this situation was relieved to know that this person wasn’t still flying large passenger planes. One less thing to worry about when getting on an airplane!
In the end, and much to our surprise, we really enjoyed our visit to Tahiti. Yes it was mostly about boat repairs in exotic locations but the repairs were a largely a success (only the outboard motor repair evaded us), we completed our provisioning and we met a lovely locale who gave us the gift of his time, savored some fabulous meals and had two awesome dives. So, on Monday, June 12, we left Tahiti for Moorea, excited to visit a less developed island but very content with our Tahitian experience. And, much to our further surprise, our sail to Moorea was as advertised. We sailed on a delightful beam reach at about 8 knots for the entire 22 nautical mile sail. That meant that we arrive relatively quickly (by sailing standards 3 hours to travel about 20 miles is quick!) and, after anchoring just outside Opunohu Bay, we had time to get in a quick snorkel before cooking dinner and settling in for an evening aboard Che Figata.
Our brief visit to Moorea was truly lovely. On day 2 of our stay we picked up our anchor and moved into Opunohu Bay. While our fist anchor location was very nice — we had a stunning view of the mountains on the north side of Moorea and got to relax to the sound of the surf crashing over the nearby reef during our evening on the boat — it was very far from the dinghy dock which was located deep within the long and narrow bay. We really wanted to dinghy to shore so we could explore the island plus there was a restaurant, Tama Hau, with great reviews conveniently located right next to the dinghy dock. By noon we were safely anchored in Opunohu Bay and, after a quick lunch, we headed into shore. We were pleased to find several well marked trails and settled on a long hike on a loop trail that snaked through a lush tropical forest with streams, passed by several archeological sites of ancient maraes and lead to the Belvedere Lookout, famous for its panoramic view of Cook and Opunohu Bays. It was a wonderful hike and a 20,000 step day further justifying (not that we really needed an excuse) our dinner at Tama Hau. Our evening at Tama Hau —another quintessential casual (flip flops optional) waterfront restaurant with picnic tables on the sand — was lovely. We were joined by the owners of Pawsitive Lattitude, Brian and Joyce as well as their guests Robert and Mandy. We met them when we were anchored outside of Opunohu Bay. When we first arrived we saw their American flag and dinghied over to say hello and talk about our respective plans while visiting the island. We mentioned our plan to try Tama Hau the next evening and they asked if they could join us. Always happy to make new sailing friends we were thrilled to oblige.
For our final day off Moorea we moved to Cook Bay. The attraction there was twofold. First, it was another deep and beautiful bay surrounded by mountains on all sides. Second, it was home to a small and easy access fuel dock that, at least according to one of our fleet mates, takes top prize for the world’s most picturesque place to refuel. After the 28 hours of motoring from Rangiroa to Tahiti we definitely needed to refuel so we wanted to check it out. It was as magnificent as advertised. The dock, itself, was tiny — shorter than Che Figata end to end. It is self serve in every sense of the word. No one is there to help you with lines. To tie on to the fuel dock Jill had to jump off Che Figata, lines in hand while Zack steered, and secure them to the cleats on either end. Fortunately, there was little wind and the wind that did exist was pushing us away from the dock — making the jump off our Che Figata onto the dock a little more difficult but reducing the risk of hitting the fuel dock with our boat. (We hate when that happens.). The fuel dock is located on one side of the narrow bay so, as you pump diesel into the tanks, you gaze up at these lush mountains on the other side with a small village — church at the center — nestled at their foot. The pump was slow and we were in no rush to leave!
Of course, eventually, our refueling was compete and we found a nice sandy spot to anchor. We went back to shore with our dinghy to do some exploring and retuned to Che Figata just in time to cook dinner and get ready for our planned sail to Huahine that evening. Huahine, another largely undeveloped island, was the next island on our list and it was about 80 nautical miles from Moorea. Depending on wind speed and direction that could take us anywhere from 10 hours to 14 hours. Given our experience with wind forecasts vs. wind reality, we have learned that though you want to set sail when the winds are forecasted to be most favorable for your voyage, you can’t assume that the wind will behave as predicted. Following that logic, we’d have to assume worst case scenario and plan that the sail would take us 14 hours. That meant that if you wanted to be assured of arriving in a new, unfamiliar, anchorage in good daylight, you’d really have to leave by 2 AM in the morning. That just didn’t sound that appealing to us so we decided to set sail at 7 PM in the evening on June 14 with the hope that we would arrive the next morning after the first light.
To get from Moorea to Huahine we would be traveling Northwest. The wind was supposed to come from the east/northeast at about 15 knots so that would give us a nice beam reach sail. Naturally, that is not what happened. (We were shocked!) At first the wind was very light and coming mostly from the South/Southeast putting the wind almost right on our tail. But then, at about 1 AM the wind picked up and was running at a pretty consistent 25 – 28 knots from the east. On a positive note, this gave us close to a beam reach and we were flying at 7 – 8 knots. The bad news is those heavy winds created confused seas and bouncy conditions. It was not a comfortable sail. When we took turns sleeping (the little sleep that occurred) we did it by laying horizontal on our bed so that we didn’t roll side to side. At one point when Zack was on watch and Jill was in our cabin she opened our main hatch to get some air. Unfortunately, while she was asleep a rather large wave crash over our boat reaching all the way to the stern hatch and pouring water onto the bed. She awoke to find one side of the bed quite damp and wondered how that happened until she felt some lingering water dripping from around the hatch opening. (Zack later confirmed that we had, indeed, been hit by a large wave that splashed over the stern of our boat.) Needless to say, she closed the hatch and it remained closed for the duration on our voyage.
We arrive in Huahine at around 10 AM in the morning and found a nice spot to anchor off the town of Fare which is on the west side of the North Island (Huahine-Nui). We were pretty tired because neither of us had more than 4 hours of sleep so our plan for the day didn’t include anything ambitious. We simply went into town to check it out and visit the local grocery store which was reported to be better than the large supermarket on Tahiti. There were a few items that continued to allude us — including canned black beans and tahini (not ingredients used in much French cooking) — and we had our fingers crossed that we might find them in Huahine. Unfortunately, that was not the case but we were able to buy some more fresh fruit and other odds and ends. After a few hours in town it was back to Che Fiagata and onto D’Avea Bay, located on on the southwest side of the South Island (Huahine-Iti). That location was recommended to us by our New Zealand friends on Rumpus. They are the couple who have been sailing back and forth from New Zealand to French Polynesia for the last 16 years so we figured they may know a little something about the best anchorages.
They did not steer us wrong. The anchorage was stunning with just 3 or 4 other boats, a beautiful coast line with both white sandy beaches and lush flora and crystal clear water the shimmered in magnificent blue/green colors ranging from deep blue to turquoise to foam green (and various other shades in between) as you looked towards the shore and out to the ocean. It took us a few hours to motor from Fare on Huahine-Nui to the recommended anchorage on Huahine-Iti so we arrived to this wonderful location mid afternoon. That gave us just enough time for a brief trip into shore to check out a small local resort, Hotel La Mahana, as well as visit a few local businesses before heading back to Che Figata to prepare dinner and settle in to another lovely evening aboard our floating home. Jill treated us to vegan mushroom and onion quesadillas and her black bean, corn and jackfruit chili. A medium bodied Côtes du Rhône nicely complemented our meal. (One of the best parts of being in French Islands is access to fabulous and very affordable French wines and we took great advantage of the opportunity to restock our wine stores while in Tahiti!)
After getting a good night’s rest we were much more ambitious on day 2 of our visit. When we visited Hotel La Mahana Zack noticed that that they rented cars and he came up with the idea that we should rent a car for the day so we could do a self-guided tour around the entire perimeter of the island and also get in a hike. It was a fabulous idea and we had a truly grand adventure following Zack’s itinerary. We visited some gorgeous beaches, more maraes built around the shoreline, a pearl farm and the sacred blue eyed freshwater eels — massive creatures that range in size from 4 to 6 feet in length. (We posted a video of them on our Instagram account). We also found a hike that took us up 1,400 feet (roughly one hour of hiking straight up!) to a lookout located at the south tip of Huahine-Iti with a spectacular view to the north and a small burger joint owned by an American who sold everything years ago to trade in her hand bags, fancy cloths and make up for an unadorned life in t-shirts and flip flops.
Zack did an incredible job curating our tour and it would be hard to single out one of our many stops. That said, Jill was very glad to have finally visited a pearl farm. As most of you probably know, French Polynesia is know for their “black” pearls. We place that in quotes because, in reality, they are many different colors including iridescent shades of purples, greens and greys. Though we had been to many black pearl shops, somehow we had avoided a visit to an actual pearl farm and Jill felt that we couldn’t leave French Polynesia without learning how these pearls are farmed. It is really quite a fascinating process. It involves the implantation of a small round bead created from the inside of the shell of a clam from the Mississippi River (oysters reject plastic!) as well as a small oyster graft (think skin graft). If the pearl purveyors are lucky, the graft will grow around the bead creating the colored pearl. To get specific colors, the graft is carefully selected from an oyster with an inner shell that is the desired color. The result of the process is not known for 18 months when the oyster is opened ever so carefully. Producing the larger pearls involves many iterations with the pearl farmers inserting a slightly larger bead in a oyster that successfully produced a pearl after each 18 month period. We returned our rental car at 5 PM — just in time to shower and return to La Mahana for a delightful dinner at a table for two on an outdoor patio overlooking the water. It was an all around amazing day!
After a fabulous visit to Huahine it was time to move on to Raiatea. This was just a short hop of approximately 20 nautical miles. The wind was very light so we motored sailed the entire way leaving Huahine at around 10 AM and arriving in Raiatea at around 2 PM. The anchoring was a bit tricky because the anchorage we targeted had very shallow areas that dropped precipitously to 80 feet. Plus, there were lots of areas with sand and coral together. We had to find a sandy spot that was shallow enough to clearly see the bottom, deep enough that we wouldn’t hit bottom with our keel in low tide and large enough so that our anchor chain didn’t hit coral as our boat swung around with changes in wind direction. It look awhile but by 3 PM we found a great spot. Once securely anchored we took our dinghy to shore to visit a very small, understated, “resort,” Opoa Beach Hotel. It is a lovely place dotted with 9 quaint white clapboard bungalows with sky blue roofs and a lovely dining area including tables out on the sand for cocktails and an indoor/outdoor structure with a great tropical vibe for dining. (www.opoabeach.com). We wanted to inquire about dinner and, after our success on Huahine, see if they could help us secure a car rental for the next day. We scored on both asks and enjoyed dinner, and a dance show, at the resort that evening.
The next morning (June 18) we were excited to pick up our rental car. One of the owners of the hotel, Arnaud, personally handled the rental car arrangements and spent time with us reviewing a map of the island suggesting places for us to stop as we drove around the perimeter of the island. During our self guided tour we visited another pearl farm, a vanilla plantation (Mataio Vanille, where we met the caretakers and the owner’s two friendly dobermans, Reagan and Obama — no, you can’t make this stuff up!), the botanical gardens and Taputapuatea, a UNESCO world heritage sites with remains of several large maraes believed to date back 1,000 years. As we drove around the island we were struck by the lush dense canopies of 3-4 different trees covering the mountains. If you didn’t know better you would swear that you could walk on top of them.
It was a great day all around but we particularly enjoyed our second visit to a pearl farm, Raiatea Pearl. What made this pearly farm unique is that is is a small scale operation owned and operated by two life-long friends. One of the owners, Landry, personally led our tour sharing with us the process they use to create their magnificent pearls. While the process is basically the same as the one described at our first pearly farm visit, with the owner as our guide we learned additional nuance that further underscored why these pearls are so expensive. According to Landry about 80% of the oysters survive the initial process of implanting the bead and the oyster graft but only 30% of those produce a pearl and many of those are not the desirable round pearls. In other words, after 18 months of waiting, less than 25% produce a pearl and only a fraction of those are the coveted round pearls that are used to make bracelets, necklaces and earrings. Of course, the pearl farm visit resulted in another purchase for Jill. It happened to coincide with Father’s Day and Zack reasoned that Jill deserved a gift for making him a father! 🥰. (No more pearl farm visits. The tours may be free but we always leave with less money that we arrived with.) Our only disappointment of the day was that is was a Sunday so everything closed early. We brought water along with us but, planning on stopping for lunch, we didn’t bring any snacks. We arrived in “town” — Uturoa — just before 1:30 PM to find all the restaurants either in the process of closing or already closed. We were definitely hypoglycemic by the end of the day but Jill made sure to prepare a hearty meal — pasta smothered in fresh sautéed zucchini, onions, mushrooms and garlic — to help us recover. More beautiful French wine helped us wash down our meal.
We woke up the next morning (June 19), our last one off Raiatea, to a glass like anchorage. It was so calm (and shallow) that we could see our anchor chain extending forward from the bow of our boat in the crystal clear water. Not something that you see every day — even when the water is clear, the waves and ripples can make seeing the detail on the bottom difficult — and it definitely confirmed that we picked the perfect, coral free, spot to anchor. (Phew!) As we turned around to the stern of the boat after marveling at our anchor chain we spotted a couple of eagle rays frolicking nearby with their wings popping high out of the water. It was as if they had come over to wave good-bye. We took that as our signal to hoist our anchor and we were off to Tahaa, our final planned stop before Bora Bora.
We arrive in Tahaa, after a three hour motor sail, early afternoon. The anchorage was another tricky one like Raiatea because of the abundance of coral and combination of very deep and very shallow areas. Unlike Raiatea where is took some time to find that perfect spot to anchor, we lucked out and found a great spot very quickly. It was a bit on the shallow end (in these types of anchorages we take our hand held depth finder into our dinghy and motor around our boat — creating an imaginary circumference — to assess the depth within our swing range to make sure we have a wide enough area of water all around us to accommodate our 6.5’ keel) but we loved the large sandy patch just deep enough for our draft. Of course, just as we anchored a catamaran swooped in and, quite literally, anchored right on top of us. By the time they extended their chain their stern was practically touching our bow. We were a little concerned that they might not want to move (different captains have a much higher tolerance than we do for anchoring in close proximity to others) but we blew our air horn and when they looked back at our boats they picked up their anchor and moved further up in the anchorage. They were still quite close but far enough that we weren’t worried about a collision.
Tahaa is famous for its underwater coral gardens. This is a really shallow and fairly narrow straight between two islands across from the Tahaa mainland. Everyone who has ever visited Tahaa tells you that you have to visit the coral gardens so we selected an anchorage that was a short dinghy ride away. That said, we were prepared to be underwhelmed. There was some less than positive reviews on a few of the navigational charts where sailors can add comments about their experiences with anchorages and surrounding sights. After reading those we assumed that the recommendations we received were from people who had limited experience with great snorkeling and didn’t know any better. Still, we were anxious to experience the coral gardens for ourselves and, after our quick and successful anchor, we headed straight to the gardens! Guess we are getting a little smug because we could not have been more wrong. Not sure if those that wrote the negative comments were just having a bad day (or maybe they are just curmudgeons) but the coral gardens were magnificent and definitely one of the many highlights of our sail around French Polynesia.
As mentioned, the coral garden is located in a narrow straight between two islands. The depth in this straight ranges anywhere from about 2 feet to perhaps 15 feet and is filled with mounds of healthy coral that extend up close to the surface. This creates a labyrinth as you swim from one end to the other and across the straight. In some places the space between the top of the coral and the surface is too narrow to swim over creating a deadend and forcing you to back track to find a passage from point A to point B. Other times there was barely enough room to ever so carefully glide over the coral — holding your breath while sucking in your belly — to continue on your path. And sometimes you had to simply standup and walk being careful to step around the coral and sea creatures. The visitor’s bureau recommends that to avoid damage to the coral you snorkel without your fins and you can definitely see why. (We followed that advice.) The tidal water flowing from the ocean through the narrow pass creates a fairly good current keeping the water cool and full of oxygen as well as nutrients which, together with the coral, creates a healthy ecosystem filled with colorful reef fish, octopuses and those iridescent giant clams. As you swam through the gardens you were so close to the coral and fish that you could hear the crunch crunch as parrotfish nibbled on the coral. (BTW, when you are on a white sandy beach you can thank the parrotfish for scraping, ingesting and then expelling the coral which becomes that fine white sand. A fun fact we learned on one of our dives in the Tuamotus.) It was really an incredible experience — both because of the beauty of the marine life in the coral garden and due to the sheer fun of swimming in a maze where you didn’t know what you would discover around the next corner.
Though the coral garden was the main feature of our stay in Tahaa there are two other notable mentions. The first was drinks and tapas and Fare Miti, a floating rum and tapas bar on the Tahaa mainland. What a delightful place. With just a handful of tables and a bar inside an area that might be 15’ X 20’ and a few rum barrels (serving as high tops) surrounded by stools on a narrow outside deck, Fare Meti, had this cool, warm and cozy vibe. We enjoyed the sunset, cocktails, beers and a range of tapas there our first night in Tahaa with our friends on Kalli. Only opened to 8 PM, we closed the place down not leaving until sometime thereafter. (Who is looking at watches!). The second was the stingray show waiting for us upon our return to Che Figata. We were thrilled to find about 5 stingrays circling around our boat enjoying our underwater lights which we had left on. As many stingrays as we have seen over the years watching them burrow in the sand and glide gracefully through the water never loses its magic. We went to bed that evening with large smiles on our faces!
But then it was back to reality. By the time we arrived in Tahaa it was 9 days since we had departed Tahiti where, as you know, we spent the better part of 9 days captive on our boat. Following our departure we made up for lost time by totally ignoring our boat chores — no cleaning, no laundry. Eventually though you run out of clothes and dirt inside and outside the boat becomes too prolific to ignore so day 2 of our stay on Tahaa was largely spent checking items off our daily boat living “to do” list. After our wonderful experience in the coral gardens capped by an evening at Fare Miti we were not complaining! Still, though we had planned to eat dinner on Che Figata after completing our chores, we decided to reward our hard work by a second visit to Fare Miti. We thought it would be a quiet evening with just the two of us but were delighted when our friends from Berlinetta entered the bar and we invited them to join us. It was another extended evening with a beautiful sunset, drinks and tapas and, once again, we closed down the joint!
The next day, June 21, it was off to Bora Bora. Another quick motor sail to our final destination in French Polynesia. Our stay in Bora Bora was mostly about getting ready for our next passage — the approximate 1,300 nautical mile passage to Tonga via Niue, where we would make a brief stop. We needed to refuel, reprovision (we had done most of our staple provisioning in Tahiti but needed to replenish the fresh fruits and vegetable), get sheets and towels laundered, attend the skippers’ briefing to learn about the passage and check out of French Polynesia which was a two step process. In addition, we were getting a new crew member. Though we had decided to remain a crew of 2 for the rest of the rally, a member of the rally staff, Rachael, needed to get on a boat for the next leg of the rally due to the difficulty of traveling to the next location (Tonga) from Bora Bora by air. So we volunteered and we won the lottery. We were delighted to welcome Rachael on Che Figata for the next leg but it did mean cleaning out the cupboards we had originally emptied for Mark but promptly filled with all our staff upon his departure. We also needed to do another trip to the grocery store to make sure we had enough fresh fruits and veggies for 3.
All of these various tasks kept us quite busy during our short 5 day stay on Bora Bora. In fact, we only had one completely free day (June 24) during our visit. Mostly, we had a few hours here and a few hours there in between jobs and other obligations. We used one of those windows to take a dinghy tour around a portion of the island and do some snorkeling. During that outing we got some great pictures of Bora Bora’s iconic profile — it is stunning — and used one of those as the feature photo for this post. We used our free day to go on our final dive in French Polynesia with Top Dive. Our friends Brian and Robert from Pawsitive Latitude joined us. We had 2 lovely dives with the first dive being particularly spectacular. We were taken to a spot know for an abundance of Eagle Rays. Within moments of descending down to the sandy bottom we saw a huge group of eagle rays. (Today’s educational moment: This is not called a school of rays, a flock of rays or a gaggle of rays but a “fever of rays.”) There were 100+ — we lost count! We rested our fingertips on the sandy bottom with our bodies floating slightly above as we watched them swim in circles near us. Zack got some great video with our GoPro. After what felt like 10 minutes but was actually 45 minutes it was time to ascend. None of us were ready to leave. To cap that marvelous day we arranged dinner with Brian and Robert at St. James restaurant. Brian extended an invitation to the crew of Calla Lily, Mike and Shelby, and we all a really fun time with lots of laughs over dinner and cocktails. We will be going our separate ways as we leave Bora Bora but are really hoping our paths cross with Pawsitive Latitude and Calla Lily. What great people.
We completed our final departure and boat tasks the next day. Among other glamorous jobs included attending the skippers briefing, taking care of the final clearance out of French Polynesia, defrosting our freezer, prepping some food for the passage and doing a quick clean of our boat’s interior. We are now ready to say goodbye to Bora Bora and set sail to Niue on June 26 at noon. Our rally departs in two groups of 11 boats each for a total of 22. We are in group 1. When we left St. Lucia we were a fleet of 29 so we lost nearly a nearly a third of our fleet. Some boats have dropped out because they they want to slow down and spend more time in French Polynesia, Tonga and Fiji. Unfortunately, most of the attrition is due to the crews feeling exhausted after dealing with a torrent of boat issues. For them the ratio of work to fun was just not close to where it should be and we feel for them. Everyone started this journey, after years of planning and preparation, with a shared dream to sail across the pacific to Australia. Though they are are looking forward to what’s ahead (most have fabulous plans) vs. what they are leaving behind, the death of a dream is still hard to process.
Despite our occasional mishaps (little things like engine failure 😀) and having to sort out a plethora of repairs to Che Figata caused by the wear and tear that is inevitable when you are sailing thousands of miles in often rough conditions, our 6 weeks in French Polynesia exceeded our expectations. Though the friendliness, inclusiveness (the gender fluidity in French Polynesia is remarkable) and kindness of the people was a common thread throughout, each island chain was special In its own way. We now have a deep appreciation of Marquesan culture and the pride of the Marquesan people over its rebirth. We will remembers the Tuamotus for the beauty above ground (quintessential sandy atolls dotted with palm trees and surrounded by blue lagoons) as well as the splendor underwater (colorful hard coral giving the ocean floor a curated look and reefs teaming with brilliant reef fish, groupers, sharks and those iridescent giant clams). When we reminisce about the Society Islands we will think about the ultra lush tropical vegetation covering the mountains, the pearl farms, the ancient maraes, the incredible meals we enjoyed in Tahiti and the warm hospitality of Joseph Wong, our volunteer Tahiti tour guide.
And with that we sign off for now. We will post our next blog entry after our passage to Niue and our visit to that small island nation known for its limestone cliffs, caves and coral reefs.
