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8th August - 26th August, 2005
arrived: the infamous Molly McDaniel, Skardu’s eminent stalker. She flew out from St.Lucia at a
moment’s notice to spend another week on board, but more importantly to celebrate her birthday
in true Polynesian style.
The morning of Molly’s birthday, we were woken up early by the sound of drums and singing.
We poked our heads out and all around us the yachts were fully dressed with all their flags and
pennants. What a celebration! What good timing! We soon found out that for the last few days
the whole city had been on standby in anticipation of the arrival of “Geronimo”, a large racing
catamaran, which was attempting to set the record for the fastest sail from Sydney to Tahiti. We
woke up just in time to raise our own flags and see Geronimo being lead towards the town quay
by a procession of over 20 outrigger canoes. Captain Cook might have witnessed something
similar 250 years ago. The canoes were decorated in flowers and palm leaves and men were
blowing conch horns to herald the yacht’s arrival. After a few more songs and some speeches
Mark and Quintin got their own birthday presents a bit early, a photo taken with Miss Tahiti… all
three of them! Too bad we couldn’t convince them to model for our beer calendar.
It was only natural that Molly would want to throw herself headlong into local society, so that
evening after the obligatory champagne celebration on board we headed into town to our favourite
roulottes on Papeete’s waterfront to indulge ourselves in some local fare.
The next day we left Tahiti for the last time, and set off for “Les Iles Sous Le Vent”, the leeward
islands. Scott Gardner , one of Mark’s friends from Kellogg and San Francisco, had mentioned
that he would be in French Polynesia for his honeymoon, so we arranged to pass by Moorea for
a few hours on our overnight sail to Huahine. Our timing worked out well, and it was great to be
able to welcome them on board for drinks… what a small world.
Of all the Society Islands, Huahine must rank as one of our favourite, as much for its unspoilt
charm as for its beauty. It is small, lush, inviting, manageable, and one of the only islands we've
really been able to explore almost in its entirety by land. The first night we anchored off what we
later found out was the President of Tahiti's beach property, and then the following day we
dinghied half way around the island for a few hours. We visited the small village of Faie to see
and feed the famous "Blue-Eyed Sacred Eels". They live under the bridge in a bend in the river,
and would appear at the first sign of food, normally the canned mackerel sold in the small stall
nearby. A dark brown-black with piercing blue eyes and white gullets, they were enormous
(some measuring 4'6" in length) and plentiful (at least 25 of them), but fortunately fairly tame.
They would crane their heads out of the water as you tried to aim pieces of fish into their mouths,
and one or two had a go at Molly's pink toenails thinking they were food.
Continuing our heart of darkness tour, we explored a little further upriver to another town, known
for its many maraes: ancient stone religious/social platforms where ancient Polynesian rituals
were conducted. Many of them were still intact, but after you’ve seen a few of them, they all start
to look the same. More interesting were the other pile of rocks in town: the ancient stone fish
traps that had been built into the river. Stones were placed in v-shapes about 100m long,
extending across 95% of the river, and culminating in little dead-end traps. As the current in the
river changes, the fish get caught and the villagers can then pick them up at low water.
Ingenious, and certainly a lot easier than the fishing we’ve been doing.
The following day we decided that we needed a bit more exercise so we rented bikes in town
and cycled 20 miles around the main island. We saw many of the same sights, but it gave us a
better appreciation for the lush interior and especially for the size of some of its hills! Somehow
we still had enough energy that night to help celebrate a birthday with “Sunday Morning”. We
had met this beautiful charter yacht in the Marquesas, and now that the English owners were on
board, the skipper and his wife wanted us to meet them. In keeping with the theme of small world
coincidences, Molly recognized them from home since they live in St. Lucia half the year. A few
drinks and a little dancing in the local bar in town rounded off our stay perfectly.
We had an early morning start the next day to get to Raiatea in time for Molly to see some of the
island before she had to leave. Since the day anchorage we choose was somewhat tenuous,
we each took an anchor watch, and while Molly and Quintin visited yet more beautiful maraes,
Mark took the dinghy for a quick explore up a jungle-enveloped river. That evening, after a BBQ
dinner, Molly was delivered by dinghy to the local airport, which offers the best water-borne drop-
off we’ve ever seen: a little canal leads to a delightful covered dock right on the doorstep of the
terminal building, the whole surrounded by lily-ponds and manicured lawns. How we love
Polynesia!
Once we had said goodbye to Molly, it was back to work again for a while. We visited the
nearby boatyard (the only one in French Polynesia) in the hope of getting our radar repaired,
only to be told by an electrician that its best days were behind it; guess it’s now going to be dead
weight until New Zealand. Instead we turned our attentions to repairs of a different kind: the tooth
that Mark had chipped in St.Martin needed to be repaired again, so we docked in town in search
of a dentist and to run some errands. We have learned over the past year that it’s best to write
our plans in the sand at low tide, and this was no exception. The dentist Mark found was a
young Frenchman who was a champion game-fisherman. We had been planning to leave
shortly for Bora Bora, but after he invited us to go fishing with him that weekend we delayed our
departure by a few days, in the hope of learning a thing or two. We used the intervening few
days to do a quick circumnavigation of Tahaa, the island to the north, and to enjoy the views over
Raiatea after an evening hike up one of the island’s hills.
At 6.15am Sunday morning we were like two kids waiting for Christmas. We now know how
Seb and Oli felt when we took them fishing a few weeks ago (See journal #25). Sadly the
weather was fairly rough, which wasn’t ideal for catching marlin but, as a consolation, we did
come back with two mahi-mahi and a lot of good fishing advice: “one white bird means nothing,
but two white birds and a black bird is a good sign”. Who would have known? It was too late to
set off that afternoon for Bora Bora so we took up Fred’s invitation to barbecue some of the fish
back at his place. His house was in one of the most beautiful settings you could imagine, nestled
on a hill, surrounded by fruit trees, and with a multi-million dollar view from his deck of the
changing blue colours of the lagoon. It’s enough to make you want to become a dentist, and was
a fitting way to end our stay in Raiatea.
After a few changes in plan we finally arrived in Bora Bora a few days later than scheduled. It’s
undoubtedly a very beautiful island, and worthy of many of the superlatives bestowed on it; the
twin-peaked Mt. Otemanu is impressive from any angle, the barrier reef on which ocean swells
break into plumes of white spray are magnificent, and never before have we seen a blue as blue
as the water in its lagoon. Is there such a colour as Bora Bora Blue? Does the tourist board
dye the waters to lure young honeymooners? However, the downside of all this beauty is the
devastating rate at which large over-water bungalow resorts are being built; we must have
passed over a dozen such resorts in our three-hour sail around the island. Then again, maybe
our opinions should be taken with a pinch of salt, for we have seen some truly unspoiled islands
over the past few months. If, after our 3-week Pacific crossing, we had arrived in Bora Bora
instead of the Marquesas, who knows, maybe we never would have left. Fortunately we had
been warned about the touristy nature of Bora Bora so it didn’t come as too much of a shock.
However, one thing is for sure, after two and a half months in French Polynesia, we are now
very much looking forward to braving the open ocean again and exploring our next stop; the
unspoiled and relatively uninhabited (read population = 3) island of Suvarov in the Northern Cook
Islands, about 5 days sail away.
