French Polynesia

 Cook’s Bay, Moorea Island.

We are about 12 miles north west of Tahiti and finally back to normal.  The bay is about 2 miles long, facing north.  The sides are lined with palm trees and in the background we are surrounded by lots of huge (2,000+ ft.) hills.  There are 25 other boats here, not quite as quiet as we thought it would be.  We are anchored 100 yds from a small church, which we all attended this morning.  The service was in French but the preacher was so animated that the language was not important.  The singing was great.  The hymns in French we sung beautifully, but it was the Polynesian versions that allowed the congregation to really shine. Men and women singing different parts, beaming ear to ear. It was fantastic. 

 We are happy to be out of Papeete.  It is a nice place to visit, but we were stuck there (am I getting any sympathy here?)  Waiting for the motor to be repaired while other cruisers were moving on.  We put the time to good us, making lots of repairs and ticking off many maintenance items on Margarita, in fact she is in better shape now than in a long time.  It is a chapter we are happy to close.  We have determined that the engine problems were due to 20 gallons of bad fuel (containing 5 gallons of seawater) that we took on in   the Galapagos.  Twenty gallons that we didn’t even need, just topping up for the long passage, and we paid for it for the next 2500 miles and 6 weeks at sea with no motor (and therefore no water making) as well as the extra time waiting in Papeete for the parts.  Let’s not discuss the cost in dollars of that 20 gallons.

 Anyway, the kids have had lots to write about in their journals, and it made for good stories during our trip home in July.  We have since found that the boats that went straight from the Galapagos to the Marquesas or even those that left directly from Mexico also had a tough time.  It is a very different crowd out here than in Mexico.  It is a younger crowd, more kids.  We are still waiting to find a boat with girls for Bronwen and Emma, but there have been lots of boys for Douglas to burn energy, and dinghy gas, with.  Right now they are all out kneeboarding.  We bought this thing in Tahiti and it has been a great success. 

D and B are doing 360^o spins on it with ease.  Emma, Sarah and I are having fun but not up to that level yet. The only downside is that gasoline costs about $4.50 a gallon here.  But it is well worth it.

Bora Bora was really wonderful. 

It completely exceeded our expectations.  We expected to find it like Hawaii.  But the actual town was tiny. And the hotels  tastefully done, for the most part Makuti roof bungalows along the beach here and there.  And we were totally removed from them anyway.  We anchored on the west side off one of the reef islands for several days. Nearby was as small, beautiful sandy palm treed island which belonged to club med but after 3 PM they didn’t use it( actually they didn’t really use it anyway, and so all the cruisers would go over there and play.  There were a lot of kids in the anchorage, and they would swarm over there in various dinghies and do t he Robinson Crusoe, or swallows and amazons thing.  It was a lot of fun.  Bronwen even found a 13 year old girl.  Then we moved over to the reef island on the south east side which was spectacular. The anchorage was a huge wide open turquoise clear lagoon of about 10 to 15 ft. with Bora-Bora Island towering over it, palm fringed beach.  And seven other cruising boats, six of which had kids.  Blue Jay was there and you may also know Seal from Seattle  Some of which we had met in Mexico.  And we all had sailing dinghies or canoes, windsurfers which we shared.  Poor Ieuan (our inflatable dinghy)  towed everyone in t he anchorage around on the kneeboard.  While we were there the moon was full, and the water was so clear we could see the sand bottom at night.  All the cruising boat crews went in to the beach one evening for a potluck bonfire.  Very memorable.  Another fun thing that happened there was our three Belgian friends off a boat we met in the Papeete yard showed up and we were able to spend some time with them.  Such nice guys, all in their twenties, such a sense of humor.  We had a lot of laughs.  They kindly offered to give the kids a scuba lesson.  Douglas and Emma were a little young but Bronwen took the opportunity, did really well and had a great time.  I told here she should jump at it because she wouldn’t get such a good looking instructor again!!  We did some great snorkeling 15 feet of water, heads up to 3 feet from the surface, and closer.  So that you could pull along and swim between the heads, like gliding in a plane.  The fish were pretty but small and not as abundant as one could hope.  Here it is better, more fish and better coral.  Some very shallow spots that are a bit tricky and require you to suck in your belly.  We saw a spotted moray eel yesterday and others saw a big (60+) school of leopard rays nearby.  The water is crystal clear.  The current, from the surf coming over the reef, can be strong.  We did one drift snorkel with the dinghy in tow.  Emma is doing really well now, still a bit tentative on clearing the snorkel, but at least she can put her mask on  without fussing (hair pulling) and enjoys the scene.  Bronwen is a fish. I The am sure.  She is always the last in the boat, and the first in come to think of it.  She checks and sets the anchor to avoid the coral and really enjoys cruising around under water.   She and Douglas are doing some nice surface diving, although I think B has my difficult Eustachian tubes that make ear clearing a pain (ha ha ha.) 

 We were sad to leave, but it was time to move on.  Also, these lagoon/beach stops are fantastic, but you don’t get the local culture as you get near a town

 We have started up school again, but it is really one of the biggest challenges – so many things intervene.  I hope it works out to get them into school in N.Z. for a couple of months, for all our sakes.  It is a pity time is hurrying on, it would have been nice to have a couple more months to slow down through this bit as originally planned.  C’est la Vie.  It all adds up to the experience of live after all.