Huahine, Fare

Polynesia is credited with inventing surfing and Huahine is the centre of all this. Huahine's waves attract international champions in the world of surfing. While that is not quite our line of activity, one of the best spots happens to be right where you enter the pass at Fare. It also happened some winter storms to the South of us swept up a big swell, resulting in good break...

Looking sideways one boat length away from Bravado as we enter the pass.

Whisper a "buddy boat" of ours enters the pass.

Truth be told, the waves (just) don't break in the pass, but it certainly makes for a memorable entry!

Fare itself lives at the lazy, slow pace of the South Seas of old. We spent time along the main tree-lined street facing the wharf and hiked North towards Lake Fauna Nui, where there are some of the best preserved Marae, social/religious gathering sites of French Polynesia. We also saw some V-shaped damns in the tidal gateway. They are centuries old, but still used today. They drive the fish together, making it easier to catch them as the tides carry them in an out of the lake.

V-shaped fish trap at Maeva.

Marae at Maeva.

TRUTH IN REPORTING STATEMENT
To keep our readers in rainy Europe happy: From time to time, we experience serious tropical rainstorms. Often they last only a few minutes but then again, sometimes they last a lot longer. We hate to disappoint, but generally we like them as they give us and the boat a nice fresh water rinse...

Lariekoek during a rainstorm

Huahine Auto-Stop

Seen from the back of a car: Ocean, The reef protecting Huahine, and the lagoon.

After sailing all night we went through the pass of Maroe Bay in Huahine at 6:15AM with a beautiful sunrise. Aedgard on Lariekoek followed close behind. We anchored just off the village of Maroe in crystal clear water with a little reef behind us. Huahine consists of two islands: Huahine-Iti (small) and Huahine-Nui (big). Maroe is on Huahine-Iti.

Each time we visit an island, we have an urge to see "all" of it, rather than just a few bays. This time we set out to see all of Huahini-Iti by hitch-hiking. We split into two teams, each covering the same ground in opposite directions. The teams were:

Clockwise: Ewout and Jet.
Counter-Clockwise: Judith, Hein, and Eltjo.

The rules for the exercise were:
- Take a photograph of each person giving you a lift (Auto-Stop in French).
- Eat an ice cream.
- Collect the following items:
-- 1 Paperclip
-- 1 napkin from a restaurant with a printed name on it
-- Autograph or stamp from a government official (Police, Firefighter etc.)
-- Fresh edible fruit, not bought.
-- Random item that expresses the joy of being in Huahine/a cruiser.

Receiving a paperclip from the hotel manager

Both teams meet at a "magasin" in search of ice cream

It was a fun afternoon. Ewout and Jet completed their trip with just two rides. The other team needed 5 rides. Halfway around the island the two teams met and hunted for ice cream. But the one and only 'magasin' that we found sold no ice cream, so we all settled for a cold drink. After that the counter-clockwise team had some difficulty getting a ride as no cars passed. It was late in the afternoon, they walked for an hour and were starting to think up a plan B, when finally a car passed, stopped, picked them up and took them all the way back to the boat, arriving seconds before the clockwise team.

The local population is *extremely* friendly. Tourism is way down, but they told us that it doesn't hurt that badly: "There is a lot of fish in the sea, fruit in our backyards, people spend little money in the stores, and we do not need to heat our homes." - Anonymous local.

Because of the tourism being down, there is even more fruit than usual. We received an abundance of pamplemouse, bananas, pumpkin, and heads of lettuce. No matter what we said, we were not allowed to pay for these. What an island!

Who is the winner of the treasure hitch-hiking hunt?
The readers need to decide! When you decide keep in mind:
- Neither of the teams managed to find ice cream
- Ewout and Jet had a paperclip and a signature from a government official (one of their rides worked in social security), whereas Judith, Hein and Eltjo did not manage to obtain these (they had so much fun they forgot the trivial stuff).
- Both teams had the required napkins.
- Random joy of being in Huahine item: Ewout and Jet bought a beautiful sea turtle carved from an oyster shell. Judith, Hein and Eltjo picked a bunch of colorful Huahine flowers and took a picture of a splendid green outrigger canoe (they did NOT spend money).
- Fresh edible fruit: Ewout and Jet brought bananas and a pumpkin (fruit?). Judith, Hein and Eltjo brought a coconut and a noni.
- Both teams had pictures from all their rides, of course the counter-clockwise team (JHE) had three more rides so THREE pictures more.
- Even though they had many more rides, Judith, Hein and Eltjo managed to arrive at the starting point seconds before Ewout and Jet. However, Judith was not done saying goodbye to her last ride or taking a picture of the driver until well after Ewout and Jet sat down waiting for her team to be ready to return to Bravado.


PHOTOS OF THE RIDES

Eltjo, Hein, and Judith: Ride 1



Eltjo, Hein, and Judith: Ride 2 (yes we rode in the back)


Eltjo, Hein, and Judith: Ride 3 (yes once again we rode in the back)


Eltjo, Hein, and Judith: Ride 4 (lady went *way* out of her way to drop off at Bravado)


Jet and Ewout: Ride 1


Jet and Ewout: Last ride. (lady is the government official who provided a signature)

TEAM "JOY OF HUAHINE" PHOTOS

Eljto, Hein's Joy of Huahine: Riding in the back of a truck in a tropical island

Eljto, Hein's Joy of Huahine: A green outrigger canoe waiting to be used



Jet's Joy of Huahine: Wind blows through your hair as you tour an exotic island with your dad


Jet's Joy of Huahine: Discovering new places


Jet's Joy of Huahine: Trying on an *orange* Pareo


Jet's Joy of Huahine: Fizzy water to quench your thirst.


Jet's Joy of Huahine: Peaceful boating scene


Jet's Joy of Huahine: Quiet anchorage with Raiatea in the background


Jet's Joy of Huahine: Wandering down a country road at sunset.


Which team won? What do you think?

Cooks Bay Moorea

Cooks Bay

After eleven days at the Tahiti Yacht Club, and lots of fun with Apple and Zen, we motored in 3 knots of wind to the nearby island Moorea. It took all of four hours to arrive in Cooks Bay, named after the famed British explorer. Quite a few of our friends, who we had not seen in a while were anchored in beautiful Cooks Bay. The night that we arrived there was a Tahitian dance performance by a local group. At the end of the performance they invited the audience to dance with them. Who should they pick but Ewout, who does not like to dance at all... but he could not refuse this lovely lady in her grass skirt.

Why did she ask me?

A couple of days later Jet and Judith went pareo making with a couple of other women. Pareos are printed pieces of cloth that you wrap around yourself. We made a big turquoise pareo with lots of dolphins on it. Jet thinks it is too nice to wear and she wants to hang it in her room as a memory of our trip when we live in a house again.

Pareo Making

Mike from Apple rented a car and drove us around Moorea. We went snorkeling near a beautiful beach. Afterwards we visited a French patisserie, where we had chocolate mousse cake and cappuchino. We felt so sophisticated/normal to be driving in a car and drinking coffees again.

Juice (?) Tasting

One day we visited the juice factory on the island with our friends from Love Song. They grow a lot of pineapples on Moorea and make lovely juices. You can taste all the juices you like even the alcoholic ones at 10 in the morning. After lunch Hein Jet and Ewout went to a Berkeley research lab, where they helped lure mosquitoes for a genetic test.

Hein helps Berkeley grad student lure mosquitoes

Another day we did a hike to a belvedere point overlooking Cooks Bay and Opunohu Bay (which is the next bay over). On the hike you pass a lot of Marae, which were sacred offering places, where the Polynesians used to offer humans (brrr) to their gods. After the hike we could feel our leg muscles for the next two days!!

The Soccer Field

As we always feel that we need more exercise, being on a boat, we started to play pick-up games of soccer in the afternoons. Mike and Veronica from Apple would play with us and also Aedgard from Lariekoek, who is a really good goalie. We played on the shore at the lawn of the Bali Hai hotel.

Eltjo trying to stare down Veronica from Apple

Every day a couple more boats would join us. One day a Dutch boat came in 'Senang' with two boys, Luc (10) and Bob (9) and they all played with us. They were all quite good, especially the Mom, Vara, who had never played soccer before! Then the Whisper crew joined (Mary, Scott, Timothy (10) and Finn (7) and some of the hotel guests. We had a really good time.

Les Grands Ballets de Tahiti

On the French mother's day (June 7th), which is different from the American one (yes I celebrated twice!), Les Grands Ballets de Tahiti performed at the Bali Hai hotel. They had the most amazing costumes and especially the men were such energetic dancers, great to watch ;).
The local museum was another little treasure. We learned how to drill with a shell-wood-coconut drill and how to play a nose flute.

The Nose Flute

It was difficult to tear ourselves away from Cooks Bay. We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves here and started to understand why the mutineers on the Bounty had rebelled after leaving the Society Islands. But leave we must and after three wonderful weeks we left Cooks Bay early one morning to swim with the Sting Rays in the next bay.

Eltjo gathers courage to swim with the sting rays

That night we did an overnight sail to Huahine, the first of the leeward group of the Society Islands. We had two passengers for the crossing: a French/Spanish couple called Stefan and Marta respectively. They were really nice and we enjoyed their company even though it was only for a day.

Bye Bye Cooks Bay!!

Luxuries

Hein and Eltjo in the spreader: Can you spot Tahiti?

When we arrived in the Society Islands, we moored at the Tahiti Yacht Club near Papeete. And all of a sudden our life was full of luxuries again. For a start, there were washing machines at the Yacht Club. After weeks of doing laundry by hand for the six of us (thank you chief washer Gerbrand), it was wonderful to put it in a machine. It even smelled better than our best efforts by hand. Second, hot showers!! We had our last hot(ish) showers weeks ago in Mexico before we left for the crossing. Of course we had our regular be-economic-with-water 1 minute showers on the aft deck, but a real 15 minute hot shower with a big stream of water was a wonderful treat. Third, we found a big super market with aisles full of all sorts of supplies: kilos of brie cheese, fresh fruits and vegetables, white chocolate bars with coconut, etc. Ooh, how good everything tasted after several weeks of canned food...!! Last but not least we had internet connection again, so we could catch up on all the news and download our favorite NPR programs. To top it all Jet and Judith went shopping in Papeete, found a little French boutique and have some NEW clothes to wear!! All the wonderful luxuries of life.

Jet in her new red dress with baguettes.