Letter from Atlantia August 2009

Tahiti lives up to its reputation as being a friendly, lively (during the week) and expensive island. Fortunately it is also a beautiful island. Most buildings do not rise above six stories and these are dwarfed by the central volcano. Papeete, the capital, has one building of nine stories on the waterfront but they are all shorter in the streets behind. Most of the architecture is French 1960's to 19990's but with more taste than found in France from the same era.

Some of the trees are enormous and must have been here for centuries at the time of thatched buildings , cannibalism, and captain Cook. He first found his way here in the 1770's to chart the path of venus for the Royal Society.

Our anchorage at the start of our visit was on the west side, sheltered from the prevailing easterlies, although sometimes the wind would swing and strengthen. There is talk of 2009 being an El Nino year when the currents in the Pacific reverse and hurricanes in the Atlantic reduce. We certainly didn't find a current reversal in the early part of the year but there is no doubt that the winds recently have been variable, both in strength and direction. As we write the wind is blowing about 30 knots from the south east. Nearly a strong trade wind. Fortunately we are no longer at anchor but tied to yet another metal pontoon that constitutes part of the marina in the centre of Papeete.

We have had some interesting experiences here, mostly on the buses. Half of the bus fleet is known as Le Truck. The reason is obvious. They are trucks. Flat bed with a timber and perspex erection behind the cab. They really are very colourful and ethnic, but are slowly all being replaced with modern, comfortable, air conditioned auto buses. A shame in some ways, as long as you don't have to travel too far in Le Truck. Since the maximum distance Le truck goes out of Papeete is about six miles it is a shame they are being replaced.

We visited the museum. A bus ride, and a longish walk, from the Marina Taina to the south. It had a bower anchor belonging to Captain Cook there, lost when one of his ships nearly drifted onto the surrounding reef. There was a picture of another, half buried in coral, which is now solid stone. About five feet in 350 years.

The early communications with Europe were in the eighteenth century, but the King of Tahiti gave France the Government of his land, and title to a considerable area of it, in about 1880. This century sees France still governing the country, but there is much talk of increased independence. This is extremely unlikely in the near future since France injects a huge amount of cash into the area, and all for the sake of calling it part of France! (and testing bombs in the late 20th century). We were assured by a lovely Frenchman, Alain and his wife Claudie that E.U. money was not involved. If only the French tax payer knew what he was paying for! A refined and happy society who have not yet reaped the benefits of the world banking crisis or credit crunch. They know it is coming though by the considerable loss of yacht business and tourism this year.

The local fishing boats have the helmsman in his own seat up near the bow in splendid isolation. It is said that this is due to the dorado (mahi mahi / dolphin fish) that swim in the bow wave and are speared by the helmsman who has his harpoon handy next to him. This may be the case but it is also a good place to view the up coming reefs and coral heads which abound.

The local canoes are either the single man proas or the 6,8, or 10 man catamarans. They really enjoy their racing and one can see them at almost any time paddling inside and, sometimes during a serious race, outside, the surrounding reefs.

Another of our bus adventures was to the adjacent volcano of Tahiti Iti.

Tahiti Iti is separated from Tahiti Nui (the big place!) by an isthmus populated by a small town with a large cathedral and two supermarkets. The bus staging post is opposite the suspended electrical supply wire where the noddies of the island seem to congregate.

Just like swallows although they do not seem to be congregating to fly south. Just to laugh at all the poor would-be travellers waiting for the buses that nearly never come. We discovered that the last bus from the south of Tahiti Iti, which is where Robert Louis Stevenson stayed, leaves at midday. If you get stranded you have to hitch a ride. One of our friends actually hitched a ride in a police car due to the lack of timeous bus transport about 9 o'clock in the evening. A very weird system. Our companions on that trip were Colin and Milin from their Scottish Beneteau 56 called 'Nae Hassle' Not a completely true name since they had a bit of hassle with their rigger here replacing some rigging. A beautiful and comfortable boat though. They too are off to New Zealand.

One of the benefits of the anchorage at Marina Taina is the floating bar. A wonderful boat with a thatched roof that cruises around inviting other boats to tie up to it. The sand bar on the reef, where it sometimes anchors, provides a number of customers when they cease playing volleyball in two feet of water. No doubt they all take an early bath when they fall off their stools.

Also at the anchorage is the warren catamaran 'Taraipo', owned by John Jamieson who is on his second circumnavigation, this time with Nicole from Switzerland. John used to work at RYA Scotland as the racing coach, and took the Dragons at the Royal Forth Yacht Club for race training on a number of occasions in the 1990,s. We have had a number of very sociable encounters with them and hope to see them again on our travels.

One of the wonderful aspects of French Polynesia is that almost all the women wear flowers in their hair.

Margaret was given some flowers for her hair for her birthday which also surrounded her hat in the evening. They were very attractive but didn't last long even though we kept them in the fridge overnight.

We have been fortunate enough to be visited by Stephen and Susan for the last two weeks, and we have completed a whistle stop tour of some of the other Society Islands. In Moorea we saw the back drop of the mountains which feature in the film of 'South Pacific',

and watched the dancing and music making of the Polynesians at the Club Balihai.

In Tahaa we visited a turtle refuge,

a pearl farm,

and a vanilla farm,

all through the courtesy of the owner of the Hibiscus Hotel with its free moorings outside. Leo, for he is the owner, has purchased over 6000 turtles for his cure and release turtle refuge over the last ten years . They are all Pacific green turtles and are caught in fishing traps or nets around the islands. We gave him a donation and had an expensive meal at his hotel, which seemed the least we could do to assist his altruism.

We swam in a coral river which was only a few feet deep, next to the only hotel in Tahaa. Almost all the very expensive hotels in French Polynesia have their 'apartments' over the water. They consist of small self contained bedrooms with a swimming platform leading to the lagoon so the guests can have their early morning swim without straying away from their rooms. The bar and restaurant are sometimes in the open air although the majority of the communal areas are of large beautifully thatched structures whose frames are timber and whose chandeliers are composed of hanging droplets and circlets of fabulous shells.

Stephen was not startled this time when he saw the octopus. Apparently it was quite tame sitting amongst the vary coloured corals and sponges whilst the small and brightly coloured fish swam blithely around.

The sharks of course that were swimming around the outside of Bora Bora were a different matter. A number were about six feet long and only some were known man eaters. Fortunately the sharks and fish they feed on had just been fed by the tourist boats so fodder was plentiful without attacking humans.

We caught up with Keith and Ann in their sloop Ketchup 2 in Bora Bora. They are heading back to Australia after a nine year circumnavigation together with Brian and Margaret on Gipsy Days who have been on their boat for 14 years. Margaret even ran into a sleeping whale in the Indian Ocean some years ago in the middle of the night. They both got a shock, although no damage was done. Keith controls a radio net of about 15 boats every morning, broadcasting on the SSB radio their positions and weather conditions as they make their way to Tonga. Some are already there.

The whirlwind tour of the islands was great fun, although we intend to revisit two of them on our own on the way to Tonga, which we will reach by the end of September. We hope to see hump back whales again. We saw six on the penultimate day of our offsprings stay.

The last day of Stephen and Susan's voyage was a bit bumpy as we had 50 knots of wind and steep 3 metre waves for the 12 miles between Moorea and Tahiti, when we were sailing them back to catch their plane. We all arrived safely however and the plane was duly caught.

Our next voyage is via Bora Bora to the North Cook Islands, to American Western Samoa and then down to Tonga. From Tonga to New Zealand with our friend Kevin from New Jersey, and then to Scotland for Christmas. The last part will be by plane for the crew but Atlantia is booked into the Riverside Marina in Whangarei, so she should have lots of company there. Hope you enjoy the pics. The whole family had a hand in them this time.

Love Atlantia.