Taioa Bay

Today started very early. We needed to run the dingy over to the local market for 4:30 am, this in order to get the best selection of fresh vegetables and fruits. We have another long run ahead of us in a few days, so we need to stock up a bit. The fruit here is heavenly..... Everything is ripened on the tree (or nearly so) and actually tastes like what it is supposed too (and more). We can't seem to get enough of any of it. So this was our opportunity and we scored big. Once back to the boat, in the still darkness, we went back to bed for a bit before our next adventure. O.K., up and ready to go, we finished our gigantic fresh donuts and coffee, loaded the dingy, hauled in the single flopper, upped the anchor and headed out of Taiohae Bay for Taioa Bay. There were three sail boats anchored in the Hakatea Anse (small lobe on the main bay) when we arrived, but we snuggled in nicely. By the end of the day there will be seven sail boats, one power boat and ourselves all squished in here. We reversed the leaving pack up, down with the anchor, out with the flopper and un-loaded the dingy. The white sandy beach was calling our names, so with our cooler of beverages on ice, we headed in to shore, beached the dingy and began our well deserved swim in the warm ocean water. It is so salty that swimming is very easy, even I can float and for that matter swim! Talked to a young man on the beach, he has a copra business, which is drying coconuts for the purposes of making oils for perfumes. He looked pretty content with his small house on the beautiful beach, the palm trees waving over head and the rugged volcanic mountains in the background. He had several horses tethered on the beach grasses, he loads his finished product on the horses to haul to the nearest village, a four hour journey (return) for him. There are a lot of horses on these islands, you will see them tethered all over the place, the people use them for transportation because of the rough terrain and because they like to ride too.

Yesterday was very interesting, we hired a 4x4 and driver to tour us around the island. Richard our guide spoke very good English and there wasn't a question about his home/country that he could not answer for us. The tour was roughly seven hours long, we started at 8:00 am. The road system here is pretty good, nice concrete roads with nothing but switch back after switch back to get a vehicle up one side of a mountain and down the other side, they are narrow, but there isn't much traffic and you really can't get up any speed so they are not overly dangerous. (remember, we weren't driving). Nearly every tree or plant that grows here produces fruit, food or spice. It is very lush here, even though they are in a drought period. All of the flowers are beautiful, copious amounts of bogenvielia and hibiscus. Glen was thrilled to find chili peppers growing wild. We stopped at a local carver's house for some souvenirs and another house for a mango break. Richard took the ever present long pole with the small net on the end and pulled down several mangos which he cut on the spot for us to slurp and gobble down. We toured three other very small villages on beautiful bays on the north side of the island and had lunch at a small restaurant. Then we hiked over an archeological site and Richard explained some of the early Marquisan culture. There was lots of human sacrifice (literally) in their past. This would be a recommended "Thing to Do", we all had a really good time and the vehicle was a very comfortable suburban, so lots of room for the four of us (five with Richard).

Our evening was spent at Happy Hour at the Pearl Lodge, with pizza to sustain us. On our dingy ride home, we stopped at Oso Blanco for a night cap. They had just arrived in Taiohae in the morning from Fatu Oa. So we swapped tails of the high seas. Thus ends another perfect day in paradise.

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