Sunshine At Last!

Whining works after all, we have some sunshine. In fact we have beautiful calm And sunshine. We awake in our precarious anchorage on the west side of Raiatea in "glass" calm water and a beautiful sunny day breaking. We lift anchor and head to the north of the island by going out one pass into open water and then in another pass to enter back into the lagoon and anchor by Marina Apoitit by Uturoa. being Sunday (hence the sun!) nothing is open in town, but we do manage to catch the dive shop guy and sset up a dive for tomorrow with them. When we say nothing is open, that means nothing, so no restaurants either, we have a quiet evening on the boat. Georgia seems to be going stir crazy?????? Our dive is on a three master sail boat sunk on the reef in early 1900. It is very well preserved and we see some new creatures living in it's shell. Georgia's first wreck dive. I have to admit, it was a good one. We stock with groceries in the afternoon and ready to head to Tahaa the next day. Tahaa is in the same lagoon as Raiatea, but is a separate island. Tahaa is a very beautiful little place. It is pretty windy the day we head up but we find a good anchorage in Haamene Bay, which is good as all of the touristy things we want to do here are located here. The first two numbers that we call for the sites we want to see don't speak English. Oooh, not a good sign. I muster as much French as I know for the next call - "Ahlo?" and it works as the lovely lady on the other end responds in English (as my French is obviously going to be bad). She was a good contact too as she set us up on a tour to see a Vanilla Plantation, a pearl farm (for Georgia) and the Hibiscus turtle foundation, everything we wanted on one phone call. As we were waiting at the dock for our ride, we see Oso Blanco anchoring up next to us in the bay and call on the VHF to see if they want to join in the tour - Yes, of course. So a little trucks comes for us with seats in the box and a canopy overhead and away we all go. the vanilla farm was very interesting. Tahiti produces the best tasting vanilla in the world, but not the most expensive and not the most available. It takes a very long time and a lot of hand work to get this exotic spice/flavor perfect. We of course buy a bunch of vanilla flavor products which are very yummy. The pearl farm turned out to be informative for everybody. When we were in the Tuamotus, we got to see the nets in the water and how the oysters are managed there, but at this farm, the fellow explained in classroom style the types of oysters, how the colors (black,green,purple) are achieved and how the pearls are created. Very interesting. The Hibiscus foundation rescues turtles from the fishermen (the turtles get caught in the fishing nets) rests them up and feeds them for a bit then releases them back into the wild. We had dinner at the Hibiscus restaurant (thankfully - no turtle on the menu) it was good not to have to cook ourselves for a change.

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