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We ended up on the west side of the island of Taravai in a bay called Anganui. It was a beautiful, uninhabited part of the island that made us really feel like we away from the rest of the world. Of course, we really were. The Gambiers are really remote, and without cell phone and wifi access, we felt pretty disconnected.

We were enjoying our time sharing the bay with Marcus, Diana and their guests on Allora. We even had “movie night” aboard Allora where they set up a projector and screen outside on their boat on a calm evening that really felt special. The next day, we all went diving outside on the reef where we had a spectacular scene of reef fish, pelagics, sharks and unique coral formations. I even spotted a few fish I hadn’t seen before.

Soon Allora left as they had to get their guests off to the airport, and we were left alone in the bay. We remarked that it was the first time we could remember having an anchorage to ourselves since we were in the Perlas Islands in Panama. Little did we know that we would be all alone for the next two weeks!

Shortly after Allora left, the winds picked up from the southeast. As we were on the west side of Taravai, we were pretty protected with just the occasional gusts making their way over the hills on the island into our little bay. We started watching the weather forecast as we saw the winds were blowing in the 25-35 knot range, so we decided to stay put. Our weather forecasters informed us that there was a convergence zone sitting over south French Polynesia, right where we were. This meant that the lows and troughs that come up from New Zealand essentially stall out and hang around one area. In addition to the strong winds, we had days of squalls and drizzly rain that had us cooped up in the boat.

We kept waiting for the weather to change, but every day the forecast was just more of the same. We were stuck. When the sun finally broke through the clouds, we would go ashore to pick coconuts or paddle around the bay. Mike also tried his hand a fly fishing several days while I read several books. There were a couple of days we got a little stir crazy, but then we just had to laugh about it and told each other that there were definitely worse places to be stuck than this beautiful little paradise.

The wind finally died down enough for us to leave our protected anchorage and head back to the village at Rikitea. We knew the supply ship was coming in, and we needed to get there in advance of the ship arriving. It had been a month since we’d gotten any supplies. And, this was going to be our last shot to pick up some gas and diesel before we would be leaving the Gambiers. We had taken on some diesel when the previous supply ship came in, but not enough to fill our tanks. We were also almost out of gasoline, which we use to power our dinghy, generator and scuba compressor.

There is no gas station in the Gambiers, so if you want fuel you have to get it from the ship. They only sell it in 200 liter drums (about 50 gallons). If you need less than an entire drum, then you have to make some deals with other boats to go in on a barrel together. This makes for a very interesting situation in the anchorage. Right as the ship is pulling in, you can see everyone out in the dinghies either rushing to the ship to purchase a barrel (which is a limited supply) or going from boat to boat to figure out how to split a barrel with other boats. It is a bit comical, and stressful, especially when there are sometimes language barriers.

Once you’ve got your barrel and a plan to share the fuel, you have to take your jerry jugs to shore in the dinghy. You use a hand crank pump to pump the fuel into your jugs, then ferry them back to the boat to put in your tanks, and then repeat the process until you’ve got all your fuel. I think it took us most of the day to get this accomplished.

Fuel was our first priority, but we were down to canned and dried goods, so we needed some more food. The magazins (small stores) get their orders at different times depending on how they come off the ship and get trekked out to each store. Then, the store has to decide how they are going to stock the new food. So, each store will open and close and put out the fresh food at different times. When the fresh produce does come out, it is like vultures appear. At one point I had just purchased a bunch of goods when the store decided to put out a box of fresh pears. Everyone dove into the box grabbing the pears, including me. By the time I got back and line and purchased the pears, the entire box was empty.

Once we were full up on food and fuel, we were ready to leave Rikitea and check out another part of the Gambiers. But, more on that next time…

~katie

We left Rikitea on Mangareva and headed over to the next island south called Taravai. We were feeling pretty grateful that another boat had given us their tracks around the Gambiers to import into our navigation software when we had to traverse over a shallow patch of coral in order to get into the anchorage. I’m not sure we would have trusted there was enough depth to avoid hitting it if we hadn’t had that clear path to follow. But, we ended up in a beautiful anchorage in time for the weekly Sunday barbeque.

Herve and Valerie have a home in the bay on the water and invite all the visiting boats to their home on Sundays during the summer. Their modest home has the most incredible view and is surrounded by gardens and fruit trees. On this Sunday there were boats from the US, France, New Zealand and Austria. Everyone brought some meat to throw on the open pit BBQ as well as a potluck dish to share, which included rice, potatoes, papaya salad, pasta salad, squash, etc. and tons of desserts.

There aren’t many people who live on Taravai. Herve and Valerie enjoy opening up their home to make new friends from all over the world. And, they love having boats with kids join so that their son has some new friends to play with. The day was filled with lots of laughter and games. There were many petanque games (French version of bocce ball) and lots of volleyball. We were very humbled by their warmth and generosity and looked forward to returning the next Sunday.

At the south end of Taravai, we met another couple living in their own remote paradise. We took the dinghy to the only home in the southern bay to meet Eduard and Denise. Eduard had just returned from spearfishing with a Frenchman named Pierre and showed us their catch. They had speared these beautiful surgeonfish that were black with unique orange and yellow markings on them. I later looked them up in my fish guide to find out they were called Orangespine Unicornfish.

As Eduard and Pierre were cleaning the fish, we walked up to the house to meet our friend Diana who was speaking with Denise. I was glad Diana was there to introduce us (and her French is better than mine), because it feels a bit awkward to walk up to someone’s house across their property without an invitation. But, Denise was very happy to meet us and give us kisses hello. We were also greeted by her puppy Roxy who was a little white fluff ball and couldn’t have been more than a couple of months old.

Cruisers regularly visit Denise and Eduard to do some “shopping” as they have more than a garden. I would call it an orchard if it looked like some kind of organized planting. But, really you just walk behind their home into a forest of banana stalks, lime trees, orange trees, papaya trees, breadfruit trees, etc. She also grows lots of herbs. We walked around pointing at what we would like, and she picked the ripe fruits for us which we quickly piled into our bags. Eduard came around and cut off a huge stalk of green bananas for us to hang in our cockpit while they ripen. Finally, Denise cut some fresh basil, mint and green onions and tied them in a bouquet for us. It was the best grocery shopping we have done here!

We actually had a few days of projected calm weather, so we headed across the lagoon to a small motu called Kouaku with our friends on Kini Popo. Getting there was a bit of a challenge as we had to navigate through the pearl farms. In order to develop the pearls, they hang lines or racks with the live oysters underwater suspended by buoys at the surface. We’ve been told that the oysters have to hang at 80% of the water column, so the depth of the where the oysters hang depends on how deep the water is in that spot. When navigating through the area, all we can see are the buoys at the surface, and sometimes the buoys get submerged just below the surface. The oyster lines are usually strung between two buoys, but from the surface it is impossible to tell which two buoys! So, I was up on the bow trying to navigate while Mike was at the helm. If I could see lines or submerged buoys I would yell back to him. Most of the lines were deep enough to go over. We would put the boat in neutral just in case and coast over them, but one set was definitely too shallow, and I had to yell to Mike to turn the boat quickly to starboard to go around the raised buoy which was several hundred feet away.

Once we got to the anchorage, we then had to be on the lookout for reefs and bommies. This area of the lagoon is uncharted, but we knew other boats had been there. We navigated our way through the coral reefs, found a sandy spot and dropped anchor. We had to float our chain to avoid getting caught on anything below. And, as soon as we were set, we jumped in with our masks to swim a 360 degree circle around the boat to make sure we had swing room over the coral. We dropped the anchor in 30 feet of sand, but there were coral heads that reached just 8 feet below the surface (enough for us to swing over).

We had a fun couple of days exploring the small island and snorkeling the reef outside the lagoon. We had noticed a couple on the island, who we don’t think permanently live there but were certainly camping out for a few days fishing and playing on the beach. We’re always curious about what fish the locals eat due to the ciguatera issue (dangerous fish toxin I’ve mentioned before). The locals always seem to know which fish on which reefs are safe to eat. So, when the couple came by our boat one afternoon we were pleasantly surprised to have them give us a fish they had just caught. They had quite a few of them in their boat and were genuinely happy to share their bounty without any requests in return. We didn’t get to talk to them much as they were trying to get back before sunset, but we were very excited to try out the fish. It was some sort of snapper or emperor. I couldn’t identify the exact species in our book, but I just decided to call it ceviche.

We took the ceviche over to Kini Popo for a feast that night with the lamb chops Dan put on the grill. It was a bittersweet evening as we said goodbye to Dan and Staci. They left the next morning for the Marquesas. The Marquesas would be Dan’s jumping off point for the long passage up to Hawaii and then the Pacific Northwest. It’s been a fun last two years hanging out with Kini Popo, but our paths now go separate ways…his back to the States and ours to New Zealand.

~katie

Trying to time the weather to make a seven day passage is a bit challenging. In this case, we were heading from Tahiti to the Gambiers on a southeast course. The usual trade winds are easterly, so we needed to find a forecast with some northerly component to it and a bit lighter so that we would not be bashing our brains out going directly into the wind and swell. But, we needed some wind to sail as we don’t carry enough fuel to motor for seven days.

It looked like a decent opportunity was coming up, and we didn’t want to be stuck in Tahiti another week or two waiting for another weather window. So, we motored away from the dock with our friends on Kini Popo just behind us and headed out. The first two of days had us heading into a bigger swell than we would have liked. Our boat doesn’t ride up and over a head on swell, but tends to hobby horse plowing the bow into the waves and then popping up over the other side and slamming down into the trough. Not a fun sail.

The second day was full of squalls. I swear they always happen on my watch. At one point I was watching an oncoming squall with no real way to avoid it. I put on my rain jacket to wait for the onslaught of rain. But, before the rain even got there we were hit with what felt like a wall of wind. The wind had only been in the 10-12 kt range and we had a lot of sail out. All of the sudden we had 35 kts on the beam which heeled us quickly and dramatically. Mike jumped up from down below and I grabbed the helm. The hydrovane had been steering us but couldn’t handle the sudden change of wind. Mike quickly furled in the jib and let out the main to depower it. I steered us downwind to wait out the squall as the rain started pounding down on us.

By day three the conditions were finally in our favor. We had light but steady wind and the sea state had improved quite a lot. The next four days seemed to fly by as we enjoyed mostly good sailing weather. There were some still conditions where we had to motor if we didn’t want to prolong the passage by bobbing around for hours without any wind. We had pleasant nights with skies full of stars. It was a new moon when we left, so the stars were our only light. I love laying down staring up at the constellations and looking for a shooting star or two. But, the best is when we get some phosphorescence in the water which makes it look like the stars are both above and below you.

We did have one funny experience when we passed the atoll of Mururoa. This is a restricted atoll where the French did their nuclear testing. It is off limits to civilian boats but is apparently staffed with French military. The guy on duty one night must have gotten a bit suspicious of us sailing a couple of miles offshore, because he hailed us on the VHF asking who we were and did we know we were in French territory (picture the guy saying this is a heavily French accent).

We arrived in Rikitea on the island of Managareva on Saturday afternoon. We had been checking in twice daily on the SSB with our position report, so several of the boats in the anchorage knew we were arriving. As we started looking for a spot to drop the anchor, the boats that saw us approaching started blaring horns and shouting hellos waving us in. It was quite the welcome! So, with that in mind, that everyone was watching us, it was quite comical that we had trouble getting our anchor down.

Those first couple of days that we had bashed into the swell jumbled up our anchor chain so bad that that it wouldn’t come off the windlass. Mike had to crawl into the anchor locker to untangle it while I drove the boat around doing donuts outside the anchorage for a few minutes. I’m sure we were the entertainment for the whole anchorage that afternoon.

We were happy to have arrived at our destination, but we quickly discovered a problem. Our watermaker wasn’t working. We were able to diagnose the problem and determined we needed a new membrane. Of course this couldn’t have happened in Tahiti where it would have been easy to find one! So, we spend a few days making calls and figuring out how to purchase and arrange for a new membrane to be shipped to us in Rikitea. There is no FedEx or UPS service in French Polynesia, but you can send things freight via Air Tahiti.

While we were busy trying to sort all of this out (not easy with limited phone and internet service), we started looking at the weather forecast. There was a pretty sizable storm that was going to be approaching the area in a few days. While we were stuck in Rikitea, several of our friends had ventured out to other anchorages around the Gambiers. But, Rikitea was definitely the most protected anchorage from the northwest winds that were going to hit us. As the storm was predicted to get closer, more and more boats started filling up the anchorage. What was maybe 12 boats when we arrived soon swelled to 32 boats and was getting crowded. We were sending messages to our friends who were anchored elsewhere to tell them the status of the Rikitea anchorage. They were understandably concerned with how crowded it was, as there is always a chance another boat will drag or swing into you when anchored in such close quarters. So, five boats, including three of our friends, chose to ride out the storm anchored off Taravai about five miles away.

When the storm finally arrived, I was glad we were in the position we were in. The wind was gusty and swirled around the anchorage but wasn’t too bad. The boats were swinging all around, so we just had to make sure we didn’t swing into anyone. Several boats had to reanchor to get away from hitting another boat. One boat even tied up to the commercial wharf. We were close to shore and mostly protected from the wind, but those farther out near the reef weren’t as protected. One boat went up on the reef outside Rikitea but wasn’t damaged.

Over in Taravai, they were not so lucky. We could hear them on the VHF and felt a bit helpless to assist. They saw over 50 kts of wind funneling into their anchorage. One boat dragged and ended up on a reef (luckily not too much damage). Our friend Dan on Kini Popo severely damaged his dinghy and ripped his dodger. Not a fun experience for any of them. The storm lasted for several days before letting up. With so many boats in the area, we were glad no one had any serious damage.

So, our introduction to the Gambiers was a bit of a let down with a major storm and a broken watermaker. But, soon enough we had our new membrane and better weather. We were happy to leave Rikitea after a couple of weeks of feeling stuck there to explore the rest of the Gambiers.

~katie

When I left off we had just returned from our visit to the States and were working hard to get the boat ready to leave for the Gambiers. The Gambiers is one of the more remote archipelagos in French Polynesia. Almost 900 miles southeast of Tahiti, it’s location makes it outside the usual paths of any cyclones that may occur in the South Pacific in the summer time. That makes it a great place to spend a couple of months during the summer. And, it is one of the places in French Polynesia we had not yet been to.

Due to the remoteness of the islands in the Gambiers, supplies are a bit limited. There are only about 500 people that live in the archipelago, with most of them living on the main island of Mangareava and the village of Rikitea. The Gambiers have an interesting history. There was a unique culture here at one time, but it was destroyed by the Catholic missionaries who enslaved the people and caused the deaths of thousands. Some of the original churches erected in the early 1800’s still stand on the islands as a reminder of this history.

Unfortunately, the French didn’t do much better in more recent history. Several atolls only a couple hundred miles from the Gambiers served as nuclear testing grounds through the mid-1990’s. The locals will tell you of the destruction of their agriculture and the extremely high cancer rate that occurred here.

Today, the small remaining population in the Gambiers mostly work in the pearl farm industry or are mainly subsistence based on the outlying islands. There are supply ships that arrive twice a month to deliver goods and take back pearls and oyster shells. There are also flights that arrive twice a week that keep the Gambiers connected to Tahiti. With such a small population and only periodic supplies, you can imagine that provisions would be limited and more expensive. So, in order to get ready to leave, we needed to make some serious grocery runs in Papeete.

Papeete (the main city in Tahiti) has the only large grocery stores in French Polynesia. Food is hit or miss in price. Some things are reasonable, but others are quite expensive. There is a lot of imported food from France, the US, Australia and New Zealand. Interestingly, all of the frozen chicken we have found has come from the US. But, you can get duck breasts from France and lamb chops from New Zealand. Produce is sometimes locally grown and sometimes imported. The local stuff is much cheaper. If you want oranges from Florida, its going to cost you.

Our friend Dan on Kini Popo and his new crew Staci were also preparing for the passage to the Gambiers. So, we rented a car together to make several runs back and forth to the Carrefour (grocery store) and the marina. I always think the locals must think we’re crazy when we have a grocery cart piled so full of food that we can barely push it. After putting some damage on our credit cards and stuffing every available compartment on the boat and topping off the freezer, we felt pretty good about our supplies. But, there was still one thing we were missing.

Booze is incredibly expensive in French Polynesia. Think 3-4 times what you would pay in the States. Aside from Hinano, the local beer, and one local Tahitian rum, everything is imported. You can find lots of French wines, but any other liquor is imported and a ridiculous price. Cruisers are a social bunch, and every time you pull into a new anchorage someone will invite you over for sundowners which then gets reciprocated and then another boat invites you over…You get the picture. And, we like our cocktails out in the cockpit enjoying a beautiful sunset with a palm tree lined island next door. So, to not purchase some alcohol was not really in the plans.

Our friend Marcus gave us a tip that there was a guy in Tahiti that made bootleg rum at a reasonable price. He found the phone number for us, and Mike and Dan immediately called the guy. I think there was something about the fact that they were doing something illicit, that a guy had a homemade still concocting a secret rum, that made this seem like an exciting thing to do. The next thing I knew, Mike and Dan were each emptying and consolidating old liquor bottles. Then, they ran off to make a cash deal in the parking lot of the post office!

They both came back laughing with a ten liter water jug full of rum. They had to return the jug, which was the reason for the empty liquor bottles. The two of them sat on the dock at the marina with a funnel filling up all the bottles as various people came traipsing down the dock to check out the action. They filled up the last bottle as the sun was setting, and it was time to try out the goods. The rum seller had given them a bottle of vanilla syrup and explained that the way to drink the rum was a little ice, a shot of rum, a splash of vanilla syrup and a squeeze of lime. It was similar to what the French call ‘ti punch. And, it was delicious. After several rums with a few other sailors we attracted on the docks, we returned our full bottles to our boat and to get some rest for the seven day passage to the Gambiers.

p.s. We are now in the Gambiers with zero internet or phone service other than the sat phone. What little phone/internet there was here has been down for weeks. So, its going to be a while until I have any photos I can share. But, I’ll work on getting up more text updates about our time here in the Gambiers.

-Katie

I know there are people who think life out here on a sailboat must be just like living in a Jimmy Buffet song. If you’ve read this blog long enough, you know that the challenges we encounter would contradict that notion. But, every now and then it does actually feel like we’re in Margaritaville with a Cheeseburger in Paradise with each of our Changes in Latitudes. That is how I felt one afternoon at sunset as we sat in the cockpit in a beautiful anchorage on Toau with cocktails in hand listening to Kenny Chesney sing about sailing in the islands. (If you didn’t know Kenny Chesney had sailing songs, check out his “Be As You Are” album.)

After we left Fakarava, we headed north to Toau just about 15 miles away. Our stay in Toau started out a bit raucous as we had a bumpy ride going in the pass in waves that could only be described as a washing machine. We hadn’t hit the slack tide and there was about 5 kts of current headed out of the pass against the wind. We pushed the throttle hard and were only making 2 kts over the ground until we were safely inside the lagoon.

We headed up north into the lagoon to a pretty anchorage just next to a large shallow flat. We were excited to meet up with our friends Marcus and Diana on Allora who we had met two years ago in Mexico. They had already been in French Polynesia for a year and loved this spot. Marcus is an avid fly fisherman, and the flat was full of bonefish which are a prized catch on the fly. Mike was eager to learn how to try and catch these elusive fighting fish.

Mike and Marcus headed to the flat one morning while Diana and I did some snorkeling around some of the beautiful reefs nearby. Mike didn’t catch any of the bonefish, but he did get to see Marcus get one. Not only do you have to stalk these fish in the clear, shallow water, but you have to keep the sharks away. I swear the sharks have some sort of sixth sense to know that there is a fish on the hook in distress. (I’m sure a marine biologist could explain it to me.) Anyway, Mike said it was a very cool experience.

We spent the next week at three different anchorages inside the lagoon exploring various reefs and motus. We even had several bonfires on the beach and we’re greeted by baby piglets that belonged to one of the locals living here. They were adorable. And, apparently the pigs like to eat coconut. I mean, who doesn’t?

We met several new boats in Toau, and a few of the guys were keen to go spearfishing. Mike hadn’t done any spearfishing since we arrived in French Polynesia for two reasons: (1) It is hard to know which fish are Ciguatera free and safe to eat; and (2) Sharks! We got the word from these other boats that the locals said the blue parrot fish were safe to eat in the lagoon. So, Mike was game to try and get us some fresh fish.

Mike got a couple of parrot fish for us without any incident, and they were delicious. But, on the last outing to try and spear a fish with the other guys, the shark situation got a bit too intense for Mike. And, Mike is not easily spooked. The first incident happened with Chris from another boat. He speared a fish and was holding it to his chest to swim it back to the dinghy. The sharks started circling him and biting his gun getting way too close and aggressive. Eventually Chris just let the fish go so the sharks could fight over it. Mike said he was genuinely afraid for Chris and glad he let the fish go. The docile looking sharks just turned rabid on an instant.

Next, Mike speared a parrot fish in a shallow reef area and held it out of the water as he swam to the dinghy. He had no problem and saw no sharks. But, when he headed back into the reef, there were sharks everywhere. Apparently Chris had shot a fish but it got away. The sharks swarmed to get the injured fish. Then, the sharks came at Mike biting at his gun. He even butted a shark in the head, but it was undeterred. Mike ended up dropping the gun and backing up against some coral as the sharks still went after the gun on the sand. The frenzy soon died out and Mike picked up the gun again and headed back to the dinghy where I was waiting. He said he was done spearfishing for a while. I don’t blame him. Yikes.

We hung out in Toau a bit longer than we originally anticipated while a weather system moved in. There were a couple of squally days and some stronger winds, but nothing too terrible. Once there was a break in the weather, we decided to head over to Anse Amyot with Allora. Anse Amyot is on Toau, but it is outside the lagoon. It is what is called a false pass, because although it looks like you could enter the lagoon from the ocean, the reef would block your entrance. There is a protected anchorage there, and we heard the diving was superb.

We spent two days diving at Amse Amyot which was some of the most unique diving we have done. Outside of the anchorage on either side of the entrance is reef that drops off dramatically almost like a vertical wall. Once you are down about 40 feet, you can look over the edge into the deep blue which goes down several thousand feet. It was a surreal experience to feel like you could just fall into the deep abyss. Of course, we didn’t fall as we were diving and could easily control our depth. We ventured down the side of the wall to a safe depth to check out all of the coral and fish that the wall held.

The second day diving was the best. We had waypoints from another boat to a dive spot about a mile south of the anchorage along the wall where there were caves to explore. They weren’t caves exactly but better described as grottos. They were carve outs with overhangs where hundreds of fish gathered underneath. It was here that we saw the largest moray eel we’ve ever seen. We also saw several species of fish that we’ve never seen before. And, the colors were amazing against the bright blue background of the deep ocean in the distance.

But, I think the highlight for Mike was seeing a 3 ft long Whitemargin Unicornfish. It is a weird looking fish and hard to describe. He was silvery blue with a pointed spear off his nose and a fan shaped tail with long streamers. If you have a chance, look it up. He was just sitting stationary about 75 feet down along the wall while smaller fish were performing a teeth cleaning service for him. Another weird thing we’ve learned that happens with certain fish is teeth cleaning stations.

We wanted to stay in Anse Amyot longer, but we had committed to being in Tahiti by a certain date. So, unfortunately more diving and exploration will have to wait for next time as we make our way to the Society Islands. We’re already plotting out how we can come back to the Tuamotus, because we feel like we’ve only scratched the surface of these really unique atolls.

~katie

After four amazing days diving the south pass of Fakarava, the wind picked up and gave us our first opportunity to try out our new kiteboarding equipment. We had been trying to coordinate with a French guy on a sailboat who offered lessons, as we were true beginners. But, it just didn’t seem to work out to meet up with him. As luck would have it, there was another boat in the anchorage with a couple of expert kiteboarders who were willing to give us a bit of a tutorial to get us started. They were extremely generous with their time and knowledge spending a couple of days with us to at least get the beginnings of trying to learn this sport.

There is a pretty big learning curve in kiteboarding, so you have to struggle through those initial stages to get up and running. First, you have to learn to control this huge kite, getting it up in the air and steering it while it pulls you around. Learning to fly the kite you start by body dragging where the kite pulls you around in the water without a board. Once you have that down, you can finally try getting up on a board.

I’m still working on controlling the kite. My first few hours of trying to get the kite up, keep it up and steer it in the water resulted in my swallowing and inhaling more salt water than is good for you. When the kite starts dragging you without you having full control over it, you get sucked under the water with the salt water getting shoved up your nose and involuntarily cleaning out your sinuses! Of course Mike caught on to the kite much faster than me. He was up on the board in two days, but I still have a long way to go…

After two days, the wind shut down on us and we decided to head to the north end of Fakarava and the village of Rotoava. This is the biggest town we have been to in the Tuamotus, which means the one road is actually paved. There is more activity here though. They have an airport and a few small hotels. There are some dive shops and tour boats to entertain the tourists.

One of our objectives in Rotoava was to find some pearls. We have seen the pearl farms throughout the Tuamotus, but we had heard that Rotoava was a place you could actually purchase the pearls without the huge markup you would find in Tahiti. So, we set out on bicycles one morning to head down to a pearl farm that had a showroom with pearls for sale.

We biked several miles south of town until we came to a small sign on the road for the pearl farm. It took us a few minutes to find the “showroom” which was really just the living room of the owner of the pearl farm that had a couple of tables set up with jewelry and loose pearls to view. These pearls are not your grandmother’s pearls. They are black pearls, which is really a misnomer. The pearls aren’t black but various shades of grey. They are beautiful.

The owner of the pearl farm took the time to explain the pearl making process and how pearls are rated. The pearls have classifications, a bit like diamonds, based on the size, color, any imperfections and the amount of sheen. We were really interested in how the pearls are cultivated. The owner explained how the Chinese had developed the technique of grafting to get the round pearls. They insert a “nucleus” into the oyster that is part of a shell from a freshwater mussel from Mississippi of all places. The inserted shell is round and the oyster forms the pearl around the nucleus. He showed us a pearl that had been cut in half so that you could see the inside of it. Apparently it takes 18 months for the pearl to be created. When they remove the pearl, they can insert another nucleus the size of the pearl that was removed to create an even bigger pearl, and they can do this with an oyster up to four times.

We perused the jewelry that he had to offer and bought a few pieces as well as some loose pearls that we can take to a jeweler back in the States to make some gifts for people. They really are unique, and I was quite happy with our purchases for a pretty reasonable price.

We spent a few more days hanging out in Rotoava and snorkeling the north pass and some nearby reefs. We were waiting for the supply ship to come in, so that the stores would have fresh food. We knew we would need to provision up for a couple of weeks before we made our way to Tahiti, and we were just about out of all fresh fruits, vegetables and meat.

Everybody in town knows when the supply ship is coming into town, and the dock is full of people waiting for the goods they ordered to be offloaded from the ship. Likewise, everyone is in the stores waiting for the new goods to be put out. We were in one of the magazins waiting for the produce to arrive and were not the only people standing around the store. As the store workers started setting out the apples, oranges, lettuce, broccoli, eggplant, etc., there was a bit of a feeding frenzy as the store patrons surrounded the bins and filled up their baskets. We were pretty excited to have some fresh food.

We had spent about two weeks in Fakarava, and it was time to move on. So, we made the decision to head up to the next atoll, Toau. More on that next time…

~Katie

My feelings and perception of sharks has certainly changed over the last month as we have daily encountered the big fish in the water through our travels in the Tuamotus. But, diving with literally hundreds of sharks in the south pass of Fakarava has had the biggest impact. (They estimate 700 sharks live in the pass!)

Our friends on Kini Popo had arrived a few days before us, as we were still playing around in Tahanea. When we arrived, they all raved about diving with the sharks in the pass and excitedly told us about their night dive when the sharks are feeding and often bump into you during the frenzy underwater. Mike & I weren’t too sure about the night diving, but we were eager to see them during daylight hours.

Sharks get a bad rap. They’ve been portrayed as monsters on tv and in the movies. That isn’t to say that there haven’t been horrible encounters between humans and sharks. They are wild animals after all and can be dangerous. But, that doesn’t mean that we have to be fearful of them, just cautious. I’ve decided that the sharks are a bit like stray dogs – they are curious and may approach you, certain ones are dangerous, you should keep you eye on them, and you definitely should not provoke them. Somehow picturing the sharks as stray dogs has put it in perspective for me. Stray dogs have mauled people to death, but that is pretty rare and the exception rather than the rule. It is the same with sharks. When you think of the sharks as big dogs, they seem a lot less scary.

I was a little nervous before our first dive in the pass. We timed it to hit the very end of the flood, so there was just a little current taking us back inside the pass. We attached to a buoy just outside the pass to finish putting on our scuba gear and descend about 60 feet down. We had snorkelers up top to follow above us towing the dinghies. Thankfully for my nerves, the sharks were not immediately below us when we initially descended. Once we got to the bottom and looked around, all the nervousness disappeared and was replaced by the awe of my surroundings.

The visibility was easily 100 feet, and as far as you could see was a beautiful coral covered ocean floor full of sea life. I was glad we were almost at the slack tide so that we could stop periodically to look in and under the coral at the various reef fish. I have a fish identification book of reef fish of the South Pacific, but there were so many to remember that it didn’t do me much good to try and look them up when we returned to the boat. There was every color and shape of fish. But, the thing that amazed me the most was how docile they were. The fish didn’t scurry and hide as you approached, they would swim right up to you, sometimes inches from your mask. It was as though they were studying you as much as you were studying them.

As we swam further inside the pass, we started seeing the sharks. First, there were just a couple of grey reef sharks, but as we progressed we approached the “wall of sharks.” There were hundreds of sharks in the trench in the middle of the pass. They were all very docile, facing the incoming current and looked as though they were suspended in mid-air. A few swam toward us, mainly because we happened to be in their path. But, as they got closer, they changed paths and swam away. It is a little strange to play chicken with a shark coming toward you, but they always blinked first. When you see these sharks just hanging out, not attacking fish or looking menacing in anyway, it is easy to relax around them. Apparently at night is when their behavior changes and they are on the hunt. During the day, they are just resting. In fact, there were a few white tip reef sharks that were resting directly on the sand, and a couple were laying inside a cave. It is contrary to what I understood that sharks had to always keep moving. Clearly these sharks had other ideas.

The sharks weren’t the only stars of the dive, of course. Probably my favorite part of the dive was when I was able to swim right next to a large spotted eagle ray for several minutes, as he just glided a couple feet away from me. A thrilling experience. And, we got to see the famous Napoleon fish, which are these 2-3 foot long green fish that are shaped a bit like a giant parrot fish.

At the end of the dive, you come across a half mile long reef that is only about 15 feet deep. The current usually picks up over the shallow area, so you just fly above it. It also drops you off right outside the anchorage by the boats. Mike and I both said this was easily the best dive we have ever done. So, of course we had to do it again…and again. In all, we dove the pass four times over the next few days. The conditions were perfect, and we couldn’t pass it up. Hopefully, we’ll get a chance to do some more dives in the Tuamotus that are just as incredible.

We shot a bunch of GoPro video, which I will work on editing. But, as much as we like the GoPro, it is no substitute for professional video. Another boat gave us a copy of a documentary called “The Grouper Mystery.” It is a program about the Fakarava South Pass, and the video footage is incredible. If you can find it, I highly recommend watching it.

In the video, a group of French scientists are studying a phenomenon that happens once a year only in the Fakarava South Pass where thousands of grouper congregate to spawn. It happens around the full moon in July every year, so we are going to miss it by about a month. But, we did see lots of grouper in the pass that look just like the ones in the video. The incredible thing in the video is that one of the scientists does a 24 hour dive in the pass to view the sea life for an entire day. It was certainly a big feat, and I don’t believe it had been done before. They get some amazing photos and videos of the sharks at night feeding on the grouper. We also heard that the May issue of National Geographic also features the pass, so check it out.

If diving is one of your passions, and you make it to French Polynesia, don’t miss diving the Fakarava South Pass. It is definitely worth it! Or, if you don’t dive, just watch the movie…

We’re still in Fakarava now, and we’re trying to learn to Kitesurf! More about those adventures next time.

~katie

The next atoll in the Tuamotos that we ventured off to was Tahanea. It is supposedly a park reserve. There is a rare type of sandpiper bird that is lives here, so the atoll got park status. There are just a few people living on Tahanea, maybe 10-15. They are mostly there for the Copra trade (dried and pressed coconuts). It’s hard to imagine living somewhere so remote with so few people!

Our friends on Ivadel had already moved on to Fakarava, and Kini Popo was anxious to go too. We were not yet ready to leave this beautiful spot, so we said farewell for now and headed across the lagoon alone. We arrived at probably the most beautiful anchorage we have ever seen, and that is saying a lot. The water was crystal clear blue. The palm tree studded motus had white sand beaches, and that day was calm and sunny weather. After dropping the anchor, we sat to take in the beautiful scenery and appreciate how few people get to see these amazing out of the way spots.

The next day we decided to go exploring on the islands. We had seen all of the palm trees and decided we needed to go get some coconuts. Mike brought his machete, and we brought several containers to pour coconut water into. There weren’t too many green coconuts just lying around, so Mike did his best impression of a monkey and climbed the palm trees. He knocked coconut after coconut down to the ground. Soon we had gathered quite a pile.

Mike went to work with the machete cutting away the husk at the top to get a hole opened to get at the coconut water. There is nothing quite as refreshing as coconut water straight out of a coconut! In all, we loaded up over 2 liters of coconut water and hauled back the coconuts to scoop out the meat inside. Quite a delicious snack!

There were three other boats anchored near us, and they invited us to join them on the beach at sunset for a bonfire. The days are warm here, but the sun goes down early. The nights are cool and pleasant (it is almost winter in the Southern Hemisphere), and a bonfire on the beach is the perfect way to spend an evening.

We spent the next day snorkeling some of the reefs with some of the new boats we met. The most amazing thing on the reefs were the grouper! Usually when we have seen grouper in the past, they take off into a hole or under a rock the minute you see them. Of course, it certainly doesn’t help if you are holding a speargun. But, clearly these grouper had no fear of humans. They just hung out and even swam up to you. I’ve never been 12 inches from a grouper in a staring contest until now. It was pretty funny.

That night, Mike really wanted to go hunt for lobsters on the outer reef. I reluctantly agreed to go. It didn’t really sound like that much fun to me. At the last minute, one of our new friends Robert decided to join us. So, the three of us went trekking out over the coral in the moonlight with our dive lights. It really was beautiful on the reef. We were in knee to thigh deep water with coral all around. We did our best to walk between the coral heads so as not to damage it. The waves were crashing onto the reef as the swell rolled in from the deep ocean just a few yards away, but it was very peaceful.

The two real hunters got to work searching every nook and cranny around the reef for any sight of lobster. They even put on masks to get a better look under water. But, despite a pretty exhaustive search, there were no lobsters to be found. We were later told that you have to do it when there is no moon, but who knows… We did find lots of sea urchins, but I wasn’t brave enough to take any. I’ve only eaten it at sushi restaurants, but Robert said it is good on pasta. Maybe I’ll try to prepare it next time we come across the urchins.

After a few days of bliss in this beautiful place, we decided it was time to go meet up with our friends in Fakarava. We were pretty low on fresh foods, and had resorted to eating a lot of canned food (not my favorite, but I try to make something decent out of it.) So, we departed Tahanea just before sunset hoping to catch the 6 am slack tide at the South pass of Fakarava.

Even though we had little daylight, Mike let out a fishing line. Just outside the pass of Tahanea we caught a nice 15 lb yellowfin tuna (no more monster tuna for us!). It was a great end to our time in Tahanea, but we were looking forward to Fakarava, where we had heard our friends had already dove the south pass, famous for its hundreds of sharks! Eek!

-Katie

We left Raroia with our friends Dan, Dan #2 and Michelle on Kini Popo and our French friends Caroline and Phillipe on Ivadel en route to Makemo, an easy overnight sail to a new atoll. We were happy that Phillipe and Caroline decided to follow us, as Caroline has been helping me with my French, and in exchange I have been helping her with her English (which is much better than my French!). In addition to being able to practice what little vocabulary and grammar I know so far, Caroline has taught me useful phrases like, “Il ya un trou dans mon verre,” which translates to “there is a hole in my glass.” That is exactly how most of our French/English lessons go as Caroline and I hang out on the back deck of Ivadel with a bottle of wine while the boys hunt for coconut crabs (they still haven’t caught any.)

We initially anchored right off the village at Makemo, which was much more populated than the village at Raroia. They had paved roads, several magazins, a post office, a restaurant, a bakery, a church and a pretty good size school. The people were incredibly friendly and interested in all the boats anchored off their little town. We were able to pick up some provisions to restock our supplies, although fresh fruits and veggies were scarce. But, it was nice to get some fresh baguettes for a couple of days and eat some delicious poisson cru at the little restaurant.

While we were anchored at the village, we heard from another boat that a couple of the pearl farm guys were looking for a boat with scuba tanks to help them out. Mike and Phillipe offered to help. The next morning, the boys grabbed their scuba gear and headed off in a local skiff. The guys needed divers to descend to about 75 feet to tie some line around some coral heads at the bottom on the lagoon that they would use for their pearl farm operation. Mike and Phillipe descended with the lines and a camera, so that they could video it for the pearl farm guys. That way he would know that they secured the lines the way he wanted it. They returned later that day with big thank yous from the pearl farm guys. Mike & Phillipe weren’t asking for any compensation, but we wondered if they might give us some pearls for helping them out. We didn’t get any pearls, but they did give us five gallons of diesel and a bottle of honey, which is more useful than pearls anyway.

After a couple of days at the village, we decided to head to an anchorage about halfway down the lagoon between the east and west pass. It was about a four hour trip, and we had to go relatively slow to avoid any bommies. Bommies are large coral heads that grow up from the bottom of the lagoon and can be at or just under the surface. Some are large and look like small reefs, but others are small and difficult to see from a distance. One bommie we passed was just under the surface about 10 yards away, and we were in 130 feet of water. We had heard that a catamaran earlier in the season had hit a bommie on this route and punctured one of its pontoons! We did not want to take any chances.

It is easier to see the bommies if the sun is overhead or slightly behind you. If the sun is in front of you, the glare off the water will make it difficult, if not impossible to see them. And, these lagoons are not always fully charted, so our electronic charts are only slightly useful. In order to get a better view of the bommies from a distance, the best thing to do is to have someone go up the mast to the spreaders (about halfway up the mast, depending on the boat) as a look out. From that height, you get a much better view.

Our friends on Ivadel had gone a little bit a head of us, but we decided on a plan with Kini Popo. We would have one boat go in the lead with someone in the spreaders, and the other boat would follow closely behind in their tracks. The lead boat would radio back about any obstructions they observed. Because four hours is a long time for someone to sit up on the spreaders, we would take turns switching places.

Mike and I decided that I should be the one to go up the mast while he stayed at the helm. When it was my turn to go up, I slipped into the harness and attached the main halyard. We have mast steps, so I was able to climb up the mast to the spreaders as Mike tightened the halyard as my safety line. When I reached the spreaders, I was able to stand on the spreaders as I sat back into the harness. It was necessary to hang onto the mast so that I did not swing around as the boat moved forward. There was little wind or swell, so it wasn’t too bumpy a ride up the mast.

The view from the spreaders was great. I was able to call down to Mike and radio back to Dan on my handheld VHF about the reefs and bommies I saw in the distance and when we needed to adjust course. Aside from my job as lookout, I was able to enjoy the view from that height of the atoll and lagoon. It also happened to be my birthday, and I laughed a bit that this was quite an unusual way to spend a birthday!

Ivadel was several miles ahead of us, but Phillipe occasionally radioed back to tell us, “Small potatoes here, no good, no good.” It took me a second to realize he was talking about the bommies. We were able to mark his position on the chart to avoid. Later I said to him, “Je voudrais savoir por quois les pomme de terre.” He just laughed and explained that the French refer to the bommies as potatoes or “potat,” because they look like potatoes just under the surface of the water. I had to give him that, they do. So, we are now referring to the bommies as potatoes.

That night Ivadel invited us all over for a birthday celebration on their boat. Caroline had baked me a delicious chocolate cake, and we shared several bottles of wine. Caroline and Phillipe presented me with a large box as a birthday gift, which I was not expecting. But, I had to unwrap several smaller boxes to get to the actual gift, which was a beautiful black pearl! Dan also had a gift, but it was really a hilarious gift for everyone, as he brought out seven temporary Tattoo tattoos. They were stick on tattoos of the character Tattoo from the TV show Fantasy Island. We all laughed hysterically as one after another we applied the silly tattoo to various parts of our body. Dan #2 even applied it to his bald head! Thankfully, they came off in a couple of days.

We enjoyed a couple of days at this beautiful anchorage playing on the beach before heading toward the East pass. The anchorage by the East pass was a bit tricky, as we had to navigate around several reefs and try not to get our anchor or anchor chain caught on any coral. We had been managing the technique of floating our anchor chain with buoys we got from the pearl farm, but it is still easy to get caught up on the coral, and has required us to dive on our anchor when we set it and before we pull it up if there is a lot of coral around.

The main reason we wanted to stop at this anchorage was to dive the pass, which we had heard was beautiful. We did a test run snorkeling so that we could see where looked like a good place to dive, and found that the North side of the pass had a beautiful coral reef with a sloping wall down to about 60-70 feet. That was perfect.

The next day we got all our scuba gear ready to go in the morning. We were waiting for slack tide just before the flood. But, there had been a strong south swell which sent lots of water over the reef on the south side of the atoll. That meant that a lot of water was coming into the lagoon throughout the day, and even more water was being pushed out through the pass during the ebb. So, even though the low tide was predicted at a certain time, the ebb was lasting much longer. We waited and waited until we could see that the current was slowing down and finally jumped in our dinghies several hours later.

It was almost slack tide when we finally jumped in the water and got ready to descend. We tied Dan’s dinghy to ours, and Mike clipped our dinghy to his BCD with a 100’ floating line that he uses to secure his speargun. I’m happy that the line is getting some other use, because we are not spearfishing here. We’re told that the locals that spearfish have about 10 seconds to get the fish out of the water or into a box before the sharks will be on it. No, thank you!

We descended inside the pass down the sloping coral reef wall and headed out toward the pass. We knew that the tide would start to flood soon, and we would turn around and head back inside the pass when the tide turned. Because it was basically slack tide, there was no current when we initially descended, and we could easily swim and and enjoy the beautiful coral and reef fish. It was like diving in an aquarium. My favorite were these little purple fish that I kept seeing swim around the coral. There were a few reef sharks which were mostly cruising far above us in the shallow areas of the coral reef, but nothing like the sharks we saw in Raroia.

Just as we were getting to the outer edge of the pass, we could feel the current start to flood, and we all turned around and headed back to where we started. The timing was great. On the way back, Mike and I hung back behind the other three and looked under a few rocks, which paid off. First, we saw a lion fish, which is one of the most poisonous fish in the ocean. We obviously did not touch it and were wearing gloves. Next, we found two moray eels. We’ve seen lots of moray eels in the past, but this is the first time we’ve seen two in one hole. We looked down to see two heads sticking out with their menacing looking mouths open at us. Pretty interesting. In all, it was a wonderful dive, and I was pretty proud of the five of us for figuring out how to dive a pass ourselves. It made it all the more special.

Next, we were off to Tahanea…

~katie

p.s. Hoping to be able to post video of our dive when we get to Tahiti.