End Off with Hotel Intercontinental

I awoke after the best sleep I've had for a while now. No lapping waves on the dinghy, no paroxysmal squalls and getting up to close the hatch before our cabin was soaked, no anchor alarms to check on, or loosely tied kayaks crashing on the deck. For the first time in several days, my back wasn't sore from the mattress.

It was pouring outside and didn't look like it was going to let up. We put on our swim suits to check out some of the pools. The Intercontinental had a lagoonarium which wasn't bad. Schools of fish swam around with some that were quite sizable. Shannon liked one that looked like a colorful zebra, and another torpedo-like swimmer that she thought looked like a cartoon fish.

Unfortunately, I cut my big toe on a rock getting into the lagoonarium which later was impossible to keep dry. Hopefully it won't get infected.

We packed up our room and checked out. The clothes we washed yesterday were still a little damp in this weather, but should be okay. We contemplated paying 10000 CFP to check out at night as our flight didn't depart until 2am. Originally, we planned to go to Moorea, but because the weather was so crappy, we didn't think there would be much point getting soaked there instead of on Tahiti.

We had two overpriced clubhouse sandwiches only to find that the shuttle between the hotel and downtown Papeete was full. So we walked, going by a Champion supermarket only 15 minutes away where we could have purchased some food to go. By the time we walked to the airport, it started pouring again, so we caught a cab the rest of the way.

The Lonely Planet wasn't far off the mark saying that Papeete could be skipped completely. We picked up a tourist map from the tourist center where 8 employees without clients to serve stared at us as we walked in. We wander a little bit at the market and up and down a few streets killing time before eating at McDonalds and taking a cab back to the Intercontinental. Cab fares pretty much double after 8pm, so we made sure to be back well before then.

Despite the exorbitant prices of everything in French Polynesia and Papeete, standards of living outside of the resorts and over water bungalows look very poor. Residential streets are unevenly paved, many houses looked shanty with corrugated tin roofs and wispy dirty curtains in the windows. Cars run well enough but are older and European sized. Maybe it's just because the rain and humidity makes everything look dirty and a little worn down, but I imagine a similar island country but with a British rather than a French colonial history, like The Bahamas for example, to be more affluent.

At the hotel, we sat on the balcony overlooking the swimming pools and Moorea in the distance until it was dark. Then we bought an hour of Internet at the business center for $10, did some quick emailing and spent a couple hours browsing and watching some of the pictures and videos we've taken.

For French Polynesia, we brought three cameras: the Canon 3i as the workhorse equipped with polarizing filter, my waterproof Lumix who unfortunately got moisture in when we were in Mexico so occasionally water condensed in the lens, and the GoPro with the wide angle lens. I back up all photos to the two portable hard drives we brought whenever we have access to a computer with two USB ports. While waiting for our flights, we swapped all of our photos of the cruise so we ended up with around 22 gigs of media.

The last half hour before catching our transfer to the airport was spent drifting in and out of sleep on a hammock beside the lagoonarium.

One more excitement for the day. When checking in to our flight at the airport, the agent told us we couldn't go to New Zealand without a flight out of the country! The way we booked our flights, New Zealand was the last leg of the expensive flights and our plan was to fly discount carriers the rest of the way booked later. Even though we had a flight from Hong Kong to Vancouver in February, it didn't matter.

Shannon was like "Wha? No way! We had been waiting all day and a couple hours at the airport and now we couldn't even get on our flight? What the hell?" Had we know, we could have had all friggen day to take care of this.

We were rushed over to a "ticketing office" just beside the desks where a couple of other people looked like they were in the same situation. There was a computer kiosk in the cramped office that Shannon impressively hacked into and we quickly booked an el cheapo flight from Christchurch to Sydney. It even had a printer.

Armed with this itinerary, which I might add seemed very easy to forge, we got seats together beside the window.

Goodbye paradise! And on to more adventure!

The End of An Adventure

It rained hard this morning in Hamenee Bay. The sky was vey gray and it didn't look like one of those brief showers. I got up early to catch up on yesterday's writing and the rest of the crew gradually trickled out of their rooms.

Because of the weather, we decided not to do the Taha'a coral gardens by Tautau. It would have been drenching getting there and snorkeling without the sun probably wouldn't have been ideal.

Ben and I took the dinghy out for a joy ride doing fast turns and maneuvers. We visited the Americans on their 40' catamaran on the buoy next to ours. Their boat was definitely newer and more luxurious with a real shower and high ceilings. All sail sheets and traveler could be accessed right at the wheel, but it also had the winches at the mast. They were staying at Hamenee another day, probably because of the weather, and then their charter was finished as well.

Our boat was due in at 1pm, so we didn't get rolling until 10am. I was at the helm in Shannon's purple rain jacket getting soaked. We thought about visiting Champon pearl farm but given the rain and that we'd have to take the dinghy out and Chantelle's ankle, it just wasn't worth it. We continued due south and arrived at TYC sooner than expected.

The crew cleaned up the boat while I was driving and we were instructed to moor outside the base until 1pm when the technician and diver could come out to check the boat. We made a quick lunch of course crackers, cheese, corned beef and Sidekicks.

On the whole, the yacht cruise was great. I had a fantastic time. Unfortunately, the last few days were probably only "good" rather than excellent like the first part of the trip. James and Richard aside, I think after Chantelle twisted her ankle, the next day everyone was hung over for the return to Raiatea, and there, the water wasn't as sapphire blue and the weather took a turn for more rain. Wet towels accumulated on deck and hanging clothes wouldn't dry. So by today, people were ready to be off the boat.

Check out was fairly unremarkable. Hine was there again to greet us. I gave them pretty much "very good" across all categories of the evaluation. Sure the speedometer didn't work at the cockpit, we couldn't figure out the oven, the main sheet was just long enough, and overall an older boat, but it was well maintained and we had no problems sailing, motoring or anchoring. The only criticism was that they didn't have the refrigerator working on our arrival which delayed our departure. But their welcome was excellent. Hine drove us to and from Champion for provisioning on the first day, and on the last day drove us to the airport along with a stop at the pharmacy for Chantelle because her crutch was missing a peg.

We said our goodbyes. We shared Jennie and Mike's flight to Bora Bora, flying over the island gave us a great view from the port side seats. The island was beautiful from the air even though it was overcast and threatening rain.

Mike and Jennie disembarked for their over the water bungalow at the Intercontinental while we continued on to the Intercontinental in Papeete.

Our transfer met us exactly as scheduled at the airport and wisked us to our hotel.

The hotel was beautiful. So far, we've been spoiled at high end hotels on this trip! We were welcomed with juice and the porter, clad in Polynesian shorts and tattoos only, happily drove us and our luggage to our upgraded panoramic view room.

We discovered that the Tiare Restaurant was featuring their Marqueses buffet - traditional French Polynesian cuisine - and a dance show later in the evening. You know me and buffets. I couldn't resist. We took a nice non-water-rationed shower, and headed to the restaurant.

It was 7:30 and actually I was getting quite tired. Being used to getting up at sunrise while sailing, I wasn't sure if I was going to make it for the show at 8:30.

The buffet menu included delicious pumpkin soup in a coconut bowl, goat in coconut milk, and several varieties of raw fish including the famous poisson cru. For sashimi lovers, this was it.

We had a table with an unobstructed view the entire traditional Polynesian dance show that we watched with dessert to end the evening.

The catamaran was a huge success. Just flipping through our pictures and videos, we had a lot of fun and a great experience. Shannon says it's very similar to having an RV, except that you're on the water. Being in French Polynesia, I think being on water is definitely where you want to be. Price wise, I don't think we could have done any better either. Excluding flights, the total cost for the catamaran portion of the trip which included lodging on the boat, all meals including three where we ate out at some nice places, alcohol, all traveling and excursions that we did on our own, cost an average of $175 per person per day. That's six people sharing the charter. While going to eight people would have cut costs down a little, we found that would have made the boat quite crowded, finding a place to sit for meals would have been tough. Six was very comfortable, and it'd be impossible to imagine ten, which is the full capacity of the yacht.

It was a fantastic sailing experience, my first serious charter. My confidence is up since we didn't run aground nor encounter weather beyond my skill. Everything we did from navigating to water planning, provisioning, docking, anchoring and sail trimming was just like at home. All that training in Vancouver paid off, and I can add this trip to my sailing resume!

Hibiscus

We slept in late today. I didn't get up until 8:30, sleeping like a baby as it rained on and off all night.

Mike was at the helm motoring north to Hamanee Bay. It was raining enough to soak through the towel I had wrapped around me while helping navigate. There were definitely some tricky sections where a couple of markers were changed from the charts that we had and low visibility from the rain made distinguishing a red and green mark difficult. At one point I was sure glad to be up on deck as we headed straight for coral keeping a green mark far to our left instead of far to our right.

But we made it to Hamenee Bay less than two hours later and moored in front of The Hibiscus restaurant. Mike did pretty well motoring right to the mooring buoy and I snagged and tied it, all while a Moorings catamaran full of Americans watched on. They later told us that they were impressed with our skills. Ben later told me as I suspected from the engine sounds that Mike was doing "the all or none" throttling at the helm. But for his first time it was a great job.

We had shrimp ramen soup for lunch which ws great. I gotta say, for something so easy to make, instant noodles really hit the spot while sailing.

While cleaning up, I sent Mike with Jennie and Shannon to check out the Hibiscus restaurant and ask about the excursions that they had there. A lot of new things for Mike today. You could see Shannon was really nervous with Mike driving the dinghy.

With this sailing trip, Mike talked to me about taking lessons in London and maybe getting into sailing himself. If he can find the time, I think that would be pretty fun for him. On this trip, I think he's seen and done a lot. We've done plenty of sailing, and all of this morning Mike got to motor and navigate through the lagoon. He brought along an intro to sailing book that he was reading. He thought the toughest part was knowing what all the ropes do, which is true. I thought back to three years ago in Vancouver Yacht Club crew circle not knowing what anything did except the jib sheets.

Fortunately the rain let up in the afternoon and we went in for a vanilla tour. There are two commodities for which Tahiti is supposedly famous: black pearls and vanilla. The island of Taha'a is the main vanilla producer.

We went with the Americans to La Vallee de la Vanille. The proprietor Brian, a Danish ex-French legionnaire, drove one truck and his friend Richard took four of us in another car. Chantelle was in the front with her sprained ankle, and Ben, Shannon and I in the back. Chantelle chatted away with Richard and we learned that he used to live in France and was now retired in French Polynesia.

The welcome to the vanilla plantation was very nicely set up, and more than I expected. Brian gave us each a refreshing juice and had a plate of pineapple and bananas along with crushed coconut. He showed us the vanilla plant, how it was cultivated and harvested, how was dried and had to be massaged to release the vanilla flavor. Brian's farm was one of the few organic farms unlike those that we saw in greenhouses. Apparently, there are two types of vanilla. One that we commonly buy from several countries and can be found in our local grocery store. The Tahitian variety of vanilla was produced only in Tahiti and very difficult to find elsewhere. You may find some in Paris but would cost you something like 15 euros a bean. It was also extremely potent, with a quarter of a leaf flavoring two pots of rice or pasta.

We all bought a couple of packages to take home. It cost 2500 CFP for 10g.

Throughout this excursion, our driver Richard was the cutest man. I think he really liked Chantelle. He took a lot of photos of the tour group with his cellphone, and picked flowers for Chantelle and Shannon to put in their hair. Driving back to the restaurant, he stopped and picked a couple of hibiscus flowers for the girls. By the end of it, Chantelle and Shannon had three flowers each adorning their heads.

We went back to the catamaran and all of us had a swim in the bay before showering off for our dinner reservations at 6:30.

The Hibiscus Restaurant was run by Leo and Lucinda. It had some bungalows across the road, and I think is called a yacht club as well. It was older than the Bora Bora Yacht Club, the latter having been rebuilt since the cyclone several years ago.

There was no one in the restaurant but us but Leo served up an amazing dinner with salad, jackfish and creme brulee. There was no menu. It was about $60 per person including a beer.

It had started to pour again so we hung out in the restaurant trying to wait out the rain. We bought some pearls, Mike four, and Shannon and Chantelle three each for earrings and a pendant, at what I thought was a pretty good price, $30 each, considering how much the Italian couple paid at the Champon Pearl Farm. How do you tell if they're fake?

Then Richard suddenly made an appearance with his Polynesian guitar! He sang us several songs and made quite the hit. We found out Leo and Lucinda's daughter was Miss Tahiti 2004, and signed their guest book, which they had volumes and volumes of.

When the rain briefly let up, we were sent on our way back to Arearea.

I woke up this morning to rain, rain, more rain, and the scent of vanilla on our boat. It is actually pouring quite hard and didn't look like it was going to let up any time soon.

Raining our last day. I can't really complain actually. It sounded like we arrived at Le Taha'a just missing some bad weather and now only at the end of our sail is it really starting to rain hard. That's the risk of shoulder season though. Imagine what it would have been like if our entire ten days was like this!

I think we were very lucky in other respects too. Just listing off random things like the cardiologist at Bora Bora Yacht Club after our mountain hike, the free vanilla and pearl tours, great restaurants, nice sailing, James the river guardian and Richard at the Hibiscus. No mechanical problems, and by the book cruising. All in all, I think a fantastic first charter. 

Happy Halloween and the Botanical Gardens

This morning, I was once again impressed to find that our anchor held. The water was darker but clear enough to see fish swimming around at the bottom amidst low lying coral. Our anchor was ok and did not appear to be caught.

I kayaked to check out the private island to read the sign. It said "guard dog." A dog started barking.

There was supposedly good snorkeling around the area but I didn't find any, at least none that was good as Tautau's coral gardens or Bora Bora.

Here is Shannon working the anchor!

We went back to Uturoa which was a whole different town. Still not hustling and bustling, but as busy as a two street town could be.

Ben went to pay the doctor and hospital for seeing Chantelle and buy crutches, Chantelle kept watch over the boat knitting, and the rest of us checked out the floral market, the artisans, but most importantly, the other grocery store in town, Legault, and bought subs for lunch and a few more supplies.

With Ben at the helm, we set off on an uneventful motor to Faaroa Bay. We anchored near the mouth of the Aoppomau River in 10 meters waters. We've been trying not to use the rope on the anchor since the last time and all the trouble we had raising it afterwards.

We set off up the river on dinghy and kayak and had a great cruise up the river. We got a little wet as the weather was overcast all day, and it started raining. It was like a theme park ride almost, many different plants on the banks, various fruit trees, some docks and old kayaks and dinghies belonging to locals.

On the way back, we came across a local named James who kayaked up to Mike who was paddling ahead of us, and started chatting. Next thing you knew they became best friends!

He told us that he was the "Guardian of the River." He offered to take us up to his botanical gardens. So why not? There was a little side stream we went up until it got too shallow, then walked up the rest of the way leading right to the botanical gardens as promised. Most of us didn't have sandals, but surprisingly all the foliage and leaves didn't give the feet too many problems.

So James took us all around this garden, showed us tons of flowers, plants, fruits. We sampled the hottest chili pepper Shannon and I ever tasted and cocoa fruit. James pointed out coffee, star fruit, and papaya plants. Mike tried to climb a coconut tree.

After the tour, we returned to the river and made a stop at his dock. James went into the bush and returned with a stalk of bananas for us to eat. He then proceeded to cut up young green coconuts which were full of coconut milk. I don't mean a little bit of juice like the ones we hijacked from the Barcelo trees in Mexico, but it had like a liter of milk each. There was so much that two of us couldn't finish one coconut. He also prepare two coconuts full of milk for us to go.

The meat in the young coconuts are soft. James cut up a brown fuzzy coconut that had already fallen to the ground. This was the one that had the crispy white coconut for eating.

It appeared that James really didn't expect anything in return. There was no waiting for us to tip him, no selling stuff at the end of his tour. That was it. Back at our boat, we didn't find that it was burglarized. It seemed like Guy said that the island people, it was still small enough to have genuine friendliness. Maybe James was bored and wanted to show us around. Whatever the reason, we were extremely grateful.

We invited him to our boat and fried up some of his bananas and gave him a bottle of rum.

That was such a good river tour and so much better than expected with James randomly showing us around. I wondered how many other tourists got the botanical gardens tour.

After a swim and a rain shower, we made some delicious fish steaks that we got from Uturoa. Eating Halloween candy and cookies, we played a game of Pocket Cranium before hitting the sack.

Until Next Time Bora Bora

I was just thinking about the really interesting people that you meet while traveling. Last night was no exception. What made yesterday more interesting was that the people I met were also sailors or interested in sailing in one way or another. Now I'm a part of that community (international community?) of sailing enthusiasts, swapping stories, this charter experience being my first one.

We were supposed to pay our tab this morning but to our dismay, the Yacht Club didn't open until noon, as it was Sunday. Because we had to cross over to Raiatea, we left and later send an email to give them our billing information.

We had full sails out on close reach half of the way and motoring into the wind the other half. It was actually quite a great sailing day and the only thing that could have made it better was if the winds could have carried us all the way there. We were doing a constant 6-6.5 knots with sails.

Everyone was pretty wiped out from the night before except me, so I helmed most of the passage. This time around now that I had experience, I trusted the autohelm which made things much easier.

Ben was partially functional and felt better after he heaved over the side. All of us decided not to mess around and take the ondansetron Mike brought which really helped. I never really had a problem with sea sickness, but then again, I guess I had never sailed unprotected waters. Today's crossing was no as bad as going to Bora Bora, but you could definitely see the swells, like huge gigantic waves in an enormous bathtub.

Everyone else pretty much slept the entire way and didn't emerge from the cabins until Ben and I had docked out boat in Uturoa about five hours later.

It was a ghost town. The only activity was singing in the church being a Sunday. The Shell station where we were hoping to fill up our outboard tank was closed at 11:30am, about two or three hours ago.

Us guys walked about the two main streets of Uturoa and discovered the hospital immediately south of the Shell station on the roundabout. The emergency department was staffed by one doctor and the radiologist was just on his way home, but insisted that we bring Chantelle in for an x-ray.

So it worked out pretty well that we got an x-ray right away. Chantelle won the ankle lottery an didn't have a fracture!

On the boat we had prepared Shannon's famous shrimp linguine for dinner. Flies tried to share in our meals, and each time a motor boat would speed by our yacht would pitch against the dock. We couldn't wait to get off the dock. Some old guys, probably drinking buddies, were sitting along the dock the entire time, just watching the day go by. They were here since we docked to us leaving and hadn't moved from under their tree. I guess this is island lifestyle.

As we were sailing south towards Ile Tauro to anchor for the night, we passed by a Princess cruise ship docked at Uturoa. It wouldn't have been a great stop since nothing was open on the Sunday in town. We waved at the passengers looking out at us on board.

I imagined that they totally wanted to be on a catamaran like ours sailing themselves, being their own cruise captain rather than being stuck on the cruise ship. When Ben and Chantelle were checking in at the St. Regis, the receptionist told them that she had always wanted to sail around the Society Islands. Which reminds me of how lucky I am, and how lucky all of us are.

There were three areas of around 5 meter depth soundings just east of the pearl farm on Tauro. We chose one of them and anchored for the night. 

Mount Pahia and Halloween Party at the Yacht Club

Saturday started off good. We had not drifted at all actually and were anchored at exactly the same place when we went to bed. The gusts disappeared actually, soon after midnight.

Our plan was to climb Bora Bora mountain. The peak that you can ascend is called Mount Pahia. People recommend climbing early in the morning because it can gt quite hot. There's also a sign at the entrance to the trail that recommends having a guide with you.

Well, we had a slow start to the day. Had some breakfast, then half an hour of free time in the water. The water is just so beautiful in this area. We did some snaps of us diving off the boat, doing cannon balls and climbing up the anchor bridle.

We got a mooring buoy near Total, and took the dinghy into town. It was already hot! By the time we used the bathrooms and were all set to hike, it was already 12:30.

The climb up was definitely not the easiest hike. Good footwear was essential. I wore my closed toe Sketcher sandals with socks and it continued to serve me well. Shannon's new Merrell sandals had no grip whatsoever and she was having a lot of trouble. Chantelle traded her for her shoes because she was more nimble which helped a lot. Mike had reef shoes on which weren't so great either.

Good thing Shannon prepped for doing some rope hiking because there were 6-7 parts to the trail that required climbing a rope. Scaling up paths holding on to roots were not uncommon and sweating like pigs was a given. The path was not too difficult to follow and we had no problems with getting lost.

The view up top was spectacular. We didn't have the clearest of days but regardless, the colors were beautiful and we could see some of the other islands in the distance. 

Ben and Chantelle continued on to the very peak another twenty minutes away, but the rest of us were tired and started heading down. Slowly. The decent was just as difficult with several slips and slides on the butt. Jennie and Shannon were definitely not having a lot of fun and questioning whether it was worth the trek for the view.

We were really looking forward to sitting down at the cyber cafe for a smoothy once we reached the bottom, but we heard a scream behind us. No one answered our calls. Shortly after, we see Chantelle piggybacked on Ben coming out of the trail. Right at the bottom in a grassy area, Chantelle twisted her ankle with an audible snap! It was really tender and Ben thought it was broken.

A local came out right away with some cream for Chantelle to rub over the ankle. We found out that there were no doctors today because it was Saturday and that we'd have to wait until Monday for an x-ray.

Shannon and I went off the the pharmacy to buy an ankle splint while the others got Chantelle to the dock.

We got back to the catamaran and after a quick swim to get all the grossness and sweaty grime off, we motored around the corner to Bora Bora Yacht Club as we were completely out of water and we saw a sign at the Chin Lee grocery store about the Halloween party there.

It was like the best decision ever especially after the Bora Bora climb. We docked and were welcomed by the owner of the club who set us up with water. He convinced us to abort our shrimp linguine supper and eat at the club for $12 a plate, mooring included. Sure, why not? While we were filling the boat we took advantage of the free showers.

We moored just off the yacht club and came back in for the party. It didn't matter that much that we didn't have a costume. We planned on buying some after our hike, but it didn't work out. Dinner was not bad, being a homemade special Turkish meal.

The owner of the Yacht Club turned out to be a cardiologist. Him and Mike instantly hit it off and talked all night in French about making 100,000 euros a month being the only cardiologist and internist in Bora Bora. He moved here from France five years ago and bought the Yacht Club five months ago. He was quite a bit drunk and his wife very young looking. He had a 10 month old who was really interested in the Halloween decorations and lights. Mike said to me that we picked a great place to stay for the night. I couldn't agree more.

The Club started off slowly but eventually picked up and was quite happening. There was a mummy which was quite a hit and they made grave sites just outside.

Guy the Brazilian sailor who gave us bananas earlier showed up later which was awesome. He brought along Hanne, a Belgium girl who was "couch surfing" and ended up being crew for a Canadian skipper who wanted to sail the Pacific. Guy's brother and mother left two days ago leaving him behind to sail on his own. His next destination was the Cook Islands tomorrow. He had just finished his PhD in management at McGill and had a job to go back to in January.

It was really neat to meet someone like that after learning about sailing and reading books on races and such. This guy was a genuine solo sailor, and he was working on making the third reef on his sail better. He said he liked solo sailing and that he and his brother built this sail boat over several years together. He told me about some of the places he traveled to where the entire population of an island might be 60. Here he was welcomed as a guest and provided with fruits and food. Money was not used, unlike in Bora Bora where locals might sit out with a table of fruit, waiting all day to sell. He said that the longer he traveled, the more tempting it was not to return.

People often say how lucky it would be to go sailing or travel for months at a time. They might say they wish they could do that, but for whatever reason can't get away. The truth is, it is not luck, but a choice that you make.

Guy delayed his career to sail. Hanne is sailing the Pacific pretty much for free in exchange for chores on the boat. Ben's parents raised him on a sailboat for during his first few years of life. Natalie in Vancouver traveled from Switzerland to Vancouver, picked up sailing and planning on crewing on a boat as well.

 

We all had several drinks that evening during the festivities. Shannon had a good time, probably one of the best nights I've seen her have at a bar. We talked to some of the locals, a cross dresser bought me a Heineken, and we all had a good time dancing with the mummy, even Chantelle when we got her a stool in the middle of the dance floor.

 

Lazy boat day

What a lazy day today, at least for everyone but Ben and Chantelle. Those two started off the day with a scuba dive. They called last night from Bloody Mary and were picked up by the diving boat this morning from our boat.

While they were gone for several hours until 12:30, the rest of us took naps, read a little, cleaned up. We discovered our pizza dough had unfortunately grown mould and some bananas were getting too ripe. Actually, I think we were all tired and didn't mind the rest.

The weather today was actually quite crappy. It rained on and off and the skies were mostly overcast. Gusts of winds came and went as well, but we were well moored to Bloody Mary's buoy.

I didn't even put on my sunscreen until mid morning, but even before I was sticky from the humidity.

Chantelle and Ben came back from some amazing dives. Lots of big sharks out in the ocean, and a place with tons of manta rays.

We ate lunch then went back to Vaitape. We had a hell of a time finding a parking spot though. All the mooring buoys north of town were taken. We tried stopping off at Total for some gas but Hilton Bora Bora shuttle snuck up in front of us and prevented our docking.

We eventually anchored nearby in 30 meter waters and dropped rode down to rope and went to town.

Chantelle and Ben did a run part way up the mountain while the rest of us strolled town, going to Super U and Chin Lee for some supplies.

I'm not sure, but I think a little boy gave me the fist. Ben told me the first time here that he got the finger from a woman. I wonder if there is a lot of tourist resentment here on Bora Bora. I guess that wouldn't be surprising since this place depends so much on tourism yet all these people are in your village all the time.

At five when we returned to the dock, it was raining, but this time, it wasn't a quick in and out rain, but a continuous rain that would last the rest of the night. This wasn't entirely unexpected because More Mike had checked the weather forecast earlier and today was supposed to be a thunder showers day progressively getting better the next two days.

We gritted our teeth and set off in the dinghy back to the yacht, tourists laughing at us from the dock, and us laughing at ourselves.

Because we weren't sure about the anchor scope, we motored off to where we anchored the first night we were here in Bora Bora. It was getting relatively late by this point being around six when our anchor was in place.

We had a nice dinner with the rest of our burgers topped with mushrooms and goat cheese.

Ben and Chantelle were obviously wiped. And it was only eight thirty. Then the wind started blowing in gusts again. Strange and ominous sounds came from the boat. We checked the GPS to find that we were about 65 meters from the mark that I placed upon anchoring. At one point during a gust the boat seemed to have snagged something and jolted a bit, followed immediately by the bilge pump going off. Strange. Then the bailing device we made by cutting a water bottle in half blew inside the galley. Are these omens?

Ben told us stories about sailing when he was younger with his family and that fateful Friday the 13th when their monohull was knocked down shredding sails and such. I shared some stories about races that I've read about.

Watching the GPS, Ben said he now knew how his father felt when anchored and how he would always have a drift alarm and double anchors. The GPS never drifted further than the 65 meter radius fortunately. I double checked around the boat. There were no snags, the anchor appeared proper and there wasn't any coral within headlamp range. I was actually impressed that the water was clear enough for me to be able to definitively say that.

So we decided to set alarms throughout the night just to check on the GPS and make sure we hadn't drifted.