25 May 2014

Raiatea and Tahaa

We left Mo'orea for the overnight sail to Raiatea.  Despite originally deciding to skip Raiatea in favour of Taha'a, we instead spent a few pleasant days in the Marina Apooiti in Raiatea and exploring the nearby town of Uturoa.  Sailing there from Mo'orea was a pleasant overnight sail without a lot of traffic about, although we were passed by Orca 3, an Australian flagged catamaran (in fact on its way back to Australia from where it was built in France) during the night.

On the way in, in fact just before we were about to make our gybe to the entrance leads into the Raiatea lagoon, we caught this:

Very tasty indeed!  Flash fried with some soy sauce and garlic it was some of the best fish I've ever eaten, and look at the size of it!  Needless to say we still have a freezer full.

Uturoa is a sleepy little town although it has a nice fruit and vegie market and 3 small supermarkets carrying a range of different things.  We also found a guy (Richard) who assisted to get my outboard running again, as it had started playing up in Mo'orea.  The marina also had a laundry and showers which were very welcome.

Next stop is Taha'a. Things are all very close here:

Raiatea and Taha'a share the same lagoon, this was taken just after leaving Marina Apooiti on Raiatea.  Taha'a is to the left, and to the right in the distance is Bora Bora, which is about 5 hours sailing time away.

Taha'a is a very pretty island, lush and green almost to the extent of making Raivavae look barren.  The main export here appears to be vanilla so I went to visit a vanilla plantation today and bought some vanilla pods and powder direct from the farm.

Internet coverage has been spotty and expensive since we arrived in French Polynesia, but right now we're moored off the Hibiscus lodge/bar/restaurant in Haamene Bay which has free (and reasonably fast) wifi.  3G coverage has been fairly poor here although it was OK in Raiatea, but at about $30 for 400MB it's expensive.

Tomorrow we will leave Taha'a and head for Bora Bora for a few days.

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