On the evening of May 6th we left Moorea and headed for Raiatea, a 14 hour overnight sail away. This was to be my last overnight run on Arc World and it couldn’t have been better. That night was the 2012 “Super Moon” night. As I’m sure most of you know, once a year the moon is full at the same time as it has its’ closest orbit to the earth. This year the moon was 15,000 miles closer than average, and was full, on my last night at sea in the South Pacific. I’m being specific about the Pacific here because I will shortly have another night at sea when the O’Connor siblings – except John – do our annual trip overnight to the Isle of Mann on the June Bank Holiday weekend. I will not be wearing shorts and T-shirt that night!!
Anyway, back to the Pacific. We have had some beautiful full moons on this trip and I have mentioned before how the moon and low lying planets cast floodlight type beams across the sea. Well, none compared to this. Back in the late 90’s I was lucky enough to be sitting with David, in France, directly under the path of a solar eclipse. At the moment of total eclipse it was if someone had just plucked the sun out of the sky – not at all the same as the light at sundown. In the same way, the Super Moon was not all the same as any old full moon. It was more like hours of silvery daylight. It wasn’t until the moon was very high in the sky that we had any real sense of night-time. Amazing. Along with this, we had true Pacific Trade Wind conditions – 15kts of wind, calm seas and a clear starry sky. No sail or navigation changes to be made during my shift. I had a peaceful 3 hours – just me and the elements. I’ll miss my night shifts.
Raymarine navigation mapped (will need to zoom)
Sitting on the "dolphin seat" - where I go to grab some quiet time
We arrived in Raiatea at dawn and anchored in a bay at the mouth of a river. Remember the Rio Diablo in San Blas where we went upriver and through the jungle looking for a waterfall that never materialised? I remember it well and was somewhat anxious when I woke to find the dinghy being lowered and bottled water and bug spray being loaded up. Here we go again. As before, John had taken all the information we needed from a book. The river forks in two, we take the left fork etc. Before we even got to the mouth of the river Faaroa, the dinghy engine walloped into a submerged tree trunk. From then on Jerry sat at the front of the dinghy with an oar stuck in the water in an effort to head off any further debris. It was a nice enough trip up the river but nothing as Apocalypse Now-ish as the Rio Diablo. Also, after about only ½ a mile the river was completely dammed with logs and we could go no further. On top of that, when we got back to the boat we discovered that there were lots of flies on board so we had a killing spree, upped anchor and moved off to where some other Arc boats were anchored in front of the town of Uturoa.
Jerry on log duty
Young girl fishing along the Faaroa river. Not sure who comes to buy at this stall. Not a lot of passing trade!
Raiatea is known locally as The Sacred Island. In the Tahiti blog I described a Marae (temple) where human sacrifices were made to the Gods. A lot of the Polynesian islands have Maraes, but it can only be a true Marae if it contains a stone from the Taputapuatea Marae on Raiatea. This island is the second largest of the Society islands, after Tahiti. A local man told me that Hawaii was populated by settlers from Raiatea, but I read somewhere that Raiatea was the main stopover for settlers from Hawaii. I’ll have to look up Wikipedia cause we all know it never lies!!
We visited the Taputapuatea Marae and it is indeed an awesome site. I don’t have good photos because it is quite extensive and the light was fading when we got there. It’s clear that the islanders still hold the site in great religious regard. There were many recent offerings of coins, shells, clay pots, coconuts etc laid out on the ancient altar. We saw something at Taputapuatea we hadn’t seen before. Wood carvings called Unu. Maraes are always surrounded by trees, probably for privacy during the sacrifices, and the Unu, carved on bark, are illustrations of dogs, fish and geometric designs. It seems that they are very rare as they have not been preserved over time.
Unu
Offerings on the altar
Complex root formation on this tree.
Our last stop in Raiatea was at the visitors dock in Apooiti Marina where we spent the night. Most of the boats here were charters from Sunsail and Moorings, for those of you who might be interested in a weeks sailing here sometime!! Business was less than brisk and at least 20 charter boats were lying idle. We loaded the tanks up with water – again. We were also approached by a woman from one of the other Arc boats looking to jump ship. Seemingly the crew problems continue. We politely declined. From this dock we could clearly see our next destination, Taaha, a mere 4 miles away. The only downside of the marina was its really good restaurant. Since arriving in the Society Islands I am slowly undoing all the healthy eating and associated weight loss of the previous months. I am a sucker for French cooking, unfortunately.
On our last night in Raiatea, Jerry, Gavin and I made our way into the main town, Utuora. We had been told there would be nothing open but out of sheer determination we managed to find the one and only open bar-restaurant, which turned out to be Chinese!! We met the crew of Glamorous Gallah, Ozzies, who can de depended upon to find an open bar. As the evening progressed other adventurous crews wandering around also found us and in the end there were about 20 of us holding up the bar at closing time. Gavin used his not insignificant charm to blag some takeaway bottles for us stragglers and we adjourned to the quayside for a deoch an dorais. This is my favourite time of day as the temperature sinks to a cool 30 degrees!
Sapphire moored at Apooiti Marina. She barely fit!!
Me, sitting down on the job of filling the port water tank.
More pina coladas in Apooiti marina
I stopped the car to photograph this coconut in the middle of the road. Clearly no traffic. The coconut was still there when I returned 30 minutes later.
View of Taaha from Raiatea
The following day we left for the short trip to Taaha. On the way we passed a Black Pearl farm. We had hoped to visit a pearl farm while in Tuamotu after which I would give some details in a blog. But because the snorkelling and beaches there were so good there we didn’t get around to it. However, we were given some information in Ahe, from 2 young lads who dive for pearls. So here’s what I’ve gleaned and it may not all be accurate….
Pearl farms tend to be owned and run by Chinese settlers. It seems that it takes 2 years to learn the art of cultivation and harvest. There is now a school on Rangiroa where Polynesians are being trained to run their own farms. French Polynesia is the ideal place to set up pearl farms because of the large lagoons within the atolls. The lagoons have almost no tides and with the exception of in the actual passes, there is no current. The farm buildings are large stilted huts placed in about 20 meters of water. Thin ropes are suspended from the floor of the hut. The oyster shells are attached to the ropes with a nylon mesh. An oyster can be seeded only when the shell reaches a particular size and some internal organs are sufficiently developed. When the shells are about 30 months old they are taken up from the ropes and the delicate grafting process can be carried out. It is all manually done and as I understand it this is the process that takes 2 years to learn.
The shells are prised open and a bead is placed into a pearl pocket. (I’m sure there is a technical name but this is how it was described to me). The pearl pocket sounds like a tiny flap of some sort that is lifted, the bead inserted and the flap replaced. This has to be done in 15 seconds or the oyster will die. The grafters work 12 hours a day, live in the farms, do about 400 shells a day and are well paid. Only about 30% of the grafts produce pearls and the quality varies.
After the grafting is done the oysters are put in wire mesh baskets for 45 days. I think they are then opened again at this stage and if a pearl has started they are put back on the ropes for another 2 years. You can see why they are so expensive. About US$200 for one good quality Black Pearl. The one vital piece of information I didn’t manage to get is what makes the pearls black. Sorry about that. I’ll sign up for French lessons this winter. Might be more useful than Bridge!!
Pearl Farm in the Raiatea lagoon.
Next blog will be from Taaha.
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