Sharks & Rays

Friday 8 August 2014

At dusk on a parking lot-like section of waterfront in downtown Papeete a herd of trucks pull up, offload tables & chairs and set up restaurants. It's called the Roulotte. Excellent food at reasonable-ish prices with sun setting over the harbor as a backdrop. Not the peak of Jan's Tahiti experience as she got sick both times, but entire balance of crew loved it.

Knew it was coming in near future, but didn't get the Mo'orea wedding time for Thomas & Gaylynn (from Qi, pronounced Chee) until an hour and a half prior. Scraped our stuff together and headed out for the 3 hour sail from Tahiti. No worries as ceremony was late and, although missing the actual event, arrived for the more critical post-nuptial drinking and carousing.

Expecting to motor the entire way due no wind, about a mile off Tahiti with a mere zephyr from the NNW, it veered and filled in on opposite tack for a great sail to Opunohu Bay. Although half the cruising population in French Poly appears to be in residence, it's beautiful with clear water and a magnificent view of Mo'orea. Snorkeling inside the reef on the other side of entrance with stingrays and black tips gave GoPro a workout.

Saturday

Feeling that a smidgen of self-abuse was in order we, along with several others needing a similar character building experience, hiked up to a place called Belvedere this morning for a magnificent view of both Opunohu and Cook's Bay. Two+ hours there via road (which goes nowhere but the lookout) and similar back on a trail left the lower extremities begging for mercy. After an all too short rest, dinked over to Hilton resort for happy hour with crew of Rewa to discovered how much enjoyment we could wrest from a couple each $9 happy hour maitais and mojitos before returning home after dark through a mine field of coral.

Original plan for diving on outer reef tomorrow was forestalled by reports indicating a bust, so new improved idea is to go back to stingrays & sharks earlier in the day while they're still in a frenzy from getting fed. Meantime dinner with second to last unwatched Adventures in Paradise episode will precede an attempt to pack 24 hours of sleep into a mere 12.. we continue to suffer from a sloth (one of three favorite deadly sins) deficiency.

Jack