Tahiti.

What does this word Tahiti mean to you? Does it invoke visions of palm trees, lagoons and lush mountains? Do you see novels about the South Pacific with visions of Captain Cook or perhaps Captain Bligh standing on the deck of their wooden ships surrounded by native dugouts? Do you see calm, clear blue lagoons stretching out from below your sleeping hut, itself on stilts over the water? Tahitian dancing? Perhaps it's none of these things for you. You may just have visions of a tourist trap vacation spot.

For me, Tahiti is a powerful word, implying the exotic and other-worldly. Now that we are here, we are beginning to fill in the details and discover its modern reality. So far, we've only been to the islands of Tahiti and Moorea. And at that, for only a little over a week.

For us so far, Tahiti has turned out to be centered on a small city, the city of Papeete, the capital of French Polynesia, along with its suburban sprawl, a feature that few cities seem to escape in this modern world. Being in the neighborhood of a city for a while is fine with us though, as we have not seen much "city" in several months and frankly, we kind of like cities.

To be exact, we are in a marina south of the city by about 10 kilometers. Actually, that's only partially true. We are not really in a Marina per-se; we are in a mooring ball field adjacent to a marina. If you are unfamiliar with what a mooring ball field is, click on the Google map here on the blog and zoom in to the location associated with this blog entry. Google has a nice high-res image of this location and you can see all the boats lined up in rows, as we are all attached to individual buoys anchored to the bottom in rows of underwater concrete blocks. It kind of reminds me of being at a floating drive-in movie. Or an RV park, which is really what it kind of is.

There are a large number of boats here and like the Marquesas, there are many boats and sailors here whom we know. The annual migration across the South Pacific continues and familiar boats arrive every day.

One familiar theme we are encountering among our fellow sailors here in Tahiti is fatigue. Many of them are expressing sentiments of being tired of sailing, are basically worn out and ready to sell their boat. As are we. Yes, the high points are truly high, but crossing oceans is hard work and at some point your adrenal glands just give out! I could go on about the trials and tribulations of ocean crossing and Pacific Island hopping, but I can already hear the responses of "poor you" - sailing in the South Pacific. Oh, it must be tough. Well... Actually, it is.

One of our fellow puddle-jumpers, Chris and Anne-Marie Fox on Starship have a nice blog entry on "Boat Blues". Anne-Marie does a nice job in that piece of detailing a bit of the emotional roller coaster one can experience during long distance sailing. You can find a link to Starship's blog under "Boats We Know and Love".

One of the tougher issues faced in long-distance sailing is having ready access to fresh fruits and vegetables. This is where Tahiti shines. The traditional local market downtown Papeete is a joyful place for a sailor missing fresh salads. Red lettuce and tomatoes! Whoo hoo! And look over there - decent carrots! Mint! Cilatro! Fresh Basil! Perhaps that all sounds a little odd, but for us at the moment, this is the joy of Tahiti.

At first, getting to the public market downtown seemed daunting, given that it is 10 kilometers away, meaning long bus rides or expensive taxis. But we soon realized we could run there in our dinghy, making it about a 10 or 15 minute ride to the downtown marina, from which the market is only a few a blocks to walk.

Being moored in a suburb of Tahiti (sorry, but yes, there are suburbs in paradise) also means we don't have to go to the downtown market if we don't want to. A 10 minute walk from the boat is a Carrefour grocery store. Think Fred Meyer or perhaps an upscale Walmart. Maybe Target with a grocery store. It's huge, well stocked and part of a small mall. Of course, if you're really desperate to be cured quickly of civilization, there is a McDonalds within a 5 minute walk of the marina. (This has not been particularly difficult for us to resist.) The attraction of the downtown market over the Carrefour grocery is that the veggies are just noticeably fresher. It feels more local and is certainly less corporate.

Although we've only scratched the surface, one other detail about Tahiti stands out: the reef. If you looked at the Google Earth image of the mooring ball field mentioned above, perhaps you noticed the reef. If not, look again. To the right of the mooring ball field is the island itself, but to the left is the reef that surrounds the island. This reef is what makes the mooring ball field - and Tahiti itself - work. The reef surrounds the entire island, protecting it from the open ocean except for a few openings where boats can enter and exit.



(The picture above and the opening picture was taken at a famous surf-break opening in the reef called Teahupoo - 100 yards away from these massive reef waves was a calm opening from which this picture was taken by our Swedish friend Caroline. Yes, we were there - the swell - and how close you could get because of the opening in the reef - was mind bending.)

This reef is Mother Nature's seawall, protecting the island from the sea and creating calm inner lagoons where boats can travel in natural channels and moor or anchor in large, quiet lagoons. Unless of course the lagoon is next to an airport or a highway or an Intercontinental Hotel, all of which are present in modern Tahiti.

But what about those fresh fruits and veggies? Where do they come from? There must be a rural Tahiti out there somewhere that we have yet to discover. Every morning, we hear roosters crowing from across the water. We suspect rural Tahiti must be close.