PART 1
July 12, 2011 to Sept. 19, 2011

Finally an update to our blog! It's been over 2 months since the last post! Wow! Time passes so fast when you're having fun. So here is the update:
It's hard to write about all the stuff we've done and are doing without getting into too much detail, which I know is boring. So please bear with me if this seems to drag. We're doing so many exciting things we want to share with all of you our experiences.
After Lisa, Drew and Fiona left on the 27th, we left Papeete and went out to Moorea again just for the afternoon to wait for the timing to be right to head on towards Huahine. As I've explained before, we don't want to arrive at a new anchorage or mooring in the dark. It took us 28 1/2 hrs to get Huahine. But it was a good run with absolutely wonderful waters. When we got to Huahine we 1st thought we would stay at the little anchorage in front of the main town of Fare. But after looking at it, we decided to go on to the inner anchorage of Avea Bay. it's a nice anchorage at the end of the Island and is very pretty. We wound up staying there for 12 days. It seems like we plan to only stay at an anchorage for a few days and always wind up staying much longer than we'd planned;>) We went on a great hike up the mountainside overlooking the anchorage where Storm Haven was. It was beautiful and we took several pictures of our "baby" out at anchor, of course! Walking back, Paulie's knees really started hurting again on the downhill slope. Guess she's gonna have to give up going on hilly hikes. Getting old is the PITTS! Anyway, our friends on S/V"Yolo", Karen & Jason, came in as we were thinking about leaving and so we stayed for another couple of days. We hadn't seen them since we left Fakarava in the Tuamotus and decided to stay and play catch-up with what they've been doing. We took a dingy ride around to the other side of the Island with Karen and Jason and did some snorkeling. It's a little sad and disappointing to see all of the dead coral in the South Pacific. We hear it's getting worse all the time. The mighty Lion Fish, although beautiful, eat the coral and kill it. There's a lot of other things contributing to it, Including the Crown of Thorns starfish, but that is one of the main reasons it is dying. Anyway, we had a great time but decided we'd better head on towards Bora Bora as we were running out of time in the French Polynesians. Since we were only allowed a 3 month Visa, we were very lucky for some reason, someone down the line of paper work made an error on our exit date -- in our favor! So we got an extra month to stay there. But even so we had to be out by July the 26th.
We left Huahine on July 12th and after a 5 hour trip we anchored down again at the island of Tahaa. Tahaa is right across the bay from Raiatea. We decided to miss Raiatea and spend one night at the anchorage of Baie Haamaere in Tahaa and then get up the next morning and head to Bora Bora. Our davit was not working right and wouldn't lift and Don had to fix it at Tahaa. We would have really liked to spend some time at Raiatea and Tahaa both. But, time was running out if we wanted to get out of French Polynesia by the deadline of July 26th.
July 13 we left Tahaa at 7:35 AM to head to Bora Bora. It took us 6 hrs to arrive in Bora Bora. We first tried to find a empty mooring ball at the Bora Bora Yacht Club at the little town of Vaitape. Seeing none that looked appealing we went on around the corner to the new Mai Kai Marina. The waters are very deep to anchor in here but the new Mai Kai Marina had mooring balls available and so we snagged one of these. The new owner, Teiva, came out in his skiff to help us snag the mooring ball and we really appreciated it. Not having done this yet(at least not with Storm Haven) we weren't quite set up for it and it was very nice to have him help us. Teiva and his American wife, Jessica, actually ran the previous Bora Bora Yacht Club. Hurricane Oli in February, 2010 did such devastating damage to the Yacht Club they had to close it for major repairs. While closed and after spending a large amount of money, they ran into some legal problems from a previous owner (Guess it's not just a American thing!) and after fighting numerous lawsuits since, decided to move on around the corner to another location. They're a great couple and are so friendly. We absolutely loved our time there. They didn't have the restaurant or bar or laundry facilities open when we were there yet. But they were working on it all and it was going to be fantastic when they finished. It's really nice to run into "cruiser friendly" folks at these stops. And Both Teiva and Jessica went out of their way to make us all feel welcome. They have a 4 year old little girl and another baby due in September. What a neat little family.
Bryans'(our son-in-law,) twin brother, Adam and his wife Kristin were at Bora Bora when we got there. We tried to call them and get together. But they were on the opposite side of the Island and the buses are almost non-existant in Bora Bora. So, sadly, we never made connections. But we did get our bikes out and, along with our friends on the S/V "Lardo", MaryLee and Dennis, we went on a long bike tour all the way around the island. It was 22 miles and, believe me, this lady is way outta shape! But we made it and it was fun. Just need to get the old bikes out more often! The places we have to dock the dingy at have not been really encouraging to take the bikes to shore.
It took us about 3 1/2 days to get from Bora Bora to Rarotonga, We left Bora Bora on July 22 at 3:45 PM and got into Rarotonga July 26th at 8:30 AM. We had to "med-moor" again here in the Rarotonga Harbor, which we hate. There were only 2 boats in when we got there. But one of them we were right next to was a hugh Motor Yacht called "Zeepaard". It's 125' long and about 25' wide and is 3 decks high, including the pilot house. Storm Haven looked like a dingy next to that big baby! The harbor we were in is not a good harbor for North winds as it gets a little swelly. We had two bow anchors out and two stern ties to the dock. But the winds did get a little rough when the nw winds came in and it was kind of difficult to get on the dock from the dingy.
Although my last blog update said Donna and Bryan were flying into Bora Bora, I was wrong and should have said Rarotonga in the Cook Islands. They flew into Rarotonga on August 1st. They got a taxi to bring them to the dock which cost a easy $20 Tongan or about $17 US Dollars to get about 1/2 mile(MAYBE a 1/2 mile)! Sorry Donna & Bryan! Rarotonga was very expensive even though we'd heard they were a lot cheaper than the French Polynesians. We certainly didn't find it to be so!! Anyway, we had a great time with Donna and Bryan even though they took Donnas' Dad out on a hike and "broke" him;>) Just teasing, it wasn't their fault he fell;>). He was coming down from a great and wonderful hike up one of their many hiking trails and at the bottom (thank goodness is was down at the bottom) he slipped on a mossy rock that went out from under him, landing on his left back and hitting his ribs with a loud THUMP! Knocked the wind out of him, but he got up and rode with Donna on her motorbike they had rented back to Storm haven. They were very concerned, of course. But although he thinks he cracked a couple of ribs, he's fine now although still a little tender. It did manage to put a little damper on us going to some of the places with the kids. We wanted to dive at least once with them but that wasn't going to happen with Don's ribs for a while. The motorbikes were a great idea but it was hard to remember they drive on the LEFT side of the road. Don kept saying he didn't understand how come they all drove on the wrong side of the road and didn't think anything about it! Silly boy! Though Don nor I rented a motorbike, both Donna and Bryan did. They had to get a Cook Island drivers license and now they have a great treasure to remember their time on the Cook Islands. It has their picture and looks just like a regular drivers license from the US but says Cook Island. But they were great and the kids had a great time going all kinds of places on them. One day we went all around the Island of Rarotonga which is somewhere about 26 miles around the whole Island. We went to a "wine" tasting which was at this fellows house and was actually banana wine (not any of our favorite) and he also made banana Vodka! It's kind of rot gut, but was fun to try. We found that the opposite side of the Island is the really pretty side, of course. But there are no anchorages or places to moor on the other side. So we were locked into the Harbor. They were working on the Harbor for the big cruise ships to come in and also a couple of ferries to take folks to the other Cook Islands eventually. In the meantime, it was a really dirty Harbor with all the construction going on. Someday, when they get finished, it will be a nice place although we cruisers will still have to med-moor to the harbor wall. I don't know why they don't make it a little more "Cruiser Friendly" there. The people of Rarotonga were all very nice and pleasant. And tourism is the main source of income for the people of the Cook Islands at the present time. Maybe someday.
We were lucky to be in Rarotonga for their "Constitution Day" Festival week. Donna, Bryan and Don & I all went to one of the competition dancing and singing events which had teams from all of the Cook Islands competing against each other. It was awesome! There were booths with all kinds of food and local artist showing their crafts from not only Rarotonga, but all the Cook Islands. A parade was held the Wednesday we got there and it was a great parade! All the different Islands had floats and participants in the Parade.
Saturdays were "Market Day". We were only a short walk to the Market Place where they sold fresh fruits and vegetables the folks grew themselves. Of course they had Bread Fruit (it's EVERYWHERE;>(), but also Taro root, Papaya, onions, potatoes, tomatoes, oranges, limes, bell peppers and oh so much more! The 1st Saturday we were there, we went to the Market and it was only a few sprinkles that day. They had all kind of craft vendors with their crafts on display, of course wanting to sell them. We enjoyed it very much and came back home with all kinds of fruits and vegetables, not counting the bakery items we bought! Needless to say, neither of us have lost (we've both gained) weight on this trip! We went back to the Saturday Market with Donna and Bryan the following Saturday. But it was raining fairly hard and so there weren't the craft setups and food places that were there the previous Saturday.
As with Lisa, Drew & Fiona, we thoroughly enjoyed seeing our kids (missed our two little boys, although I know D & B had a better time without them -- though they missed them terribly;>)and hope they had as great a time as we did when they were here. Now that we've been to the South Pacific, we would know better suggestions for folks to come to. This time again, we weren't able to cruise to the other Cook Islands as they were each a couple of hundred miles apart and it wouldn't have been prudent for us to travel that much, especially when we would have had to come back up against the currents when we had to come back to Rarotonga for them to fly back home. That makes for a pretty rough ride and we try to avoid it at all costs:>)
End of Part 1 ;>))