Overnight sail to the island of Nuka Hiva with old buddies from Sonsie, who we met in Westport, WA, and missed in Mexico. Taiahoe Bay is crammed with more than 40 boats, buzzing with VHF conversations, possessed of a real chain hotel and a very helpful go-to guy who became our agent for immigration here. We felt like we had at first been transported to a high-end RV park or maybe a cul-de-sac in the suburbs. Not sure, but nice to meet up with all the sailors we had previously met before the passage and meet new ones. Again, good tales..the Alaska fish biologist who towed her toddler's diapers in a net across the Pacific for the "presoak", delivery captains who had been around, the politics of territory vs independence from a Swiss man who was canning his own mango preserves aboard, and a classic big cruiser potluck at the restaurant of Rose Corser who came to study Marquesan art in the 70's by sailboat. The market in town is on Saturdays and starts at 4am and ends by 6am. It is small: one line of tables for vegetables, some local and some from Papeete, and one for fish, but the parking lot is full of new pick-ups and everyone sits around the restaurant while ukelele and spoons are played to start the day.
Another reported big swell took us to the north side of the island to Anaho Bay. Copra production has died and only a handful of people live here, but a modest B&B is working. The cruiser mix is changing: French, South African, Swiss, English, Swedish. Nolan and I and Sally B from Seattle hiked up a muddy trail to a Rockwellian Marquesan town with a perfect seawall, perfect tree root under a roof in the center of town being carved, a proper restaurant called Chez Yvonne's and a crew of children from Papeete coming for a one week cultural exchange