November 17, 2018
Back in Papeete to provision for 3 - 4 months in the Tuamotus Atolls. While you can find a lot of things there, they are expensive. Beer is $3 US per can regardless if you buy a case or not. So we are taking a few cans of less expensive stuff with us in case there is a drought. Everything else is expensive as well so we stock up the beast we can to save $$$. We never did go to Bora Bora and the other islands, planning on that in the early spring as we head to Fiji. We did go to Moorea and toured around the island and one day, took the dingy over to an area known to be frequented by friendly Rays. That was fun. I was standing in the water that was about chest deep and these Rays like to say hi and to be rubbed. Some people were feeding them as well which is probably the primary reason they were saying hello.

Just standing there they would swim right to you. Up and over my shoulder at the surface or running into my legs. It was…different for sure and pretty cool. Of course, we had a few Sharks hanging around as well but they were okay and in fact, maybe a little skittish. One guy tried to coax a Shark closer with a sardine but the shark took off. Personally, I think feeding Sharks while YOU are IN the water is a bad idea…..

We did rent a small car to tour the island for a day. When we picked up the car the girl asked me if I would take one with a dent in the driver’s door and if I would, she would give it to me at a lower rate. Sure! Why not save $15? When we got to the car it had a dent all right, you could not open the driver’s door without it catching on the front fender. Other than the front bumper looking like it was going to fall off soon, the car was fine and off we went around the island.

Fortunately, we did not find any rocks slides this time around.

While back in Papeete a private Super Yacht came in. While we have seen our fair share of "Super Yachts" over the years, this was by far the largest. 4 "tenders" on board that we could see. The largest required 2 cranes to lower it in the water. It was larger than a most regular Cabin Cruisers. (a photo is now in the album of that) The next smaller one was a runabout with 4 - 350 HP outboards, both of these were kept on the fore-deck. There were 2 more tenders that you can see on the side of the boat as well as a Helicopter hanger on the top deck that housed a twin engine helicopter that they did take out for a spin one day. Not sure who owns it this boat but it is much larger than Stephen Speilburg's boat that was in here a few weeks ago.

So, we are planning on leaving next Wednesday or so to the Tuamotus, first stop being the Atoll Rangiroa near the North West end of the Archipelago. There is a Pearl Farm tour that we can take there. From there we are planning on working our way east through the Atolls stopping at ones we want to visit. I say “working our way east” since the prevailing winds are from the east so we have to plan the jumps from island to island when the winds allow. If the weather does start to turn (Cyclone season) we will head north to the Marquesas.
Updates will be a little less frequent in the Tuamotus due to the WiFi being almost non-existent and if it is available, not too good. It will mean back to Satellite communications.
I just UPDATED our Album with 42 new photos today as well.
Remember, if you want to see where we are in “real time”, click the link at the bottom of the main web page: “Hedonism Tracking”