Touring Tahiti Day 2
26 July 2013 | Tahiti, Society Islands
Day 2. We started at Nautisport and bought line for our davits. Next was the wine shop on Rue du Paul Gaugin with Karen from Interlude and Paul hunting down bargains to keep our boats going to NZ - somewhat of a challenge in French Polynesia. In theory we are entitled to duty free alcohol here but thanks to a few ratbag cruisers Customs has clamped down on access to duty free - although still unclear, it seems that to obtain duty free alcohol you have to be leaving the country within 48 hrs, you pay full price, and when you make your destination (ie Cooks, Tonga etc) you have their customs either reimburse you or send the authority to French Society and they reimburse you somehow, in other words its impossible.
Anyway, after this stop we headed for Point Venus where Captain Cook observed the transit of Venus across the Sun. The point has a memorial to Cook and a lighthouse and there were school children everywhere. The photo is of small outriggers that are covered in corrugated iron so they don't fill with water. We then headed to the east coast in search of the 3 waterfalls, a restaurant, and the lava tubes. We found the first which was very picturesque and had a good supply of taro leaves which Interlude collected for callaloo soup. We did not find a restaurant on the east coast nor could we locate where the lava tubes were so after a long trip down to Taravao and a Chinese lunch with pleasant but overwhelming ukuleles and island songs we headed back to Papeete and Le Belvedere - via a long twisted and narrow road that climbs to 1600 ft. The restaurant, Le Belvedere, has views down to Papeete and out to Moorea - well worth the drive, cycle, or walk.