The gradient is gentler on this side of the ridge between Anaho and Hatiheu. We are grateful for the easier walk at the end of the day, especially Karl who is carrying my waterproof backpack now filled with just picked pamplemousse and bananas. We are even more grateful for the generosity of Moi, the owner of Magasin Louise and our Marquesan coaches Kate and Paige. Our hearts are full with the kindness and generosity and our minds are grappling with the culture and history preserved at the Tahakia-Kamuihei-Teopoka archeological site.

Following Kate’s directions, we look for the first store as we enter town owned by her longtime friend Moi aka Louise. There is the sign for Magasin Louise. We enter a small grocery store and are pointed to the other room facing the beach. There a broad woman with her dark hair pulled back wearing a loose black flowered top and a wrapped skirt with a giant pink hibiscus. After months of traveling there is something magic when someone says â€�" I have been waiting for you. Thank you, Kate. We settle in for bowls of coffee served by Moi's daughter and begin our own chatter. Kate is picking apples â€�" it is getting to fall in New York. Tourists are noisy and not very good. The school here is small but there are children what we always see as a good sign for a small community. With Karl translating sometime and Moi being patient with my awful French we laugh and share our stories. Moi was born on the bay where we are anchored, has visited every Marquesan island by boat and been the New Zealand three times to visit the Maori. We talk of the stars and how Karl navigates with the sun. I give her a Marie Tharp's map of the Pacific sea floor. She is surprised how the Marquesas are such a large mountain in a flat part of the ocean and how far we have sailed from New York. After we take a selfie together to send to Kate, she offers to drive us to the archeological site. She honks and calls out to people all along the way and we arrive laughing at Karl's joke about how husbands are supposed to carry the large packages over mountains. We have instructions on where to eat lunch (the mayors competing grocery store and restaurant) and to stop by to fill the backpack with fruit.

Walking into the central space of this site is like walking into the central square of my childhood town but a much older town. Instead of grocery stores, churches and elm trees there are poi poi pits, tiki, carved turtles, petroglyphs and giant banyan tress. For someone who grew up thinking of how to keep warm in the snow I am finally appreciating how the open architecture is perfect for this climate. The poi pits where fermented and dried breadfruit (poi poi) were stored for droughts are about the size of a 55-gallon barrel. Around each were circular pits in the basalt worn by people mashing the breadfruit with tools identical to the gift in our forward locker.
As usual it took a little while to find the petroglyphs. We are practiced spending time and imagination looking at rocks and envisioning things so we were ready to look at every rock. Luckily Karl asked a guide where the petroglyphs were. We headed up the hill where the guide pointed. No imagination needed. These petroglyphs, carvings of a large mahi mahi, three swimming turtles and swirling waves covered a rock the size of a small car. Another rock was decorated with dancing stick figures. By now it was lunch and all the other tourists had left. Karl and I were alone in the site. What a village this much have been. A screech right over my head made me jump. A large black and grey bird looked down at me. Another new bird Moi tells us it is a Houpue.

We stroll slowly back to town. We were resigned to a cracker lunch but Evonne's restaurant is still serving tourists and we enjoy chevre in coconut. My attempt to get Evonne, an elderly woman with crutches watching everything, to notarize the document I need signed. We learn the Mayor in Taihe'o has the big stamp we need.

Moi is at her store. She picks enough pamplemousse to fill the backpack. Using a pole that looks like an apple picker. She spins each fruit to preserve the tree just as you spin an apple to get it to drop. Backpack stuffed, she drives up to the trailhead, saving us a mile of hiking and half the vertical. At the parking lot she gives us each black and red beads her daughter had made and more bananas. We invite her to visit us when she visits Kate, promising her a paella. Another Marie Tharp map slipped into Moi's hand and we head up the hill our hearts warm.