Our last days in Moorea was memorable.

We took the dinghy with our friend Dane from "Oso" to Cooks Bay to visit the Rotui Juice and Distillery Factory. They make delicious fresh juices, liquors, rums, bruts and jams from all of the local tropical fruit. Unfortunately the factory was not operating on Monday but we did get to sample the Tahiti punch, pineapple rum, pineapple liquor, coconut cream liquor, and some fruit juice. We all left with our bags a little heavier for future sunset happy hours at sun down.

After the tour we found a quaint little restaurant that overhangs the water. The food was remarkably fabulous and later we discovered the restuarant was listed in the book "a thousand places you should visit". I had a delicious grilled tuna burger with a tasty sauce that was not too goopy but saucy enough to provide a nice flavor.

The beach in front of our anchorage in Opunopu Bay is a park which makes it really nice for landing the dingy. We played a fun game of bocci with some friends. The challenge was to make sure the little white target ball didn't roll down a land crab tunnel. When it did someone would have to reach in a grab it before the crab claimed it.

We departed Moorea late yesterday afternoon for an overnight sail to Raiatea. It's about a 16-18 hour journey and we must arrive during sunlight to navigate the pass through the surrounding coral reef and the coral bombies inside the reef. Like most of the night passages it was restless and lumpy. We had planned to anchor off this beautiful little Noa Noa island at the SE corner of Raiatea. The island has an attractive canopy of trees and sandy beach and looks quite inviting. However as we were circling around investigating a sandy spot amongst the coral an Unwelcoming committee came out and started yelling at us to go away. Apparently Noa Noa is a private island owned by some American who doesn't like boaters near him. We could have anchored there anyway and not stepped onto the island but we chose to move on to where we felt more welcome. After our great experience in Moorea this was not a good introduction to Raiatea. Today we shall rest as the wind howls.