Once again it's been forever since I've put anything down on paper. So, here goes.

After departing Moorea we sailed to Huahine for our second visit. We pulled in to Fare and anchored in just about the exact same spot as our first time. The spot is nice, in reasonably shallow water with scattered coral heads and sand bottom. Rob and I did some snorkeling, but didn't see too much except for some cool shells that we collected.

The real treat of Huahine is the surf. We went out to the mellow(er) left - Fare - early in the morning and had the waves to ourselves except for one other cruiser. No locals out to give us a hard time! We caught a few waves, but the swell was very inconsistent and quite small.

The following morning we got out at 6am to ensure that we'd have no trouble with locals at Fitii, the more aggressive right. Once again, only one other cruiser was out, and he left a bit before we did. So, again, we had the waves to ourselves. Fitii is an extremely fun, hollow right. I caught a bunch of waves - by far more than the first visit to this break - and really got comfortable with how steep and dredging the takeoff is. It was super fun! Rob and I both stayed safe at each break and caught some good waves to boot.

We continued on to Raiatea after a couple of days. We were sailing fast on a broad reach, and Rob reeled in a fat skipjack tuna. As we were approaching the northeast pass into the lagoon surrounding Raiatea, we hooked up again. This time it was a large bull mahi. I fought him for about 15 minutes until he was beside the boat. He was still full of energy though, and I had to wait patiently for another 15 minutes as he made a series of small runs and direction changes near the boat. We eventually landed the 37 pound mahi, and were stoked to have a bunch of fresh fish on board!

The next morning, Rob and I went out to check the left that rolls into the northwest pass at Raiatea, called Miri Miri. This break was reasonably mellow, but was closing out a bit, and wasn't very good. Still, we caught a bunch of waves, had some very fun rides, and once again avoided getting tossed on the reef.

The weather seems to always be cloudy and rainy when we're in Huahine/Raiatea/Tahaa. Our first visit out to these Leeward Islands was marked by scattered rain and limited sunshine. This trip was only different in that the sun hardly ever came out! Every time I checked the weather I was dismayed to see nonstop clouds and rain in the forecast. The weathermen were right, too, and it rained lots when we were in Raiatea and Tahaa.

The hilight of our visit, other than surfing, was snorkeling the "coral gardens" on the fringing motus north of Tahaa. This extremely shallow area is full of interesting coral formations and simply teeming with fish. We saw all the usual suspects, but also spotted a couple of octopi, sea anemone, and my very first non-invasive lionfish! It was funny to see such a small, not obese lionfish, as the ones in FL and the Caribbean have grown to epic proportions. Rob mentioned that in the Bahamas he had fed a sea urchin to a sea anemone, and we decided to try. I pried a small urchin off the rocks, and placed it on the sea anemone. The anemone slowly engulfed the urchin, pulling it into its tentacles. Cool!

When we finally got some wind and a decent sunny day we hopped over to Bora Bora. This lagoon is incredibly beautiful, with every color of water imaginable from clear white through green to deep blueish-purple. The steep pointy mountain in the center provides a stunning backdrop to the hilighter water. We ended up spending about a week in Bora Bora waiting for a good weather window to depart for the Cook Islands, and used our time mostly snorkeling and moving around from one neat anchorage to another.

The night we arrived - a Friday - we went to Bloody Mary's for happy hour. Rob struck up a conversation about spearfishing with a guy who works there, the employee having seen Rob's spearfishing shirt. Tepapa told us that he goes every day out the pass and that he had gotten a nice giant trevally, or GT, earlier that morning. We decided to all go out together, provided we could find a day/time that worked.

We were in touch with Tepapa on Facebook, but nothing materialized. We went back to Blood Mary's the following Wednesday for happy hour, and thankfully he was working that night. We set up to go the following morning. The story of our morning out spearfishing with Tepapa deserves it's own post...please read the next post to find out!