Photo above shows the main Atuona anchorage in Hiva Oa

Ka Oha - the ubiquitous Marquesan greeting. Many Marquesan words are similar to NZ Maori, but sometimes with a twist. Ka Oha is not "Kia Ora" (stay strong) but equivalent to the Maori Aroha (love) or the Hawai'ian Aloha. There are many words right across Polynesia that sound almost exactly the same - like moana (sea), motu (island) waka (boat), nui (big), fenua (land), fare (house), but the geographcal separation has meant there are many linguistic diversions, so that Marquesan and Tahitian are now almost like Spanish and Portugurese!

We are on the island of Tahuata, the third or fourth from the bottom of the North West oriented chain of steep, volcanic islands that thrust themselves out of the blue Pacific. They are at one apex of the Polynesian triangle - or nearly so. Easter Island, more than 1200 miles to the east south east is even further out in oceanic nowhere land. To the South are the two archipelagoes of the Gambiers and the Australs. 400 miles to the South West is the huge area taken up by the Tuamoto atolls - more than 20 of them, some of them larger than Tahiti. They used to be called the "Dangerous Islands" pre-satellite navigation because they are so low and hard to see and their positions not well charted. They are now quite well visited by yachts on their way from the Marquesas to Tahiti as they have beautifully clear water and fantastic coral reefs. We will be on our way there after visiting Nuku Hiva - the northernmost inhabited Marquesan island.



Vaitahu Village on Tahuata in a squall



Vaitahu from above

So far we have been surprised how neat and tidy are the small communities. France has certainly poured some government money this way and there is no sign of third world style poverty. The population in the Marquesas is well down from the numbers who used to live here at the beginning of European contact, but those who remain certainly seem to be living relatively affluent lifestyles with all the usual first world services you would expect in a French village plus the fact that every family has traditional land holdings with coconuts and plenty of fruit trees laden with everything. The cost of living seems very high to us used to places like Colombia, Panama and Ecuador and it's hard to see how the average cruiser can contemplate spending too long in French Polynesia, but certainly that seems to be the aim of many now that long stay visas are being issued more readily by the FP authorities in Papeete.

Meanwhile, a "full blown" El Nino has now been declared for the Pacific. That's not good news for the marine life up and down the Pacific Coast of South America, as well as the Galapagos. Not good news for farmers in Oz and NZ if it leads to the usual El Nino droughts, either. Not so sure how it will affect us as we drift further west. Usually it means less well developed trade winds (no sign of that yet!) and a greater likelihood of tropical depressions and cyclones in the Central and Eastern Pacific in the tropical summer. A cyclone has already developed off the coast of Mexico in the Northern hemisphere, so that avenue down to the Marquesas and French Polynesia has certainly been well shut down, even though boats are still trickling in from the Panamanian coast and Ecuador.



Church at Atuona, Hiva Oa