Touring the Marquesas Islands

13 May 2023

by Johan van Dongen

This is the tale of my single handed sailing through the Marquesas islands over a period of 22 days.

French Polynesia lies in the middle of the Pacific, and it covers a (sea) area of the similar size like the whole of Europe (excluding Russia), and has a population of close to 300000 inhabitants, almost two third of which are living on the largest island, Tahiti.

Here a map of the whole Pacific Ocean, and the approximate track of our passage from Panama to the Marquesas. Note that we covered a bit over half of the total distance from Panama to New Zealand in this one passage, which took us about 31 days

And here a map (copied from the Tahiti Airways website) showing the whole of French Polynesia against the background of a map of Europe, on the same scale, just to show the huge size of "overseas collectivity of France" called "French Polynesia". The Marquesas are on the righthand upper side of the map. They are one of the five island groups in French Polynesia, the others being the Tuamotus (in the center) and the Society Islands (left and of center), which I both visited, as well as the Gambier Islands (bottom right) and the Austral Islands (bottom left), which I didn't visit.

In general, it was with a lot of excitement that I visited French Polynesia. I mean, this is a part of the world that most people don't get a chance to visit, and it is also one that we generally know very little about. I was lucky enough to buy copies of James Michener's "Tales of the South Pacific" and "Hawaii", which both gave me some idea of the culture of the people, whose territory I was about to enter. I would just say, that these people have some very distinct features, both in their behavior, their capabilities, especially as to their mastery of traveling at sea, and in their appearance, that I really got to appreciate as I moved through these territories.

Some characteristics that are immediately noticeable are:

- Extremely friendly, hospitable and generous. This of course varies from place to place, and probably depends also on the experiences by locals with tourists (which are a major source of income everywhere). But in many of the less travelled areas it is very common to wave hello to everyone one passes on the road, with a big smile, even if you don't know them.

- Certain facial features, that I can not describe, but that are different from any other races, It is said somewhere that these people originated long ago from the general area of Taiwan. I personally found them most resembling the North American Indians, as we generally know them.

- Different beauty ideal than we are used to in the West. We generally like lean, even skinny people, probably also because it is more healthy. In this area, at least for now, the ideal is to be obese. A very large majority of people is very much overweight by our standards. That comes also to expression in the billboards that one sees along the roads, for cellular companies for example. The people in the pictures are largely very much overweight.

- In many places there are an uncommonly large number of transgenders (or transvestites), specifically males with behaviours and clothing of women. One can read up about it, it is a subject many times mentioned. And other than in our Western culture it is my strong impression that it is not frowned upon, or leading to controversy, not are these people in any way apologetic or shy, or even overly emphasizing the feature. It appears to be a legitimate accepted choice.

- These people love to sing and make music. And are very good at it. I have come upon this all over the reqion. One of the places where this comes very much to expression is in the churches, on Sunday, where the singing, in many voices, is extremely enthusiast. Also, their playing of the (Pacific) ukulele is very developed, as is the playing of many types of improvised percussion instruments.

- They seem to love dancing and taking part in colourful festivals.

- They love tidiness in the villages and towns and colorful public gardening, Also, this is universal in the Pacific that I have seen.

- Artwork, especially wood carving and stone sculpturing is very developed, and with a very specific, in my eyes beautiful, style.

- In French Polynesia one comes upon many, many, religious sites from ancient time, mostly ceremonial platforms made from black volcanic stones, some with statues. Today these sites are not in use, although they in general are well maintained. As I understand there is very little known about the religions these sites served. The whole region converted to Christianity, and all the memories of old times became lost (there was no writing at the time). It is thought that those religions included human sacrifices and cannibalistic rituals. It was not a pleasant thought to me, when I came to those sites, and therefore I could not really become very enthusiast about them.

The Marquesas

The Marquesas are a sub group of islands towards the North East of French Polynesia - the largest of which are shown in the map below. They are of recent volcanic origin, and have close to 10000 inhabitants Below is KAIA's track through the Marquesas:

As you can see, the rightmost island on the map, Fatu Hiva, is the island closest to Panama. The reason that we first sailed to Hiva Oa was that this is an official entry port for French Polynesia, while Fatu Hiva is not.

Itinerary through the Marquesas

On the way from Panama, I had gone through all the guide books that I had, and had marked the anchorages that had recommendations of some sorts. "Well protected" against most common winds and waves, was of course an important one, availability of a "dinghy dock" (a small outcrop reachable by dinghy without having to get out of the dinghy and get your feet wet), provisioning possibilities (is there a supermarket), availability of other services such as car rental, as well as remarks such as "Manta Rays can regularly be observed in this bay", or "Ä trail near the head of the bay leads to a waterfall", and absence of (rare) remarks such as "The local inhabitants are not friendly towards visiting yachts".

Each of the larger islands of the Marquesas had numerous interesting locations to visit, so I had set out a routing that included almost all points of interest, on 6 of the islands, which indeed I followed almost to perfection.

Sailing alone

I had never before sailed alone, except for very short distances. Now that I had parted again from my crew, I was looking forward to have the boat to myself for a while. None of the passages within the Marquesas would be longer than about 20 hours, which is a time I can easily stay awake for watch keeping. Being it was the first time I would be sailing "single handed", I set myself some rules to which to adhere, to ensure my safety and that of the boat.

1. No passages where I would arrive to the new destination after dark. This is a good rule also when sailing with crew to new destinations. In many cases I added engines to ensure that I'd arrive to the destination well before sunset.

2. Only leave when you will be able to reach a very well protected anchorage. You don't want to be struggling with a reluctant anchor winch while the wind blows you towards shallow areas.

3. During the passage venture out of the cockpit only when strictly required, and always attached to a lifeline.

4. Every action you do - think it through in your mind - will you be able to do it alone, also in case things do not go as expected.

5. As it came out, I almost never used the main sail, but only motored, together with the head sail in all the passages in the Marquesas, being the head sail can be fully deployed and furled from the cockpit.

Hereafter a description of experiences and activities along the way, per island.

HIVA OA

When we arrived to Atuona, on the south coast of the island, the landscape was more or less what I had imagined, quite wild and sharp landscape features.

I had had no idea what to expect as to the way of life, the type of people, availability of drinking water, electricity, transport, vegetation, animals. The harbor, outside of which we had anchored, was about half an hour walk from the center of the town, along a good road where one could get a hike. There appeared to be a strong French presence, in the form of army buildings and the gendarmerie, which functioned as border police. The town was very orderly and with a lot of pretty vegetation. There was a post office, where local SIM's could be obtained. There were 3 well assorted super markets, with very high prices, where one could pay with credit cards. There was an ATM to get local cash in French Polynesian Franc (XPF), about 100 XPF is about 1 US$. I saw a school, and a nice church.

There is a Paul Gaugin exhibition (copies of original works), and I found that higher up I would be able to find the graves of Paul Gaugin and of Jacques Brel, both of which spent their last years on Hiva Oa, so I understand. There were cars for rent, there was a hardware store, and it turned out that right next to the harbor was the only yacht ship yard with haul out and storage facility in the Marquesas., which also included a small chandlery.

I had the gear oil of my new outboard engine replaced at that shipyard (per the motor handbook). I had earlier unsuccessfully tried to do the job myself, and had made an incredible oil mess on the boat. Here you see how two people are required to get it done.

I explored the surroundings of Atuona on foot, here a picture from the other side

Then I rented a car for a day. With that I visited some further locations in Atuona, as well as on the island:

Grave of Gaugin

Grave of Jacques Brel

The Gaugin exhibition

I wanted to explore the wild country side a bit more, but most roads and paths inland ended after a short distance. But on one of them I stumbled upon a religious site on the hill slope.

I then went to the middle of the island, where the airport is. Strange to see an active airport totally deserted.

The whole center of the island is devoid of any inhabitation, and is wild and beautiful.

I drove over to the north side of the island.
Again the landscapes are wild and beautiful, with very few inhabitants.

When entering a village it stands out how colorful the vegetation was on the sides of the road. This turned out to be the pattern over the whole of French Polynesia. A lot of effort I invested in the appearance of villages.

Near the east end of the island there is the Bay of Paumau, near to which there is an especially well preserved religious site. Even though the whole population, as far as I know, is Christian, the sites are treated with obvious respect, written explanations are provided in Tahitian, French and English, and the sites are kept clean and attractive.

While in Atuona (on May 17th), I ordered tickets to go back home for various errands and to bring my spouse, for June 19th, giving me a month to see the Marquesas, as well as have a quick look at the Tuamotus. The tickets were such that I could change the travel dates, if such would be necessary.

After a week in Atuona I felt the time had come to move on, and to "set sail" (I actually motored...) to the next island on the itinerary.

FATU HIVA

I started out badly on my first single handed passage, and sinned against one of the main principles I had set out for myself - arrival in daylight. As it was, I had started out late in the morning without a precise prediction of how long it would take me to Fatu Hiva, encountered quite strong head winds, and had to motor sail at high engine power (which I normally try to avoid), but still made it to the destination anchorage only by ~ 21:00 in the evening, when it was already fully dark (sunset was ~17:30) . Luckily the anchorage was not very full, and I had my strong, remotely operable, search light to find out where I would have sufficient space away from other boats, and from the rocks on the shore, while staying in not too deep water (according to the map, confirmed by my depth meter), and succeeded to anchor safely.

Looking back on Hiva Oa (right), and on Tahuata (center and left)

Looking forward to Fatu Hiva

In the remainder of the night a remarkable episode evolved, as follows. A few years ago I had been operated in my lower stomach area, and one of the remaining effects of the operation is, that I occasionally (less than once a year) develop a feeling of my digesting tract being blocked. I had had it twice before, once including hospitalization for observation, and now, at night, and just arrived at the anchorage of Fatu Hiva, I was developing the same condition. It is a really upsetting feeling, unpleasant and causing not little anxiety. I had been sending messages to my sister (who is a doctor's assistant) in Amsterdam, and she had been searching in the internet regarding urgent healthcare on Fatu Hiva, in the village Hanavave located right next to my anchorage. We had found a phone number, but got a message in French that neither of us understood. After an hour or two, I had found some methods to seemingly relieve the blockage, and started to feel better, and went to sleep. Apparently, my sister left a message at the Hanavave first aid post phone number, because at around 5 o'clock in the morning I heard voices and knocking on the hull of my boat! Totally surprised I went out, and in pitch dark found right next to my boat a smaller boat, a small launch with an outboard motor, with a guy driving, and a woman talking with me, I think in English. She was asking me if I had called the first help, and when I confirmed she told me to come with her. We would go to the nurse in the next village (3 miles per boat), and if necessary, I would be brought by air plane to Papeete for further treatment. She made it clear that she had received the message from my sister, with the name of the boat, and had told her husband to take their launch in the middle of the night to go and find the foreigner suffering from a serious condition in his boat. Wow. That was something. I felt much better already, and did not like the prospect of leaving my boat at the anchorage, and who knows when to return etc. So I told her that I really appreciated her offer, but that I already felt much better, and that I preferred to stay in bed on the boat, and if necessary, would come to her in the village, and take it from there. With that she left me and went home, I presume.

Search for first aid provider

The next morning, this was the view I encountered:

I took the dinghy to shore and went to look for the health worker who had visited me in the night.

Hanaveve harbor

I walked through the village of Hanavave and asked people for the nurse.

Locals happy to be photographed

I was pointed the way to her home, and in the end a girl took me to her home.

The girl (right) who helped me locate the health worker

However, she wasn't home, and a neighbor said she went out to watch the football game being played on a field close to shore. So she took me to that field, which was full with people, and after some more asking around I finally found the woman who had visited me. I did not really know how she looked, because it had been very dark, but I think in the end I came to the right woman. I tried to thank her, and tell her I was OK, but quickly got the impression that she was not really very interested, and that I was disturbing her following the game. So that was when I let go.

About the Bay of Virgins

Fatu Hiva is supposed to be one of the most beautiful islands, if not THE most beautiful, in the Marquesas. And indeed the view from the boat, in the Bay of Virgins is very striking, and in fact pictures of it appear on many sailing / cruising publications and websites. The story about the name is, according to what I read, that the bay originally was called the "Bay of Penises", but when missionaries arrived to the island, they were not very happy with that name, and it was changed to its current name.

Walk on the island to Waterfall

Apart from the beauty of the bay, it was difficult to get an impression of the island from the boat. I would have rented a car, but did not succeed to find one, or maybe there just weren't any. I looked up what would be an interesting site nearby and found that there is a waterfall not too far from the bay. So I set out to find that waterfall. I followed the road through Hanavave, and quickly was outside of the village on the road leading to the main village called Omoa.

Pictures walking through the village of Hanavave

The country side around me was beautiful. At the sign I left the road on a path.

As I went on the path became less defined and at some point it became unclear where I should go, and I returned to Hanavave.

When taking the dinghy back to the boat, I couldn't resist taking a picture of the boat against the beautiful Bay of Virgins background.

Strong rains

During the night strong rains fell down, and the wash off from the island made the water brown.

Later on, it continued raining... a lot!

Trip with dinghy to Omoa

I was curious how the island looks towards Omoa, and decided to try and reach Omoa by dinghy.
The views were spectacular, At some point I came upon a big hole in the mountain.

The rest of the views I let speak for themselves.

About halfway to Omoa, I started to feel uneasy to go too far from the boat, on my own, and decided to return.

Here a picture of the view on the way back. To understand the scale, find the boats anchored in the Bay of Virgins (on the right)...

A further picture of the scenery, towards the end of the day.

What followed was a beautiful sundown...

The next morning I left early to reach my next destination, Tahuata, as early as possible.
Here last views back on Fatu Hiva.

TAHUATA

My destination on Tahuata was the Hana Moe Noa Bay, on the North West coast, where there were supposed to be resident manta rays, which I was hoping to observe. Otherwise, I did not have any special expectations of this island, except that I wanted to have a general look at it, while it would serve as a suitable stop between two day sails on the way to the northern islands.

As I got further away from Fatu Hiva behind me, the impressive outlines of Tahuata stared looming in front. It is one of the smaller islands in the Marequesas, but at some point in history is said to have had at least 5000 inhabitants (today less that 1000), while containing remains of volcanic mountains of around 1000 meters high.

Nearing it from the south and sailing around it on its west side, it presented quite a spectacular sight.

I anchored in the bay and did not see any manta rays.

The next morning I woke to the quite view of the same bay.

I explored the bay a bit with the dinghy, visited a neighboring Swiss yacht, still did not see any signs of manta rays. Now, while writing the blog, I find that I visited the wrong bay (continued one bay too far), so the absence of manta rays is not wholly surprising.

I also also did not see any sign of where I would be able to rent a car for exploring the island. And so I decided to move on and left mid day towards my next destination.
Here a view back on Tahuata, with the bay I had anchored in on the right. And Hiva Oa close to it on the left.

HIVA OA (again)

I had already been on Hiva Oa, including road trips all over the island, except in its North West corner, where there was supposed to be a nice bay, the Hanamenu Bay. This bay was also almost right on track from Tahuata to the Ua Huka island further North, and would serve as a good overnight stop to split that long stretch into two easily manageable day trips.

Passing by Hiva Oa on its West side was nice but not overly spectacular (to the right is the end of Tahuata).

Approaching the West corner of Hiva Oa.

After rounding the corner the destination bay comes into view. It is actually two bays, separated by a tongue of land with a big dark rock at its end.

Right in front of the two bays and the rock. An impressive sight.

At the end of the left bay (the deeper one), at anchor already.

Almost the same picture, an hour later.

Looking out towards the sea, close to sunset.

With no one else in the bay, it felt pretty desolated. There were some buildings close to the beach, and I remember seeing the silhouette's of a person or two sitting next to one of them. The only way to get to land was to land the dinghy on the beach, which is a pretty challenging activity on your own. You have to jump into the water, pull the dinghy to the beach and somehow get it a bit out of the water. The dinghy is pretty heavy, and has no wheels with which you can roll it up the beach.
I decided to leave the bay very soon, and leave this place for what it was. The passage to the next island, named Ua Huka, was the longest I would make within the Marquesas, and I needed to start out as early as possible, to arrive before nightfall. In the end, I left at about 2 in the morning

UA HUKA

Ua Huka was an island that I had not found much information on during my preparations, and I visited it only because it was on my way, and who knows, I would come upon something interesting. The available anchorages were all supposed to be quite exposed and wavy. So, it was with some apprehension that I approached the island.

As I approached the island I made some pictures of the island, and of myself, sitting on one of the bow seats:

My plan was to explore the protective looking bays on the South coast, starting with the Hane Bay, then the Vaipaee Bay, and if neither looked sufficiently protective, move on the Haivei Bay on the South East coast, which was said to be the best anchorage.

The Hane Bay has an impressive rock island just outside of it:

Inside, it looked quite nice, with some buildings, but there did not seem to be a good way to land on shore with the dinghy.

I then moved on in the direction of the next bay, the Vaipaee Bay. On the way I came by a very dark rock, not looking very inviting.

The Vaipaee Bay was very narrow, with shallow patches, and some local small boats anchored in the middle. I have no pictures of that, I did not feel comfortable anchoring there, and I decided to move on towards the Haivei Bay.

At this stage I gave up any ambition to go onto the island, as it did not appear to have any facilities to explore it, and I only hoped to find a good place to anchor for the night.

This is the entrance to the Haivei Bay.

And this is from the boat at anchor.

A nice looking beach, but I remember not being sure that the holding was very firm, and after resting a few hours, I left at around mid night for the 10 hour passage to the next island, Ua Pou, where I expected to find a good anchorage, and where there were said to be plenty of interesting activities to be pursued.

Here is the track that I made between the anchorages of Ua Huka:

Around midnight I lifted anchor and in pitch darkness navigated out of the bay I had been anchored in.

UA POU

I set course straight to Ua Pou, a passage of 68 n.m, which would take between 10 - 14 hours. During this passage, at around 4:30 I got a warning from my AIS (Automatic Identification System) for a ship, apparently going the opposite way, from Ua Pou to Ua Huku. heading straight for me. I could see it was a big ship, and as I do in many cases, contacted it by VHF to verify that it was aware of my presence. This to prevent occasions in the past of ships suddenly changing course and colliding with yachts. In this case I knew the ship that was coming towards me - it was the Aranui 5, a well-known (in this area) modern combined half cargo / half cruise ship, I think it is a one of a kind. So we both changed course a bit and passed each other a bit later at a distance of of about 1 n.m. See screenshot of the AIS app on my smartphone below.

At a bit after 7 in the morning, Ua Pou was well visible in front of me,

and a bit nearer at 8:24

while at 9:31 the wonderful scenery of the island is fully visible

At 9:57 I am at anchor almost behind the break water of the Hakahau harbor, the main harbor of Ua Pou. My first well protected anchorage in French Polynesia.

Next to me children were training in their single out rigger canoes, which is a very popular sport in the whole of French Polynesia.

I quickly lowered the dinghy and headed towards the pier in the harbor,

And soon found a restaurant in the town

I then succeeded to find a sturdy rental car

and did some driving around to try to get a feel for what the island has to offer. Hakahau is the main town on the island, located in its North East, and there is a road leading South along the East coast, which ends close to the Southern tip of the island, and then there is another road leading along the West side, but does not meet the other road. Today I decided to explore the East side a bit. The weather is cloudy, the roads are sometimes rough and bumpy, and the views are nice, but not amazing, except where one can see the central peaks.

I am impressed by the huge Banyan trees spread all over the island.

I end the day with driving up the hill next to Hakahao, for a nice view on the town and its harbor (note the KAIA in the middle).

The next morning, the first item on the agenda was to fill up de boat with diesel oil. The method is to top up the boats tanks (100 liter on each side) from the jerry cans (there are 8 jerrycans on board, each 20 liter). Then put all the empty (or as many as deemed necessary) jerrycans in the dinghy, put them in the van, get them filled up at the local petrol station, back to the dinghy, and then to the boat.
The jerrycans in the dinghy and on the dock

The petrol station - just a rubber hose with a volume counter in it coming from a big tank.

The friendly petrol station operator

With that done, I used the remainder of the car rental time (I had taken it for 24 hours) to travel the West side of the island. The weather was more benign today. Below some highlights of what I came upon during the car trip.

Everywhere you drive, the impressive towers in the center of the island dominate the view...
At the island's Gendarmerie post:

Along the way:

Even at the airport. Note that this is said to be a challenging airport to land on, the start of the runway is right at the beach, the end of the runway is in front of the mountains, and it has a considerable upward slope.

On the way I came upon wild horses grazing.

This is the bay of Hakahetau, also a favourite anchorage for cruisers.

After returning the rental car, I did some shopping in the local shopping center,

and went back to the boat, enjoying the lovely view,

as well as marveling at the outrigger canoe rowers training on the open sea.

Next morning, I went on shore around 7 in the morning. My goal was to walk on my own towards one of those high peaks on the island, or at least to get as close as possible.

On the beach there was a lot of activity around the outrigger canoes. Obviously, this is an important sport on this islands, and, as I found out later, on all of the French Polynesian islands.

Around the harbour there are a number of beautiful statues, in the unique typical style one sees all through French Polynesia.

I took a street leading in the direction of the mountains.

On the way I passed a nice house

Soon I was in the outskirts of the of the town

Outside the town, I slipped into a private garden to take a picture of the view from that garden.

Going on, I came upon various components of the Ua Pou water supply system...

Finally, the path turned away from the mountains, and I could not find any other path to get closer to the mountains. So this is how far I got. The mountain in the picture on the right is the Poutetainui.

I went back a slightly different route, with its own striking views.

Back on the beach I came upon lovely Éric, Sabine, their daughter and grandson, of the MORVRAN, which I had earlier met in Shelter Bay Marina.

Within less than an hour after that I was on my way to my last Marquesas island Nuku Hiva, and looked back to Ua Pou, which had been a real delight for me.

NUKU HIVA

I continued towards Nuku Hiva, and arrived there around 7 in the evening, in the dark, and dropped anchor in Controllers Bay, at the South East corner of the island. Although the bay has a road on its side, and there are houses, the bay was very dark, and I went to sleep early.
The next morning I took things easy. I did not feel like exploring the shore. It looked like this:

Looking towards the bay exit like this:

I decided to leave this anchorage and to continue in an anti clockwise direction around the island and head straight for Anaho Bay, about which I had heard that it is very beautiful and well protected.
Leaving the Controllers Bay:

At the inside of the South East corner of the island

On the outside of the South East corner:

On the way along the East coast going North

After rounding the North East corner, at the entrance to the Anaho Bay:

Inside the Anaho Bay:

Once at anchor the weather cleared up a bit:

The next morning I notice a big yacht/ship has anchored not far from me.

Turned out to be a luxury explorer cruise boat.

I let the dinghy out and make it to the shore, to explore the beach and the bay a bit.
After a while I am joined by a big group of people arriving to the beach in a big auxiliary boat from the explorer ship. It is a spectacle - there seem to be guides and customers, with the former arranging entertainment and guidance for the latter.

I leave them and start to walk to the end of the beach. There are various buildings on the shore, including a church, and canoe storages, but there is nobody, and I would like to go to a restaurant.

From somewhere I know that in the next bay there is a small village, and I decide to try to reach it. Quickly it turns out that there is no other way than to climb up a path to the pass over the ridge (~50 meters high) that separates the two bays, and to descend on the other side.

I climb up the path and reach the pass, where there is a big antenna station, apparently to pass on cellular coverage from the village to the Anaho Bay.

At that point I am overtaken by somebody younger and more fit than myself, who offers to take a picture of me against the view over Anaho Bay.

The guy turns out to be a professional sailor on the explorer ship who is trying to make a quick trip on foot to the same village that I am aiming for.

Here another picture of the beautiful Anaho Bay from about the same spot, without myself:

I am going down the other side of the ridge towards the village of Hatiheu, on the Bay of Hatiheu

And soon arrive to the seafront in this beautiful bay.

There is indeed a restaurant, and I am enjoying a really good lunch.

After the meal I am going down to the very small port of the town, and to my surprise see the same explorer ship now anchored in this bay, and again bringing its passengers to shore.

On this side the reception is even more of a spectacle - each dinghy load of passengers is welcomed by drum music and by a festively clothed local woman.

After I climbed back over the ridge to get back to the boat I found this message in my dinghy.

Lovely Debbie of S/V Thursday's Child had gone to all boats in the bay and left the same message everywhere, and indeed at 15:30 a large group of cruisers assembled on the beach, and we had a lovely small beach party. One of the attendants was Jeanne Socrates, a woman of 80, who had sailed solo around the world. Great initiative by Debbie!

Even though Anaho Bay was really beautiful, protected and quiet, I felt no reason to stay further, and decided to continue my anti clock wise circumnavigation of the island, and proceed to "Daniels Bay", which is located near the opposite corner of the island.

At around 11 in the morning I left Anaho Bay:

At around 12 I passed by the Bay of Hatiheu, that I had visited on foot the day before.

A little later I passed by a remarkable rock formation...

At 13:30 I neared the North West corner of the island. This is where the airport lies. Even through the runway lies right next to the sea, one can not see it from sea level, one has to imagine it...

After rounding the North West corner of the island, I sailed South along the West coast of the island. There is a well regarded anchorage there, close to the airport, in Haaopu Bay. When I passed it (around 14:00), it was deserted.

A little later I was joined by a small pod of dolphins, which accompanied me for a while:

At around 16:00 I rounded the South West corner of the island.

One can see that when rounding the corner, the whole view on the South coast of the island opens up. Another effect of rounding the corner was, that I was suddenly exposed to quite strong trade winds (from the South East) and associated swell...

At around 16:45 I arrived to Daniels's Bay, with a few yachts already anchored there.

This quite long passage had gone really well, and quite fast.

The next morning, I woke up early, as I planned to go on shore and hoped to hike towards the Vaipo falls, a must-see, from all I that had heard and read. I think the highest waterfall in the Pacific, except maybe for New Zealand. However, things turned out differently.
But first some general info on this area.
The official name of Daniel's Bay is Hakatea Bay, which is part of a larger three-lobed bay called Taioa Bay. The Daniel name is after a guy who used to live here and offer some services. From the the first lobe of the Taioa bay, which has no name that I am aware off, a path leads to the Vaipo waterfall. Unfortunately I made no further pictures in Daniel's Bay.

I let the dinghy in the water, and headed for the bay where the path started.

Unfortunately, there was quite a swell coming in from the sea, leading to very high waves near the beach that I was heading for. It looked like more than I was willing to handle and risk, and I decided not to land there.

So I went back to the bay where I was anchored, where I succeeded to reach the beach easily. I hoped to be able to reach the path to the waterfalls from here, but although searching out some paths that I found, none seemed to lead in the right direction, so in the end I gave up and went back to the boat. Later others told me that they did succeed to reach the waterfalls from this beach.

There was another story that made me feel less at ease in this place, as follows: One can easily find on the internet that in 2011 a German cruiser had landed here with his girl friend, and was murdered by his local touring guide, under extremely bizarre circumstances. Even though the murderer was found and is now in jail, the story helped to make the location less attractive to me.

Anyway, I went back to the boat, and decided to go straight to my final destination in the Marquesas, the town of Taiohae in Taiohae Bay, located about 5 miles East of Daniel's Bay.

Taiohae is the largest port in the whole Marquesas. I intended to rent a car there, and use it to see as much as possible of the island of Nuku Hiva.
Taiohae also would be the departure point for leaving the Marquesas and continue to the Tuamotu islands, also part of French Polynesia, a passage of about 3 days.
I also hoped that Taiohae would be a good place to find crew to join me on that passage, as I expected a lot of cruisers to come together here, and if a hitchhiker were looking for a yacht to hop on for travelling further West, the best place to find it would be here.
Even through I had been touring the Marquesas for about 3 weeks all alone, all the passages had been daytime passages, and I could handle them alone, without sleeping. With the passage to the Tuamotus being 3 days, I knew I could not handle that without sleeping, and preferred not to have to do it alone.

So around 13:00 I left Daniel's Bay,

rounding the reefs at the entrance,

and after a bit over an hour approached the big rock at the entrance to the Taiohae Bay.

There were 30 - 40 yachts anchored in this large protected bay. I passed next to SV Delos, a celeb in the field of cruisers (top earner from views of his blogs), and half an hour later was anchored in a good spot, close to shore, between a lot of other yachts.

Pictures looking out from my anchorage towards the open sea:

I lowered the dinghy and took it to the dinghy dock,

walked along the beach,

found quite a few ads in shop windows by crew looking for a yacht,

then sat down to play a bit with my drone.

The next day I made my own ad for finding crew:

and put it on several bulletin boards in town.

In addition I tried to contact the people from the ads I had earlier seen, but apparently they were all obsolete, and nothing came from them.

In a local community hall I witnessed some amazing Ori Tahiti dancing training, with live music.

I quickly found a rental car.
Side note - out of general curiosity, and I admit unwisely, I asked the owner of the rental agency if she had heard about the story with the German tourist who had been murdered. I was a quite taken aback by her answer, and regretted that I had asked: she said the person convicted of the murder is a nephew of hers, and that he had been sexually assaulted by the German tourist. Oh well. Actually, I had heard that this was his version of events, and I quickly returned to discuss the rental transaction at hand.

Very soon after I put up my ad, I was called by Chris, and we arranged to meet. I quickly decided to take him on. Chris is a very interesting person, who is travelling the world by hitchhiking on sailing yachts. He had arrived here with a yacht, and temporary split with the owner with the agreement that he would join her again a month or two later in Tahiti, which suited me well, as I was expecting that in Tahiti my spouse Ruth would join me. He was the type of hitchhiker for whom it is important to "earn his way" and indeed an outstandingly diligent, hard working, and pleasant crew member. This is us together after the first meeting

By chance we came upon another yachties couple, who knew Chris, and who wholeheartedly recommended him as crewmember.

Chris was staying in some lodging in town, and we agreed to meet the next day, do shopping together in preparation for the passage to the Tuamotus, after which he would join and come to live on my boat, and we would depart the day after.

So now I was free to explore the island with my rental car. This is a driving map of Nuku Hiva, which I received from my rental car agency:

I travelled with the car from Taiohae (bottom center) to the Moake Lookout (just above Taihae), and then on almost to the airport (top left). Then all the way back and on to Taipivai (right center), and almost up to Hatiheu (top right), and from there back to Taiohae,

The changing landscape on the island is fascinating. My pictures below do not give full credit to the beauty of the island. And there is much more to see than I saw.

This is the Moake lookout:

Note the wild horses roaming next to the lookout.

And this is the view from the lookout itself:

I let up the drone:

and from this increased height the view was obviously much better:

Same picture, with arrow pointed at the KAIA:

Note also the silhouette of Ua Pou in the far distance!

Then I went on all the way to the airport in the North West corner of the island. I have no picture of that, only of the area not far from it.

From there I went back, passed by what is called the "Grand Canyon" of Nuku Hiva:

This is take from close to the highest point on Huku Niva (1224 m), looking East, overlooking the plateau in the center of the island:

Driving on the plateau, through mostly pine forests, one comes upon wild horses:

and upon the occasional (free) cow:

Later on, close to Taipivai, I get a good view on the Commander's Bay, the first bay that I anchored in on Nuku Hiva:

From there onwards in the direction of Hatiheu. Pictures of the Bay of Hatiheu as I got closer:

Hatiheu Bay from a different viewpoint. This is where I visited on foot from the neighbouring Anaho Bay.

On the way back, I noticed this waterfall not far from the road:

And a beautiful banyan tree:

Finally, just before arrival a view on Taiohae. Note again the outlines of Ua Pou in the background.

The next day was a day full with shopping ("provisioning") together with Chris, as well doing a lot of laundry, also to provide Chris a clean cabin to arrive to.