Hard to believe we have been in these beautiful Islands for a week. We haven't been writing our blog entries as we've been busy site seeing and socializing. We are now in "the land of baguettes". We are on the larger Island of Hiva Oa, where we had to come to check into French Polynesia with the local Gendarme. This also is a very beautiful Island but without the intimate friendliness of Fatu Hiva. We have chosen to use an agent here, mainly because we had met Laurent in Mexico,and really liked him BUT the main reason for using him here is that we don't have to pay a bond to the equivalent of a return ticket home. Laurent has written us a Bond letter which guarantees the payment if we default and stay over our 90 days. Many yachts in the past would sail into this paradise and never leave, eventually becoming rust buckets in their beautiful anchorages and harbours. The bond makes sure you have enough money to keep going or return to your home country.

We are legal now, and have officially checked into French Polynesia which gives us 90 days to see The Marquesas, Tuamotus and the Society Islands, including Tahiti, Moorea and Bora Bora. Mia, Jade and my sister Gail are flying into Papeete on the 7th June. We'll have them on the boat for 2 days We'll sail before sailing them out to Moorea where we have booked a week in a resort for them (I'll get to stay with Mia and Jade). We can anchor the yacht right outside the resort, so I'm sure the other guests will be envious knowing that we have our own private yacht.

After they leave we will do another lot of provisioning and head off to the Cook Island in company with our friends on the yacht "Talerra"(they arrived here yesterday after a 24 day passage to our 20 days) We'll probably by then have collected quite a few other yachts who will leave at the same time or within days of us. We are meeting many more yachts now that have arrived from different parts of Mexico and now being joined by Europeans who have come here via the Panama Canal. We've met a couple of lovely Dutch people, one has a little 3 year old boy on board and a French couple who are both Doctors and have had a clinic here for 3 years. I invited them over for drinks one night in Fatu Hiva, which turned into dinner and they ended up taking Greg back to their boat for a consultation for an earache. Very handy!! they gave him some drops to keep him going and a prescription to have filled here in Hiva Oa. So I said I had traded drinks and dinner for a medical consultation WAY TO GO. I hope they will continue cruising with us, they're really nice people, similar age to us, who have owned their aluminum yacht for 30 years and have lived on it whilst they worked. They're not sure where they're going next (sort of in our direction) but want to stay in French speaking areas as they still have to work to support their cruising lifestyle.