Ann in front of the Bora Bora Yacht Club. Sounds bigger than it really is 😉

Kickin' back with a cold one

Our Berkeley Yacht Club burgee is now hanging in the Bora Bora Yacht Club (all the old ones blew away in a hurricane so they are looking for new ones and gave us a free Bora Bora burgee in return)

With a couple of the staff. Really, really, nice people.

The grand view. Yep, this is the club, with our burgee of course.

We relocated back North from where we were anchored and are now moored in front of the Bora Bora Yacht Club. Got some swag already as well. Turns out their roof blew off in a hurricane so they lost all their world yacht club flags and are giving free Bora Bora Yacht Club flags in exchange for ours. We “donated” our Berkeley YC flag and now have a lovely Bora Bora one to fly.

This place is truly amazing and beautiful. The architecture is very simple. Just some tall thatched roof huts for the bar, and dinning room and an expansive deck that leads seamlessly to a deep water dock where you can bring your boat to get water or supplies.

We sat on the dock and had Mai Tai’s watching the sun set over the water and a distant motu and reef off Bora Bora. I can’t even describe how lovely, picturesque (we forgot the camera though, so this description will have to do for now) and peaceful it was looking out toward the sunset with a dozen sailboats moored in front of us.

This morning was fun. We were sitting in the cockpit having coffee when the folks from Ladybug came rowing over in their dinghy. We invited them aboard for a coffee and next thing we knew, Buena Vista also came by and we invited them on board as well. All six of us were enjoying some coffee and talking about how fun the Great Dinghy Raft was the night before when we heard Orcinius hauling up their anchor. They got it up and motored over by us where we could shout our good-byes while I blew my conch shell horn. They are leaving French Polynesia for the Cooks. Their first intended stop is Rarotonga. That’s where we’re hoping to go so we’ve arranged to talk each night on the shortwave at 0600 Z (that’s 2000 local Bora Bora time) on channel 8B (6227.0 MHz).

Tomorrow’s big event is going to be (drum roll please)….a hike to the top of the Bora Bora mountain. Look it up on Google-it’s steep. We’ll see how we do and report back.

See you all after the climb, I mean hike!

Look at the shadow on the bottom of the boat in front of us. Now that's clear water.

Sunset dinghy cocktail party anyone?

Don and Deb from Buena Vista

Lisa and John from Orcinius

Jim and Karen from Sockdologer

This isn't fun anymore, let's go home...NOT

Just a big dinghy raft....with food and drink!

We were lucky. No wind and a gorgeous sunset.

It's getting a little dark, but let's do this again!

And the "morning after" coffee klatch on Charisma

We moved away from town and went “around the corner” to a most beautiful spot. It’s about 1/8 mile off the Hilton Hotel bungalows where people pay $500/night or more to experience paradise. Well, we are anchored in their backyard. The bungalows are out on the water and are very nice, but we’re right on the edge of the reef, so the water is stunningly clear and we have a view of the signature peaks of Bora Bora. All in all, a very nice spot. We spent much of the day snorkeling. First I dove the anchor. Then Buena Vista showed up so I stayed in the water to dive their anchor, then while I was waiting for them to back down on it, I saw what I thought was an octopus in a coral outcrop under their boat. I was going to dive and poke it, but thought I’d wait until they shut off their engine. Good thing. The “octopus” was actually a large (4-5′) Moray eel who was jealously guarding his domain. Don (Buena Vista) and I dove it later on and the eel would come out and chase us away.

After a break for lunch we went back in the water and swam all around the reef by the boats. After an hour of that, Don and Deb from Buena Vista got their dinghy and the four of us went ½ mile to another spot and snorkeled some more. I can honestly say; “I’m pooped” after spending upwards of a couple hours in the water.

Cocktails tonight should be fun. There’s about four boats here, all of whom are friends and we were thinking how are we gonna get all these people together on one boat for sunset cocktails. My solution? A dinghy raft. We’re all going to make our cocktails (Charismas for us of course), then get in our dinghies and drift about 20 yards back behind our boat into six feet of water near the reef, throw out an anchor or two and raft up to watch the sunset. Should be unique!

OK, so now it’s 2200 and we’re doing dishes from dinner (well, Ann’s actually doing them, I’m writing). The dinghy extravaganza was a big hit. We had four dinghies attending: Buena Vista, Sockdolager, Orcinius and Charisma. Each couple brought their own drinks and a snack. We were anchored in the middle of the Pacific Ocean having a cocktail while rafted together. OK, so we were inside the barrier reef of an island in the middle of the Pacific. It was still way cool. The sun set and the moon came out and the eight of us sat in our little rubber boats. In Paradise. We saw a couple manta rays jump. We could see the sandy bottom. We had our cocktails. Everyone said it was the most unique cocktail experience they had ever had and wanted to do it again.

The north pass at Raiatea. Again, the breakers if you stray outside the channel

Landfall Bora Bora

Coming in the pass at Bora Bora

Left Raiatea this morning. Took the inside passage up inside the reef all the way North through Tahaa doing 6 knots under sail in 15-20 knots wind. Beautiful sail. Went through the pass on the NW side into the ocean and did the 14 or so mile passage to Bora Bora. We are now moored inside the reef at Bora Bora. We had a wonderful evening starting with happy hour cocktails with friends we’ve met along the way including Mike and Barbara from Astarte, Craig and Bruce from Gato Go, Bruce and Marcellle from Adventure Bound and Robbie and Bev from Mersoliel and then Ann and I had a great dinner at the Mai Kai. Charisma is moored all of 100 feet from the restaurant’s dock. Nice. We finished the evening with after dinner drinks at Gato Go with Craig and Bruce who are moored right behind us.

We’re looking forward to the promised let up of wind tomorrow, but in any case, we’ll go ashore and do some exploring. It’s late, so that’s it for now.

We’ve added some new pictures going back to mid-June.  You may have to clear your cache and/or history in your browser to see them.  Enjoy!

We’re moving today out of Raiatea.  Nice day.  20 knots and we heard from another boat that the waves are not too big.  Let’s hope for a smooth ride over to Bora Bora.

Position: 16 degrees, 44 minutes south; 151 degrees, 29 minutes west

Infrastructure on Raitea (note the kitty on the right)

Our Pareos

My Pareo (they are very comfortable)

(Sitting here in my new dress…I bought a Parea in Tahiti. Men and women wear them in the islands. They are very comfortable. Google it to see. It’s basically a big sheet that you can wear many different ways and I’m enjoying its comfort). We are back on Raiatea. After a pretty calm couple of days, we’re back in the “wind events”. Today we woke on our mooring to 25 knots of wind and two plus foot waves. We were protected by the reef, but it was a mile away, so the “set” was far enough to produce some good size wind waves. We took our time having our coffee because we knew once we left it would be slammin’ all the way down to Raiatea. Turned out to be right as we saw gusts into the mid-thirties that heeled the boat even though we were motoring (most of the trip was into the wind).

The smartest thing we did yesterday was put the dinghy away before dinner. If we had left it out overnight we would have had a very difficult time this morning putting the engine away and getting it aboard. As it was, it was so windy and the waves so high, we had to sacrifice part of our mooring lines. Since hearing several stories of broken mooring lines, we have taken to tying bowlines into the moorings instead of just putting the line through the mooring and then back from one cleat around to the other side of the boat. This is the most elegant way to do it, but two things happen: It introduces friction and wearas the bow line goes through the mooring attachment and if your line chafes and breaks you have no back up. This is exactly what happened last week in Bora Bora to Blue Rodeo. Their mooring line chafed in fairly high winds and the boat went walkabout while they were ashore. If not for some of their neighbors (and Super Pedro- see our blog titled “Bowling Alley” from late June) there would have been a high price to pay and some changed cruising plans.

Anyway, we put two lines out- one from the port cleat and one from starboard. Each tied with a bowline to the mooring. That way we have a safety. The only issue is getting the bowline untied in high winds. You can’t. The boat is pulling too hard to get close enough to the mooring which is underwater from the force. Soooo…our exit included a carefully timed cutting of the lines. We basically left about ten feet of line from each side of the boat on the mooring instead of trying some heroic method of untying the lines in the big wind. First the port side since I wanted Charisma to “tack” over onto starboard for our departure. There was another boat on our starboard side and the wind was such that I knew when we untied we would be blown a ways before we could develop enough speed to gain steerage. Sure enough, we “tacked” to starboard, Ann cut the line and we got blown sideways a boat length at full throttle before I had steerage. We definitely would have hit the boat on our other side. As it was, we came closer to the reef than I would have normally liked. Oh well, all in a day in the islands…

We wanted to come back to the east side of Raiatea since that’s where all the services are but it’s blowing so hard (and will continue to do so for a few days) that we ducked over to the NW side where we’re having a very calm night. The island is blocking the wind. The downside is we’re going to have to hitch a ride to the other side and then a taxi back when we go into town for provisions to get us from here to Tonga or thereabouts. In other words three month’s worth of food. Actually we have a lot of it, but we’re perilously low on beer and we need some fresh veggies and fruits. We also need to officially check out with the Gendarmes. Seems amazing we’ve been here for three months. We’ll miss French Polynesia, but are looking forward to new adventures as we move west toward New Zealand.

Position: 16 degrees, 37 minutes south; 151 degrees, 26 minutes west

Tahaa is in the foreground. We were anchored off the little island (motu) at the bottom of the picture)

Water doesn't get too much clearer than this

A beautiful day. Hard to leave this spot.

Sailing down the Tahaa coast inside the reef

This morning was one of the most beautiful mornings we have had on the trip. We were anchored in the idyllic spot we have described, flanked by stunning views of Bora Bora, ice-blue water and reefs with incredible fish (and a huge moray eel and octopus). This morning we woke with not a breath of wind. When I came up on deck, I could look down and see our anchor chain and even the anchor itself in 20 or 30 feet of water. Most amazingly though was the dinghy. We left it in the water trailing out behind Charisma and when I look out at the dinghy it seemed to be floating in the air. The water was so clear I could see below it and it just wasn’t clear what was holding it up! Very cool.

It was only very reluctantly that we hoisted anchor on this day, but we had to move on. Our stay in Polynesia is about up and it’s time to provision and check out, so we had to move on. So…up anchor, thread out way through the bommies on the way back into the main channel around the island and off we go. Our goal on this day was to get halfway around Tahaa to a pearl farm where we could pick up a mooring, tour the pearl farm, hopefully stay the night and then back to Raiatea tomorrow to provision and check out with the Gendarmes.

It was a beautiful day. The wind was light and against the direction we needed to go, so we motored. Turned out to be a good thing since we really needed to make water and charge the batteries-both need a little extra “oomph” than just the solar panels can provide in the tropics when the afternoon clouds show up.

So, we found the pearl farm around noon. We tied up to the mooring and made lunch figuring they might be closed during the lunch hour as happens frequently in Polynesia (many stores are actually closed from 12-2:30). After we had lunch, we jumped in the dinghy and headed in. What we found were five ferocious looking dogs barking at us from the dock. Bad marketing I’d say. Anyway, I convinced Ann that she should step up and make friends with the doggies who were snarling and drooling at the prospect of biting us. She bravely stepped on the dock assuming that it would be poor retail etiquette to have dogs that bite customers. She was ultimately proven correct even though there were a couple of tense moments. Anyway, after making a tenuous friendship with the big doggies, we moved (cautiously) toward some of the buildings seeking someone who might be in charge of the pearl farm. It was deserted. We walked around and all the buildings were closed and the “boutique” was locked. Oops, it was Sunday. Just when we assumed we would have to go back to the boat, a nice young woman came out of somewhere and said that they were open. She called into one of the huts and out came a nice young man who said, “We’re open, we’re open!”

To shorten the story, it turns out they are not really open all the time. Only when people show up! As they explained, it keeps their costs down to not have to be open all of the time. We got a tour of the place and a demonstration of how they “make pearls”. During the demo, we also learned that they couldn’t actually make a profit here on Tahaa farming pearls so now they are just a demo place and boutique. Disappointing, but the guy was very nice and we had fun seeing how they “culture” pearls. He then opened the boutique (which was disappointing in lack of selection). I ended up buying a loose pearl for Ann. It was a very nice one, but more as a “thank you” for them opening for a private tour and as it turned out, letting us use their mooring for the night.

So, we’re in this bay with no other boats in sight because the bay is too deep to anchor in (hence the mooring-we’re in over 100 feet) It’s actually very peaceful and nice. It’s also raining as the weather is changing, so kind of nice to be tied to a mooring instead of hanging out on the reef waiting for possible nighttime winds to come that threaten to drive us onto the reef.

Tomorrow we go the last 10 miles around the island of Tahaa and back to Raiatea to provision for our next leg into the Cook Islands. We’re working on our list, but I can tell you beer, wine and rum are at the top of the list. Ahh, the essential commodities!

Anchored at Tahaa

SnorkelAnn!

SnorkelAnn and the YellowFish

Snorkeling!

Sea Anenome

Another view of Bora Bora in the background from the snorkeling spot at Coral Gardens off Tahaa

Mike from Astarte: "Is it time for a beer yet?"

This spot is so beautiful we decided to stay one more day now that the wind has dropped.

The colors are so amazing. We’re anchored just inside a deep blue line (i.e. about 50 feet) in 17 feet of water (cerulean blue) and just 20 feet behind us the water turns almost clear in six feet over sand. We look over that very pale blue color toward a motu with shimmering green coconut palms. All of this is set against deep blue sky with the distant purple outline of Bora Bora’s distinctive double peaked mountains about 10 miles away. Amazing that we’re here.

Much of today was just relaxing. We did a lot of lounging and reading, but also made time for two snorkel trips out to the reef. The highlights included an octopus and the biggest moray eel I have ever seen. I know water magnifies things, but this eel’s head was at least 10 inches tall and I could see it snake at least five feet back into the rock it was under. Just huge. When it came out to say; “hello”, I couldn’t get away from the rock fast enough. I don’t like eels. I haven’t had enough experience with them to know what to expect and they are so huge they could do a lot of damage if they wanted to.

Don and Deb from Buena Vista showed up in the afternoon and dropped anchor behind us. After they set we went for an afternoon dive, then just soaked up the sun the rest of the day. The evening included a pot-luck on Astarte with Buena Vista and Ladybug. Great fun and lots of laughs. We have to leave tomorrow and head back toward Raietea as Monday is our check out day for French Poly. Sad to go, but hope to continue friendships that we’ve made here on across the Pacific as we move west toward New Zealand.