Fatu Hiva 10:27.89S 138:40.10W
Pacific Bliss
Colin Price
Thu 8 Dec 2011 01:30
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Fatu Hiva,
Marquesas, French Polynesia
As expected the trip up to the Marquesas was not an
enjoyable one. Actually it was the first trip where we very nearly turned
around. But we braved out the hideous crashing waves over the deck and
squalls of wind from every direction day and night, after a few day out at
sea things became the norm and perhaps a little less
scarey.  Catching yellow fin tuna on the
waySeeing landfall non the less was a
very happy sight and a dramatic on too. Having been in the moto's for so
long the arcapeligo where you never have to raise your eyes to see
land it's rather refreshing. We got to Fatu Hiva rather quickly which was
a blessing and managed to anchor off Hanavavae at dusk. It's known as the
bay of virgins but this hasn't always been the case. Pre the
invation of the french missionaries it was called the 'Bay of Penis' but this
was deem rather unsavory so the missionaries renamed it.
 It tends to take us a few days
to truely recover from a 5+ days passage. On our first morning we're
greeted by a Pod of Spinnar dolphins practicing there namesake. But
with such rough weather the children have been too fragile to contend with
any school, so we need to get back to the grindstone immediately.
With all these mountains about and the mountains
are really lush, it requires a rather large amount of rain. The clouds
above the phalic mountains are threatening for our entire stay.
    And so to Hanavavae. It's a
town weaving along the bottom of a steam valley so seem rather dark and
damp. The first person we speak to is Rosa, Later tagged by us
as 'Rosa the Ruthless.' Within milli-seconds of greeting us we where
invited to trade which at the time we were more than welcome to. The
following day we duely arrived laden with kids books etc but Rosa had failed to
produce any fruit. What we have now come to realise about Hanavavae is
it's the first port of call for most boats sailing from panama or mainland U.S,
with the exception of Galapagos. Boats come laden with trade which was a
big thing 5 yrs ago but now it's less necessary. So now anyboat coming
into the harbour is expected to do great trade for fruit. Not everyone in
the village is like this and we suspect we just came across a bit of a bad egg
but it didn't help with any blossoming love affair.
       Visiting the
ancient petroglphs of whales     A jungle walk to
the ancient marae (religious place)The following day we moved on to
the bay next door, Omoa. It's a much less visited bay which always
works for us and the folk seem genuinely happy to see us. The
village it totally beautiful, but most of all it's a joy to the
nostrils every 10mtr you head is full of another beautiful
fragrance eminating from ylang-ylang, gardenia, jasmine,
frangipane and Tiare and that's just the once that smell the others are
just an abundance of colour like
hibiscus, strelizia.
    Alfonse and Francois visit us for elevensesWe dropped
into Fatu Hiva and pick upa beautifully hand scultured bowl from a chap called
Temo - a young guy from the carving capital of the Marquesas, Ua Huka - more of
this later.
The Aranui,
which is a supply ship come cruise ship, moored off Omoa
 We have a pleasant 24 yrs sail up to
Nuka Hiva. We're all terribly excited to be here for the festival our
anticipation is to see a rather wonderful display of cultural dance dress and
music. Cosmo however seems more excited about the fact that
Christmas happens immidiatedly after.
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