Tahiti Tales
Serai
Jason and Emily Willis
Thu 12 Jul 2007 21:00
Its strange how you get a mental picure of a places before you arrive. We had not expected to like Tahiti at all, thinking it would be a big city with too many people and too much traffic. Luckily for us this preconception turned out to be false and we loved our time there. Perhaps we were just ready for a 'city' after all. Of course the first few days were spent repairing the boat from all the damage sustained on the trip over.
I spent 2 days down in the engine 'hole', rarely being allowed out until the engine worked. It was a tricky business as the engine kept hunting, suggesting air in the system. I took apart the fuel lift pump and the both fuel housings, and also blew out some of the pipes in case dirty fuel was our problem. One element or a combination of things worked, and we now have an engine that works again and does not 'hunt'. Next up was mending the hole left by the stanchion when it ripped out of the deck. This involved borrowing a Dremmel (I think now that no boat should put to sea without one of these, and the one I borrowed was a cordless version too - thanks S/Y Barefeet!) and the sanding a bigger hole with angled sides. I then cut up a block of wood and sculpted a bung to fit snugly in the hole. Once lashings of epoxy resin were applied, then the bung could be slipped into place and left to 'go off'. Once hard, the whole lot could be sanded down to just below deck level and then painted. Frankly I don't think Bob the Builder could have done a better job! Whilst repairing the engine we noticed that the steering cables had come loose from the wheels that keep them in line. This could have caused us a lot of grief, so we were lucky to spot it before it did. We loosened off the cables and then put them back on the wheels - good to go again. Our chartplotter had also stopped getting a GPS fix, so we managed to get Geoff from S\Y Sifar to come and fix that, as he's an electronics engineer!
Jobs all done, I was now allowed to have some fun. We were invited to a 4th Juy party on board Barefeet. This was an afternoon event lacking in French company, surprisingly, as American independence owes much to the help of the French and the insistence of the British forces to wearing very bright red uniforms. We had burgers and pecan pie and far too much beer. We, of course, were the last to leave and probably quite outstayed our welcome, but I had been in a very dark place for days so was enjoying the company far too much.
Sifar organised a 4x4 eco Land Rover trip into the interior of the island. We could not resist going along and had a really great day out. A Tahitian man took us. He turned up in big boots, camo shorts and sleaveless top. There seemed plenty of muscle and tatoos on show, and all the girls swooned. There followed an amazing display of outrageous flirting from each of our 'ladies' - have they no shame! To be fair we learnt a lot about tahiti from the guy, who I named Do It All, as his real name was unpronounceable and Do It All seemed to fit as he had done everything - he raced outriggers, he was a scuba instructor, a Tahitian dancer, a high diver, a base jumper...
Whilst in Tahiti we were lucky enough to be there when a dance competition was on, so we bought tickets and went along. It was amazing! There was over a hundred men and women on the dancefloor all dressed rather scantily and performed energetically for over 3 hours. Wow they can really move. The only rest bite for them being when a particularly bad singing group too center stage and proceeded to murder several traditional Tahitian songs (unless of course this was how they were meant to sound). At one point Ems had to be physically restrained from walking out, so bad was the singing. We could certainly understand why the sailors on the Bounty fell in love with Tahiti and even more so with her women.
According to our diving magazine there are 2 good dives here in Tahiti, so we organised a dive trip. I think we had 5 takers to dive on a boat wreck and an old seaplane. We descended down to about 60ft and had a great dive. Both wrecks were really good quality. We swam through the plane and exited out of the cockpit window. By we, I mean everyone except me, who got stuck in the entrance to the cockpit and had to back out and exit another way, at the same time feeling like a bit of a bloater! On the way back our Dive Guide, Alex, pointed out another dive we could do by ourselves. The following day we set off with S/Y Barefeet to check it out. It was a lovely easy dive in 25 feet of water, with 3 wrecks to see and a small 2 seater plane to look at. It was a really relaxed dive, the sort I love.
Now I sit writing this whilst anchored in Oponua Bay, Moorea. The backdrop of mountains is breathtaking, and almost on a par with Fatu Hiva. We have some varnishing to do and a water maker project, as it seems to have decided that a drout is in order! There is a place here where we can swim and feed manta rays so we shall be doing that, as well as a a bit of a hike to a place we have been told does the best Smoothies on the World - such praise obviously deserves a hefty sample.
Till the next time.
Lots of Love
J and Ems xx