Kauehi Island, Tuamotus
Harmonie
Don and Anne Myers
Tue 22 Apr 2008 03:13
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15:49.606S 145:07.120W
We continue to have a lovely time anchored in the
calm Kauehi Island lagoon. We have been here for two nights and plan to
stay another two nights before moving on to another Tuamotu island to the south,
Fakarava.
Before I forget, I wanted to mention that we found
the other half of that time zone we lost on the way to the Marquesas. All
is now right with the world as we are no longer searching for that missing half
hour.
Also, there were a few questions about Don's fish
poisoning comment in the entry he wrote a few days ago. Here's the lowdown
from The Cruiser's Handbook of Fishing:
Ciguatera occurs worldwide in mostly subtropical
and tropical marine fishes, usually reef-associated predators with a preference
for fish prey. The source of ciguatoxin is highly area specific
populations of benthis dinoflagellates.
Presumably, benthis dinoflagellates are ingested by
small fish, who are then eaten by larger fish and the toxin accumulates in the
bigger fish over time. If a human eats a fish with a high level of
ciguatoxin in it, they will suffer from abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting ,
diarrhea, numbness and tingling of the mouth and limbs, etc. Symptoms can
last from a few hours to months depending on the severity.
The bottom line is, we don't fish once we get close
to an island. We only fish in the open sea where the likelihood of
ciguatera is nonexistent.
A few words about the Tuamotus...
The Tuamotu island group, like the
Marquesas, is part of French Polynesia. There are 78 islands spread
across 1,000 miles of ocean. Unlike the Marquesas, all but two of the
Tuamotu islands are coral atolls. So what exactly is a coral
atoll?
All of the islands in the Pacific
were formed by volcanic action. The 'high' islands like the
Marquesas, are basically the tips of volcanic mountains built up from the ocean
floor as a result of lots of volcanic activity long ago. The coral atolls
are a much older version of the same thing. Coral atolls start out life as
high volcanic islands, but over time - lots of time - wind, rain and
waves erode away the high peaks. Meanwhile, coral begins to form reefs
around the periphery of the island. Over more time, not only do the high
peaks of the island erode away, but the earth's crust beneath the volcano slowly
subsides. This happens very slowly such that the coral reef formation
keeps pace with the erosion of the peaks and subsidence of the earth's
crust. As a result, a huge thickness of reef-formed calcium carbonate
(limestone) accumulates, and the original volcanic island disappears.
What you are left with is an island basically consisting of coral, shaped like a
thin ring around a big saltwater lagoon. (In case you are wondering, this
island-forming knowledge came not from mine or Don's head, but from one of our
guidebooks, Landfalls of Paradise.)
I didn't realize until we got here that the lagoons
in coral atolls are huge, like big lakes. Also, the 'island'
that surrounds the lagoon is extremely narrow and is not continuous - it's
basically a string of narrow coral islands that separate the ocean from the
lagoon. So, although it might be said that the island of Kauehi is 10
miles wide by 12 miles long, in reality, probably 99% of that space is lagoon
and 1% is land. What all of that means for boaters like us is once we make
a safe passage through the reef, we are rewarded with an incredibly calm
anchorage in clear water of every shade of blue (depending on the depth and
proximity to coral heads). The snorkeling is excellent with every kind of
tropical fish, including some small sharks - so we've heard anyway.
The sunrise and sunsets are gorgeous because they are viewed across the calm
lagoon with no high land to get in the way. The scenery is completely the
opposite of what we saw in the Marquesas - flat sandy land with palm trees as
opposed to soaring mountains and lush valleys - but beautiful in its own
way. It's not so much 'striking' or 'breathtaking' here as it is 'serene'
and 'dreamy'. This is the kind of island most would envision
as the place one would wash up after falling overboard at sea.
Gilligan or Tom Hanks would probably enjoy it here.
On land, basically only coconut palms grow.
They are about the only hardy enough plant to handle the salt environment and
bad sandy soil. This means we won't be leaving here with 200 bananas and
limes and grapefruit. Vegetables and fruit don't exist here (except for
coconuts). We went to the one, small store in the one, small town here,
and it's true - not a single fruit or vegetable was to be
found. Ok - they did have some onions, garlic and potatoes, but
that was it, nothing else, honest.
They may not have fruit here, but they do have
pearls - black pearls that is. There are at least three pearl farms here
in the lagoon that we can see from our boat. Lady Kay was approached by
some locals selling pearls, but no one has approached us yet. We
were visited by two young boys yesterday afternoon. They paddled all the
way from the village on the remains of a well-used surf board. They
giggled and smiled and let me take their picture as they circumnavigated our
boat, but they didn't speak English.
In the village, which consists of a town hall, a
small church, a little store and a post office, we met the one and only
policeman, who drove us in his truck the 200 feet from where we met him to the
town hall (can't believe they have cars on this island, although there are not
many...maybe six). At the town hall, we paid our 'tourist tax', which
amounted to all of $4.00 and signed the guest book. Yes, they have a guest
book for the island. All the visiting boats are asked to pay the tourist
tax and sign the guest book. This island probably does not get many
visitors, so the glut of rally boats that have stopped (maybe ten over
the last two weeks) is probably the biggest tourist boom the island
has seen in a while.
It has not been quiet and calm the whole
time we've been here if you count the night we invited the crews from Lay Kay
and Cleone on board for dinner. That whole episode deserves a blog entry
all its own, and so it shall have one. Perhaps tomorrow.
Anne
PS: Pictures will follow when we arrive in
Tahiti around the 28th and find high speed internet
access.
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