Form Huahine we sailed to Tahaa, the vanilla isle. The weather has been very poor, with the wind in the north and constant rain. It does make a nice change however to be cold every now and again. Tahaa is another one of these amazing islands with a coral reef surrounding it and Raiatea, it’s sister isle to the south. Both are very green and Tahaa exports about a ton of vanilla to Europe and the U.S. Most of the farmers have small acreages so a coop pulls everything together for grading and drying. We chose to go to La Maison de Vanille which after an hours walk was tucked away in the side of a mountain. We were greeted by a very friendly dog who reminded us of ours in France. The owner of the plantation took us round and explained all there was to know about the plant and the process, from pollination, as they have no insects to do the job it all has to be done by hand. The pods are then left on the plant for 9 months, picked, dried and sorted for export.

 

Needless to say, we bought a lot of vanilla and picked a few chillies from his garden as well. The boat now smells like crème brulee. With the rain as it is we went up to Bora Bora, some 20 miles away. It’s not quite the idyllic place that people make it out to be and social problems have made their mark. For the first time in French Polynesia we are having to lock everything up and haul our dinghy out of the water which is a shame. We are here until Tuesday when we go to Suwarrow, a deserted island in the Cook islands. It’s 600 hundred miles away, has a park ranger on it whose probably desperate to have someone to talk to!