More Moorea
Zepher
Chris & Lyn Darch
Thu 14 Aug 2008 03:30
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Hi Bloggers,
Grand Turismo day today , up and about early and
off to the care hire hut to collect our Hyundai Metz, one of the more plusher
hire cars we have had to date, four doors to ..
We set off first to cover the ground we
walked yesterday, just to see how far we had walked , it turns out it was 15 km
after all, we then went to the highest point on the island and wow what a view
lots of Kodak moments panoramic wonderland of the whole of the lush volcanic
floor.
Off again down to the French government
horticultural research station which is in the volcano floor, it is open to the
public and has a very good tour around the station , all in all it took about an
hr it had every fruit grown in the region in cultivation most of which we have
eaten at some point during our stay in Polynesia , and had a very informative
guide, Lyn was in ecstasy, plants all around her, me thinks she's missing her
garden ! anyway it all ended in the cafe where we had a delicious vanilla pod
ice cream made there , vanilla plants growing all around the cafe exterior as
well I always wondered what it looked like ! anyway this region grows quite
a lot of it for export .
After the ice we went off to some ruins
further down the hill , more piles of ancient stones, dated from the 13th
century, at one stage these islands supported thousands of inhabitancy and had a
very rich culture this all changes after the arrival of the Europeans
, a good dose of flu,smallpox,colds, and typhoid did the trick and
decimated the whole of the island group, enter the missionaries of quite a few
denominations and most of the remaining population moved almost exclusively to
the coast for some reason not explained in the text and so centuries of
culture was wiped out in the space of fifty or sixty years , it makes you
laugh as the locals have just got on with it and made new lives on the coast and
the white mans up in the no-nos infested hinterland digging up all these old
relics and telling the locals about there heritage, they don't seem that
bothered as mother France buys then a new four wheeled drive and has generous
welfare payments to boot , so I wonder who has had the last laugh after all
.
It was then back to the coast and circled the
island , not much to report great views of reefs and palm trees, then we took a
late lunch and returned the car .
All in all a great day, pics will follow when we
get an internet connection that up to speed ....
A Toured out crew
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