Advertisement
Published: July 14th 2015
Edit Blog Post
This is the second largest of the Society Islands (after Tahiti) and one that was added to our voyage when the scheduled stop at Niue was cancelled again because of inadequate landing facilities. Ra'iatea means 'bright sky' in Tahitian. The island is located about 25 kilometers short of Bora Bora when travelling from Tahiti. The island is regarded as the 'centre' of the ancient eastern Polynesian Islands. The traditional name for the island is Havai'i and it is regarded as the homeland of the Mãori people. However, this island was in no way a serious tourist centre - or at least not for beach lovers.
The approach should have been interesting for those who attended the navigation class earlier in the trip. MSVG had a difficult negotiation through the reef, which is well short of Uturoa, the capital. Once through the reef the ship then had to cruise a very narrow lagoon-side channel between the coast and the reef/motus. It was an interesting sail though as coast-side the lagoon was very very shallow apart from this channel. The location of the capital almost chose itself because of this channel.
D & M decided that, yet again, the best strategy
was to rent a car and sought out Mr. Europcar - this time in the guise of a French metropolitan from Toulouse who had lived 25 years on the island. He rented us a sturdy Honda, this time without AC but it was only £50 for the day. He told us that Polynesian Tourist Industry was having a hard time at the moment with the Americans impacted by the dollar under siege; for the French it was too far and too expensive in comparison to Guadaloupe and Martinique and only the Japanese were still coming.
Our guide book suggested there were no places to take lunch and that we should take a picnic. This turned out to be not quite true but was probably sound advice financially. So, having set off, we turned around and went back to Uturoa to seek out a Champion Supermarche, where we bought bread, cream cheese, fruit and a couple of beers. We set off anti-clockwise round the west of the island.
There was not a lot to see and the lagoon was too shallow for swimming. We did, though, find a marae (communal worship/social/sacrifice ground) located within a protestant churchyard. Most of
Polynesia follows the Protestant faith, thanks to the London Missionary Society, whereas much of mainland France is Catholic. There was fine view of the high mountain (Mt Temehani) where a specific flower grows (the Tiare Apetahi) this flower grows here and only here. We took a panoramic picture of the mountain.
We saw few people and no tourists on this western leg or our journey. However, the island was considerably larger than Mo'orea (and Bora Bora we were to find) being almost 100 kilometres in circumference. At the southern end there was an inland loop of 8 kilometres with a fine Belvedere to view both north and south. Just our luck that as we approached it the resurfacing lorry was out and Mr Tarmac was spraying his load all over the road. Not only could we not stop at the look-out, the vehicle also received an unplanned additional coat of underseal.
After a short drive we reached the Taputapuatea Marae which is the largest site of its type in the whole of Polynesia. Located at Opoa in Taputapuatea , the site features a number of marae and other stone structures and was once considered to be the central
temple and religious centre of Eastern Polynesia. We stopped here for lunch and photographs.
After lunch, we continued south, seeking the 'Queens Bathtub' a local waterfall, where the guide book said we could swim. On the way we came across a Vanilla farm. We arrived at 13.50 and found there were daily tours at 14.00. So we went for the daily tour. Very interesting; we learned all about Mexican and Madagascan vanilla and how that from 'Tahiti et ses Isles' there was a unique cross strain from Mexican and Philippine vanilla that remains flexible when mature. Apparently the vanilla plant is an orchid and the pod evolves to look just like a green bean - at least, it does in early February. It's left on the plant and grown in huge 1,000 metre square hot houses until it turns yellow. It is then air-dried and enclosed in cloths where it both turns black and secretes vanilla oil, losing mass as it does so. This is monitored by hand on a daily basis and the pods are graded by length. Any that are not long and straight have the seeds scraped out as this is where the flavour comes from
- a bit like chili peppers in that regard. We were advised that the world price is determined by the length of the pod as the longer ones have most flavour. When we left we bought a pot of seeds for £6 as the best value option in the gift shop. We asked about her majesty's tub to be told that whilst only 15 minutes away it was across private land. Did you know the word 'tabu' (spelt like that) is actually Polynesian. We got the message and gave the waterfall a miss.
We travelled on to the end of Ra'iatea, turned round and came back, looking out assiduously for the 'Jardin Botanique' and the kayaks for rent on the 'only navigable river in Polynesia' (actually an estuary) mentioned in the guide book. (It was too late for a canoe even if we had managed to find one.) We did, though, look for the botanical gardens to no avail. Unfortunately, it was only when we returned to the ship we learned that 'ne manquer pas' means not to be missed, but Mr. Europcar de Toulouse did tell us that most folk miss it because the owner won't put up
a sign. We returned the car, and were delivered back to MSVG.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.609s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 9; qc: 64; dbt: 0.2991s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb