Island Time

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January 18th 2009


Having dutifully retrieved our baggage, George set about trying to find our host, who had promised to pick us up at the arranged time. Half an hour later, a random man who was standing next to me as I began to look more and more frustrated, asked me “Are you looking for someone?” Yes, I said, Taaroa Lodge. “Lucky you! You’ve found me!” Ok, buddy, where the heck is your sign? Apparently, he left it in the van. “It don’t matter! Welcome to the island, man!” he said.


Half an hour of manic driving later, I stepped out of the van and almost stepped on two best friends… the laziest dog you’ve ever met, Rex, and the fattest, happiest, and definitely laziest bunny you’ll ever see. They hang around and do nothing together all day.


Like George and I!!!!!



January 19th 2009


We woke early in paradise and met those who were staying in Taaroa Lodge. Two French girls who barely spoke a word of English and a German called Daniel. Those three went off to Papeete while Katherine and I stayed because we were feeling a bit lazy, and thank the Tiki gods we did. Five minutes after they left it absolutely bucketed it down. So we cracked a morning bevy, played cards, and waited for the rain to stop. It was about two hours. Then we went to a lil ‘supermarche’ and gathered rations. This place is trés expensive, we just grabbed pasta, beer and wot-not and it was nearly $50 for three meals worth. It made us glad that we didn’t have to eat in restaurants. A small reminder why backpackers do not come here! But the scenery is truly stunning.


After we cooked up our veggie pasta, we borrowed goggles and a snorkel each and we/I took a kayak down to the luke-warm sea. My only previous snorkelling was in Cuba; this was in a different league. We saw crabs, neon blue fish, yellow striped fish, black fish with elongated red noses but no Nemo! We spent at least an hour looking and must have seen at least twenty different species.


Stupidly we forgot to slap a bit of lotion on our shoulders and even though it was heavily overcast, we got frazzled. We then bathed ourselves in kiwi yoghurt because that was one of the best things to do according to our pharmaceutical friend, Daniel.


Siesta


For supper we cooked pasta again but this time added some salami, much better. Then drank the night away with our new friends Jack Daniels and Daniel. Around midnight another guest, Denise from Sydney, arrived. She promised to take us around the island tomorrow, see the Gaugin museum, and chill on a black sand beach. Sweet! She was on a layover and had rented a little Citroen C1 and said that she’d love the company.



January 20th 2009


We were on the road by 9am, it was Denise, Daniel, Katherine and I packed into the cute car. We bumped and grinded our way around the island heading southwards from Taaroa Lodge, stopping at little huts beside the road and acquired the driest avocados money can buy and more of those candy like bananas. We drove past black sandy beaches and waterfalls falling from the hills like lightening. Denise had figured out exactly how far the museum was from Papeete and she nailed it.


The museum was small and mostly in French but nonetheless very interesting. There were also Tiki statues to the gods. Apologies for one of the photos but it was a very funny idea at the time and both Denise and Daniel copied us in a little grope. We then walked around and found a beautiful hut on the shore and just sat and enjoyed the view for at least ten minutes, the night before could explain that.


All along the shore, there were so many little holes and we were wondering what on earth lives down there until Katherine shoved the camera down with mega-flash on and then it became clear. The creepiest of crabs we have seen with thick black hairs on their legs. Thank the Tiki gods Katherine had blinded it, it gave us the edge (only joking!) They were absolutely petrified of us and the only way of getting any where near them was shoving our noses into their holes. Still it does put a shiver down my spine.


We then drove back the way we came and stopped at ‘Beach Burger’ where a burger was only $5 or 500 Polynesian francs, it was so good that Daniel had two burgers. After our pit stop, we traced our steps back to find that illusive black sand beach. We arrived to see locals all lying on their surfboards, only to dive under each wave that came, waiting for that perfect wave.


The sand, because it was black and around 1pm, was so ****ing hot I had to just peg it for the sea and I felt like the Coyote in the Road Runner Warner Brothers cartoon. Just as my feet reached the ocean steam was released into the atmosphere! Ha, Katherine went “beep beep” as she was the clever one who was wearing flop flips. Again, I have to mention the scenery, sorry, but it is dream like.


Supper was the usual salami pasta and we all agreed that it was getting boring!



January 22nd


Woke at 8 after a needed 13 hours sleep to find a new guest, Bene from Switzerland. First mission of the day was to find the Internet. So, we hopped on a bus and went 5km or so north and found a little shopping district. We asked and no one would help us, Ben checked on his i-phone and there was an unsecured signal, bang, laptops open. I could only upload one entry on our blog before someone spotted us and closed the signal down, what rotters!!


So we marched the 100m to the Meridien Hotel to ask, they said they wanted $5, I said (to myself) I’d rather try and hack in thank you very much! A hotel where the cheapest room is $200 a night and it rockets out to ridicousness. They wouldn’t help us backpackers, riff raff to them I guess. Anyway, I’m rambling. It took two goes to crack it:


Firstly
username = meridien,
password = password.

Secondly
username = meridien,
password = meridien.


So we all had 20 minutes of frantic email checking before the receptionist came out and asked if we wanted to buy the $5 worth, we said ‘no thanks’ and we were off outta there lickety-split. Hit the supermarket once again and got the bus back.


We had a couscous salad lunch whisked up by Katherine that was so delicious followed by a quick siesta (or ‘nap’ - it was a new word for Daniel).


Later that afternoon Daniel, Katherine and I wanted to head out to the edge of the lagoon which was about 200m out in front of the lodge and where the Pacific was crashing in. Dan had his own flippers, we borrowed some from Ralph and grabbed a surfboard and a kayak and headed out. The snorkelling was just as we remembered although the water wasn’t as clear, perhaps due to the slightly yellow sand and not white as Moorea. Nonetheless, we saw so many neon blue fish, yellow striped ones and even plaice.


The water got about 12 feet deep with the hugest of sea-cucumbers at the bottom and then it got shallower and shallower until I was able to stand again, but then sea urchins were everywhere so it was not a good idea to stand. Dan and Katherine got to the edge of the lagoon and they were able to stand completely out of the water. We saw someone walking on the edge in Moorea and mentioned that this was maybe how Jesus did it and those who couldn’t swim would never know. I, on the other hand, was surrounded by those damn sea urchins, armed to the teeth, when the water was only about 1 foot deep. But it didn’t matter because we all got just another spectacular view of Tahiti from the shelf.


The swim back was quite tiring for me, but I felt like a kid again. It was so cool swimming through the gaps in the reef. Even when the water was around 9 foot the reef was near vertical to an inch below the surface of the water. So hard lefts and rights making sure I kick along the surface so not to grind my knees on the coral. With the flippers, it felt like a water rally driving course and this time we took a different route to the shore and arrived at a long beach (long for Tahiti, perhaps 400m long).


This beach was similar to the fab one in Moorea. About 20m away from the shore there was a native spear fishing, just as I saw him firing and missing I saw the biggest plaice right under me just chillin’ on the seabed, man I wanted that spear but I knew I wouldn’t so I had a bit of fun and spooked the thing instead and swam so fast using my flippers and following it around the shallows. It was a five minute walk to our lodge, Dan kayaked back and on his way he found Katherine’s flop flip floating out to sea and dutifully returned it, she was a lucky one!


We showered off and then prepped a barbee for supper. Ralph gave us coals and Bene mentioned that we could start a fire with dried coconut husks. So Katherine and I went combing the beach for some extra dry ones, we brought back a vanload. We separated the fibres off and it took a bit of lighter action but soon after a bit of Bene and I huffing and puffing on it we had a rip-roarer! The photo shows just how high the flames got, plus Bene was spitting whiskey on it. We frazzled loads of sausages and zucchini and sat down to enjoy, for Katherine and I, our last night in paradise. We drank beers and talked till about midnight when we were joined by four girls from LA who went straight to bed, shortly followed by us.



23rd January


This was a slow day. It was sad packing and neither of wanted to leave but all good things come to an end. One of the four girls was playing Bene’s guitar and singing her own tunes, Katherine’s request was the Gucci Glasses song. It was good, I remember the line about throwing your college degree out to sea, annoyingly I left mine in England!


Ralph’s wife drove us to the airport and we were there well in time for what we both agreed was the best economy flight we’ve had. Gadgets galore and the nicest of plane food we’ve had.


We landed and filled out the strict forms for bringing in anything dirty and within an hour we were checked into the largest hostel in Auckland, the ACB. Arriving there, they said that we were supposed to check in yesterday! Ha, the international dateline had taken another casualty but they totally understood and said that it was perfectly okay. At least we didn’t miss the flight. Phew!

Tahiti: A Quick Recap

So there’s not much for me to add after George’s fully comprehensive review, but there are a couple of things that I found noteworthy about Tahiti, and so here they are in list-form (the best kind of form):


1) The fact that the water spins down counter-clockwise isn’t as noticeable or interesting as previously advertised. Turn your intent gaze instead to the stars, of which more are visible even than on the darkest of Quebec nights, and all your favourite constellations are rotated in bizarre directions.


2) We weren’t wearing hats with neck-flaps in the rain for nothing, kids: Moms everywhere are right. You CAN get viciously sunburnt in cloud cover so heavy it’s almost dark outside.


3) Yoghurt actually works better at calming sunburns than aloe vera, I tested Dan’s ridiculous theory on either halves of my body, and the yoghurty side healed much faster, but as a trade-off is disproportionately covered in bug bites.


4) The bananas are the length of your palm, and very fat. They taste like banana-candy, and if you leave one out for too long the birds will eat your breakfast.


5) Randomly, the toilet-paper tubes aren’t stuck to the rolls. They spin independently.


Otherwise, Tahiti is everything we expected from honeymooner brochures. It’s paradise all right, but the land of the free it is not. Bring money. Or, if you don’t have money, try not to eat or drink so you can afford the ferry to Moorea.

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Photos

Flower Power
Love the burn line necklace

Mr. Lazy
He's not the only one

What an arse
At the Gauguin Museum

Dan at the fruit stand
Fat bananas taste like Haribo

Black Sand Walkabout
Footprints

In the surf
Close enough for comfort

Kiwi Yoghurt Therapy
Good one, Dan! Use that chemist's knowledge

Sunset from the balcony
Golden brown, texture like sun

Ralph's pet bunny
It likes to eat cookies