Blogs from French Polynesia, Oceania - page 33

May 30 OK, here’s the text that did NOT get uploaded to the blog in the Marquesas. Well, we’ve been living on the boat for about four months now, we’ve sailed over 5,000 nautical miles together, and we’re all still friends! We left the Galapagos over two months ago, spending 22 days at sea on the crossing to the Marquesas Islands. At 3,210 nautical miles, that will be our longest ocean passage between home and New Zealand. (A nautical mile is 6,000 feet, a bit longer than a statute mile, so that works out to almost 3,700 of the more familiar land miles… a long way to be out of sight of land.) The Marquesas are the youngest of the French Polynesian island groups, steep volcanic islands that have not existed long enough to develop rings ... read more

Some say it is uncouth to discuss money, especially on a refined blog such as this one, and to be honest we normally wouldn't but flipping hell Tahiti is expensive. Breakfast for two, surprisingly not included in our rate, was $100 - yes folks, that is 50 pounds. For some muesli!! It rather tarnishes the stay when you realise that you are going to pay 200 pounds for breakfast for a 4 night stay. Especially as that is our normal daily budget for everything!! We declined breakfast after that. However literally everything is incredibly expensive. At least twice the price of the UK i reckon and about 5 times the price of Argentina.. ok that's enough of that... So what about the place.. well yes it's got palm trees, yes it has black pearls (boy do ... read more

PARADISE LOST and REGAINED?… Just walk away Renee…. CAN YOU BE MORE (S)PACIFIC… NO MAD NOMAD HERE… AN ANENOME OF THE PEOPLE?.. Infernal, Internal Thermals…and much, much more!.. Nuku Hiva, now a memory, but something transpired there, it really got to me, I’m still not sure what it was…..more later maybe Unlike the Galapagos Islands which were basically conventional volcanic islands - you know, cone shaped, sloping lava fields to the sea, calderas, tunnels all that stuff, the Marquisas are far more topographically challenging. (and, as there are English, French and Spanish spellings, even differing names for many of these places, you may notice some inconsistencies !!) The Marquisas, enormous tortured rock mountains, stratified layers, peaks and rolls, huge cliffs jutting vertically from the water 100’s of feet, high crested peaks to 3,000 feet, constant cloud ... read more

Greetings to all from Papeete, Tahiti, French Polynesia. We have been here a week already and have enjoyed a couple of dfays at a mooring at the Tahiti Yacht Club which was very peaceful as with a Thursday Public holiday and the following Monday the locals all took a 5 day weekend and nothing got done. Moved into town and finally got checked in while tied up at new docks that have only been installed 2 months before, quite rooly with the ferry wakes and really noisy from the traffic from 6am til late. Subsequently anchored off Marina Taina which is free and has some delightful snorkelling under the boat. But I digress, I left you in Fatu Hiva and we spent 4 weeks in the Marquesas really enjoying the outrageous geographical features and beautiful bays,friendly ... read more

Right no entry about Wellington definitely when I can but I am going to Perth tonight and my friend Katy (aka SWINGER) wanted me to put some pictures from my trip to Tahiti so here are some pictures and the first entry about Tahiti. After spending one night on the bus from Wellington to Auckland where I barely slept (gosh babies should be banned from buses and planes!) a few hours in Auckland Airport and 5hours by plane I landed in Papeete, Tahiti at 9pm and welcomed by my mum and my old sister. Was tired from the last night and I knew I was going to have another tough one as we had to stay at the lovely airport of Papeete for the whole night. Unfortunately I only saw my old sister for a couple ... read more