Bora Bora

[Kyle]It's a long day-sail from the eastern side of Huahine to Bora Bora. To make the most of the daylight, we had to pick our way through the channel to the pass before it was light enough out for us to feel perfectly comfortable doing so. Once we were in deep water, we deployed the spinnaker and had a faster than predicted run past the twin islands of Raiatea and Taha'a to Passe Teavanui on Bora Bora's western side. We were tied up to the public wharf at the main town of Viatape with just over an hour of daylight left.

Approaching Bora Bora and Viatape (the main town)

It had been a full day following an early alarm. This is when we would usually try not to let the other one see us nodding off during dinner, but the drums were calling us.

Bora Bora has its own Heiva festival, timed so as not to conflict with the Tahitian one, and the very last event was still in swing. In this case, it was the musician's competition. The last group of maybe thirty drummers was going all-out with their big finale. Bora Bora's Heiva grounds are right on the opposite side of Viatape's small harbor, so Maryanne and I were able to get there for the big finish after a quick, thirty-second trot. Since we were so close to the end, the person at the ticket booth waved us through without asking for payment.

Bora Bora Heiva: drummers and prize giving evening

Despite Bora Bora's Heiva being a more minor affair than the big one in Tahiti, the setting is much more dramatic. Tahiti's Heiva is in an outdoor arena, which looks like an arena. Bora Bora has their Heiva in a big, sandy square, with the backdrop of Mt. Otomanu's impressive cliffs. The performers here are above average, given the size of the population, as the surrounding resorts employ them to entertain their guests. This makes the Heiva in Bora Bora seem more like a friendly competition between hospitality corporations than individual islands.

When the group finished, another set of drummers on the sidelines started up their own very energetic rhythm. It took us a while to realize their staccato was the Polynesian version of a drumroll as the awards were announced and handed out. We stayed for a few of the announcements and then Maryanne noticed the trophies were being handed out from amongst what looked like hundreds filling the pavilion behind the judge's table. After an hour of giving them out, it looked like they had hardly made a dent. We made an exit and then had an amble around the temporary restaurants and booths set up around the perimeter. It had very much the feel of a State Fair, only with palm fronds. We have no idea when the last awards were given out, because we were tucked in bed and out cold by then. When we emerged again at daylight, all was quiet except for a few men fishing off the corner of the wharf.

The Heiva comes with a carnival atmosphere, with pop-up restaurants and game "arcades" and lots of gambling opportunities

Despite our luck at finding the tail end of the Heiva, our main reason for coming to Bora Bora was to clear out of the country, as it is the most leeward island that can conduct the necessary formalities. We went to the Gendarmerie as soon as they opened in the morning and they told us it wouldn't be until the following morning that we would be able to retrieve our stamped passports. That gave us a day of killing time in Viatape.

Despite being the main town, Viatape is not what most people who aren't us come to Bora Bora to see. They come for the overwater bungalows, which are mostly on the motus at the edges of the lagoon. That way, they have views toward the impressive and endlessly photogenic Mount Otomanu in the middle. These bungalows belong to fancy resorts that have everything their guests could possibly desire. For those guests, Viatape is merely the transfer point where they will spend a few minutes between their resort's launch and the ferry to the airport. Within a few steps of the wharf, there are stores that sell triple-priced souvenirs and quadruple-priced pearls, but no restaurants or bars for whiling away larger chunks of time. A little further afield, however, there are three big, relatively reasonably-priced supermarkets. They seem to cater to locals, who mostly live on the big island and commute to their jobs on the motus via company launch. Maryanne was keen to pop into each of these to top up on our fresh provisions. I assented, on the condition that we do it on the long walk back from the nearest restaurant with seating on the water. That place was most of the way to the Bora Bora Yacht club and was probably not technically in Viatape.

Neither of us was really in the mood for a whole meal, but we were hoping we could tide ourselves over with a couple of appetizers until the kitchen opens at Begonia for dinner. That plan ended when we found the most suitable item to be a 5000XPF (~$50US) crudité plate which was basically baby carrots, celery sticks, and slices of cucumber.

The drinks had more normal pricing - mostly. Maryanne went for a big bottle of Hinano Beer for 750 francs. I splashed out and decided to get a Ti' Punch for something just under 2000 francs. My reasoning was that most Tahitian rums are high proof, like the Caribbean Rum Agricole with which the drink is properly made, so I thought they would thus have a better-than-average chance of concocting a reasonable facsimile. To the restaurant's credit, my Ti' Punch tasted pretty close to the original Caribbean version, although it would have been more properly called a Mo' Punch, since it was more Moyen (medium) than Petit (Small).

As we sat looking out over the water and enjoying our drinks in this amazingly beautiful place, a fancy racing catamaran sailed over from one of the motus and then docked right in front of us, filling our view. Aboard as guests were a youngish couple who haughtily disembarked and then were shown to their table at the far corner, which wasn't blocked by their conveyance.

For entertainment, we turned our attention to the Drink Menu. We noticed that they had one bottle of bubbly listed for 330,000 francs (knock the last two zeros off to get US Dollars). I thought I must have been doing the math wrong, but I was not. That wasn't the only one, either. They had two others above 300,000 francs, and another seven above 100,000 francs. This is when the best response to, "Hey, everyone! The drinks are on me!" is for a certain adorable spouse to push you into the water before you can get past the first word. That way, you may be able to pass it off later as some sort of completely unrelated domestic dispute.

Later on, back at Begonia, we were just getting ready to sit down for dinner when a launch came up and the guy on board knocked on the hull. Maryanne went out to meet him, thinking he may be about to ask us to move one way or another to make space for another boat.

Then he started off on the wrong foot.

"Where's the Captain?"

Uh...sexist! Maryanne bristled at they guy just assuming she wasn't the captain, and to serve him right said "the captain is busy". The guy could see me through the cabin windows and I was clearly not busy either. He interrogated Maryanne with questions, then told her, while looking straight at me, that there was a one-hour time limit at the wharf and that we had to leave immediately and proceed directly to one of the paid moorings at the Yacht Club, over a mile away. Maryanne noticed that he was wearing a polo shirt with the name of the company embroidered on it that manages the moorings in the lagoon.

"No, thank you." She said, "We're waiting for Customs clearance from the Gendarmerie. We'll leave when we get it."

He did not like this.

"When is your clearance coming?" he demanded.

"They said first thing tomorrow."

"No!" he bellowed, "You have to go to a mooring and come back in your dinghy tomorrow."

He hadn't taken a good look at our dinghy.

"We're not going to do that. We'll be gone tomorrow."

He then reiterated his one-hour limit and told us we weren't allowed to stay at the public wharf overnight.

That's funny, apart from launches doing drop-offs, we had not seen any other boat tie up at the wharf for less than six hours. There were three other boats, all charter catamarans with paid crew, that stayed the whole night last night. The rules aren't actually very clear, apart from that you can stay a "reasonable" period of time, and please don't block the water hose. Now you can be sure Maryanne researches carefully the rules and regulations for anyplace we go, and quite simply the rules are not made clear ANYWHERE for this location; normally in such conditions we'd be open to a helpful local clearing things up for us, but this guy had already annoyed Maryanne so she wasn't quite so open to advice. By the time of this visit we had local boats at the wharf that were then when we arrived (so definitely beyond the 1 hour rule he was attempting to enforce). There is no written notice online, nor on the boards by the wharf, and we felt if the local boats could stay beyond 1 hour and even overnight, then we could (plus the mooring field is faraway, expensive, and not easy to get ashore from to reach the Customs office that we needed). Maryanne had decided we were staying put unless someone could point to an official written ruling on the matter.

Because of the Heiva, there were plenty of police officers around last night. Neither of the two cops we walked by repeatedly, and also exchanged salutations with, bothered to tell us, "Hey, you can't leave your boat here at night."

When Maryanne dismissed the mooring guy's order to leave (so he could charge us for his suggested alternate location), he changed tactics and tried telling her her boat wouldn't be safe. In the morning, everything not nailed down would be gone. It was clear his preferred tactic was to use bluster to try to cow her into compliance. He then demanded to know where we had spent the previous night, with the implication clearly being that we must have used one of his moorings, and then left early for the public wharf, in order to deny him his rightful fee.

Nope, that didn't happen, so good luck proving it did.

With Maryanne not being helpful and me making no move towards getting the boat ready to leave, he next threatened to call the police on us.

"Oh, that would be great!" Maryanne said. "We would love to know what the actual rules are about the wharf and to hear their guidance first hand. If they tell us to leave, we'll leave."

He then told us he was going on his rounds to collect his fees for the night and that if we were still at the wharf when he got back, he's calling the police.

"Lovely," Maryanne said, "We'll see you then."

We then went to the Gendarmerie, and found they had our papers ready earlier than suggested. No mention was made about us not being allowed to be on the wharf since the last time we saw them.

Mooring Man never came back.

I must admit I was a little disappointed. The ideal time for us to leave, meteorologically, was early the next morning, before the Gendarmerie opened, but I was kind of looking forward to seeing if we could get Mooring Man's forehead veins throbbing.

I don't generally like conflict, but trying to bully me into paying money I don't owe really gets my hackles up. Even though we hadn't technically done anything wrong, I have no doubt that if Mooring Man had more time that day, he would have happily spent it making our lives unbearable at the wharf – a thinly-veiled protection racket.

It's a shame, but for boaters like us, Bora Bora has become Paradise Lost. While we were there, Maryanne found an article about a new marina development planned to replace most of the mooring space near the yacht club. It said it was going to cater to high-end yachts and local boats. What is really being said loudest there is what is not being said: If your boat didn't set you back at least in the high seven figures in Euros, British Pounds, or Dollars (or nine figures in French Polynesian Francs), please feel free to go elsewhere. 'Elsewhere' in this case being one of the distant mooring fields (actual moorings scheduled to be installed soon) far out of sight of the bungalows being rapidly built on every meter of shoreline, far from services, and far from anywhere cruise ship or resort launches might frequent.

Viatape is a very small town, and any short walk soon offers country views

Of all the Society Islands, Maryanne and I have spent the most time in Bora Bora. We love it. It is beautiful, and the people, apart from Mooring Man, have been lovely. We have many happy memories of days spent sailing the Pudgy around the lagoon, swimming with manta rays and trailing a stream of smiling Polynesians in their outriggers as they showed us how much easier it is for them to paddle their boats at six knots than it is for our two diesels to do the same with Begonia. We remember stunning sunsets and spending afternoons at Bloody Mary's, eating pub food and using their slow internet with our bare feet in the sand. It was in Bora Bora that our friend Dave Ormandy first swam over a mile from his boat just to introduce himself. We became fast friends and subsequently learned that a mile-long swim was a mere warmup for him.

Bloody Mary's is now closed and their moorings have been removed. The laid-back tiki bar that was once a center for the international cruising community is being replaced by the owners with another high-end bungalow resort which will be accessible only by paying the significant fee to get past the velvet rope.

All this means that, especially if the government continues to streamline the clearing-out process so that it can be done online without having to make a stop, our Bora Bora days may sadly be behind us. It will still be worth altering course, if just "to have a good look" when/if we pass this way again; the stunning Mount Otemanu will forever call out for closer inspection.

---

Town Dock location >> On google maps

Huahine

[Kyle]The city (Papeete) is great and all, but we were starting to get a little weary of the constant crowds, streetlights, and especially the traffic noise. We were looking forward to a few days on the more thinly populated 'back' side of Huahine.

To get to Huahine from Tahiti, we needed to do an overnight sail. It went pretty smoothly. We sailed on the windward side of Moorea, which kept us from having any drama with calms in the lee or waves wrapping around the island to slam into each other. The wind was far enough astern that we didn't even need to bother unbagging our mainsail, opting instead to alternate between the jib and the spinnaker, depending on wind strength.

Departing Tahiti, and passing Morea with its distinctive peaks

We entered Passe Farearea, on the eastern side of Huahine without issue. Then it was a bit of a meandering path to the anchorage near the village of Tefarerii. The rumor was that there may be four moorings available there for pickup.

Regulations in French Polynesia are in a state of flux right now. During the Covid pandemic, both the public and the government got weary of all the boats that got stuck here when borders were locked down. This growing anti-boater sentiment caused the government to come up with a whole slew of anchoring prohibitions designed to make all the boats magically disappear to somewhere else. They needed to leave some capacity for local charterers and a few visitors, so they decided to prohibit anchoring on popular islands, of which Huahine is one, and install a fixed number of government moorings to keep the number of boats below a certain level. These moorings have time limits, must be reserved in advance, and be paid for online. They do, at least, protect the coral from careless anchoring, and require less effort to pick up and cast off than deploying heavy ground tackle does. Communities, and especially high-end resorts, embraced the idea because the boats would now be out of their backyards and over in the boonies, where nobody wants to be. It's basically the same logic that decided where to put the Indian Reservations in the United States.

When borders started reopening and the acute part of the pandemic started to wane, stranded boats continued on their way, thinning out the anchorages. The impetus for the new system started to fizzle. What remains now is a hodge-podge system that is only partially complete. There is a set of prohibitions against having a boat anywhere not in newly defined designated mooring areas, except when underway. Most of the actual moorings, however, as well as the websites for reserving and paying for the moorings, have only been partially installed, leaving spotty coverage at best. The 'best' moorings for us made it nearly impossible to enjoy a shore excursion in Huahine, so we were grateful that we'd been before (in 2017 and in 2018) and managed to explore so much during those visits.

That's why we weren't sure what we were going to find when we arrived in Huahine. We had tried to reserve a mooring using the new online booking system, but the link for making the reservation sent us in a circle back to the home page, and the system for paying did not seem to exist yet. We did manage to send an email with our request (and get a reply) so we were sure we had a reservation but were not quite sure for what, sinch we had also heard rumors that some or all the moorings there may have been either damaged or removed, and may or may not have been maintained, or possibly not installed yet. Also, there were no locations for the moorings, other than a general area delineated on a poor-quality map.

Coming within view of the anchorage, we found two other vessels there, each of which seemed to be on a mooring. We couldn't see anything that looked like any more. Maryanne eventually spotted something pretty near one of the other boats, so we started easing that direction, while keeping an eye on the alarmingly decreasing depth. Only when we were about two boat lengths away did it become apparent that we were not heading for another mooring, but were instead aiming for what may have been a marker for a local's fishing or lobstering spot, which was in shin-deep water. We managed to put Begonia into reverse and back away before we hit anything. Irritatingly, the people on the nearby boat, which was within easy hailing distance at conversational volume, did nothing but give us country-cow stares the whole time as they waited for the crunch. Thanks so much for the heads-up, a-holes!

Maryanne then spotted the other two moorings, which are separated from the first two by a pretty big gap. That's great! We'll be over there, you stay here.

Since the moorings were nowhere where anything useful could be reached without a fast dinghy and plenty of fuel, we decided to content ourselves splitting our time between hanging aboard and snorkeling the adjacent reef. The reef is actually very large, so it was easy to turn each excursion into all-day swims. For the last of these, we got it in our heads that we really wanted to see a deep hole between Begonia and the outer edge of the reef. The intervening reef was too shallow to swim over, so it was necessary to take a much longer, circuitous route to get there, that was maybe four times the straight-line distance. The hole turned out to be not as spectacular as we had hoped, just more of the same stuff, only deeper, but factoring in the currents, we did get to finish our day feeling like we had done something energetic.

We didn't go ashore at all, the current mooring field status makes that all very much more complicated than on our prior visits, but we did get out and snorkel a lot.

Kyle climbed the mast to fix our wind speed indicator - the plastic screw fitting at the end of the arm had developed a crack and for now we've 'fixed' it wtih a hose clamp so it can't completely fail (another item for the repair list once we reach New Zealand). Kyle snapped a picture of the bay from the top; you can see how far apart the moorings are.

---

Mooring location >> On google maps

Papeete, Tahiti

[Kyle]From Point Venus, it was a quick, hour-long trip along Tahiti's north coast to the center of the main city of Pape'etē (the capital city of French Polynesia). The marina at the waterfront does not take reservations, so the procedure is to show up and see if there is anything available. If not, it's an hour in either direction to get back to where you came from. So far, we have been lucky with this because, as boats get bigger and bigger, Begonia has stayed the same size. Whatever dock space remains between two big boats has had enough of a remainder left over for us when a third big boat wouldn't fit.

Things are even easier today. With better cell service, instead of leaving an open spot to chance, the marina put us in touch with another boat that was planning on leaving a Begonia-sized hole behind a few days hence. The guy was a bit vague when pressed for the specific time he intended to depart, but hinted he was most likely to leave Tuesday at around noon. Maryanne exchanged texts with him a few times after that and each time, he said it almost certainly would be Tuesday.

Sure enough, after we pulled up our anchor and were halfway to the city, he said he didn't feel like leaving today, maybe tomorrow. We decided to continue on, since the distance back to Point Venus was more by that point, and maybe we could find a different spot that was vacated by another boat after all.

When we got there, I dropped Maryanne off to go to the office. The guy there said he had no space, but since the two traditional boats tied up at adjacent Pā'ōfa'i Gardens were out for a few days, there would be space along the public wall, where we could tie up for free until a slip was available at the marina. The public wall was exposed to big wakes and others gave warnings of petty crime, but big fenders and leaving someone aboard at all times should tide us over for one night.

Much to my surprise and relief, Maryanne volunteered me to be the one to stay aboard tidying and doing little jobs, while she shouldered a bag of laundry and headed out to the place nearby that does it{Maryanne - we'd been here before several times, and expected to use the Marina self-serve laundy, but things change and that facility is no longer available, so we were left with a long hike to a very expensive option - Ugh!}. Not wanting to return home empty-handed, she also made a pass through all three of the nearest grocery stores to memorize their inventories. By the time she arrived back at Begonia, hours later, I was able to convince her that it would be safe to leave our boat unattended long enough for a congratulatory drink at the adjacent waterfront bar, which was literally six boat lengths ahead of us. She agreed on the proviso that we get a seat at the rail facing, where we would have a full view of anybody who tries to sneak aboard for some freebies.

There were a couple of dodgy-looking guys sleeping under adjacent trees, but neither of them seems to have thought Begonia's hard fiberglass cockpit was a better deal than nice, soft grass.

In the morning, after Maryanne finished an early bakery run, our guy texted her to say he felt like he would probably be leaving his marina slip soon. O.....kay. We got ready and after verifying there were no other boats preparing the grab the spot, waited until we saw him coming out of the fairway before we started engines and untied our lines.

Great! Now that we're in a proper slip in a secure marina, we can both now go out and have fun!?

Not so fast! Cities and marinas are only actually related to fun in the most thinly tenuous way. Marina-based fun must first be paid for with dirty, unpleasant jobs – jobs which we are paying for the privilege to complete.

By far, the biggest thing looming on our list was provisioning. We were low on nearly everything and needed to procure another batch that would be sufficient to get us through another few months until we could once again have access to big stores with lots of selection. After I had finished assembling our heavy-duty wheelie wagon, Maryanne broke the news to me that she had already determined the best store for us would be the fourth-closest one, a well-stocked Carrefour over a mile away (a giant supermarket rather than the nearer mini-marts).

When we got there, sweating from the tropical heat and relieved to finally be in the mild air-conditioning of the store, Maryanne did what she is used to doing and headed over to the big carts to retrieve one for each of us. Mine would have much of its volume taken up by the folded wheelie wagon.

Now, hang on a minute! I suggested that instead, we could use our ungainly wagon as our shopping cart(s). That way, when it's full, we know were done with our present sortie. She didn't like the idea, but went along with it anyway. At the far end, after trying to pile just a few more things on top of the increasingly unsteady pile in the wagon, she was still looking for more stuff and making noises about how we had barely managed to get anything on her multi-page list. She finally stopped when I pointed out that, in addition to the difficulty of pulling the sagging cart home, neither of us would enjoy adding the burden of a forty-pound bag on each shoulder.

Our shopping, as usual, looks a bit strange from the outside. On our first and heaviest haul, we looked like a couple of survivalists who plan to ride out the apocalypse on cans of corn, peas, and various varieties of beans, which we apparently intend to wash down with beer. Next was lots of carbs – rice, pasta, crackers, etc. and enough nuts to keep a busy bar stocked in nibbles for a week. Each trip, our huge wagon was filled with giant amounts of what would be a woefully inadequate slice of a proper diet. Only on our final outing did we get to have our wagon overflowing with colorful produce and leafy greens, as if we had decided to make our fortune by opening a juicing and smoothie chain.

One of the many trips to provision (and then finding places to stow everything); Our last supermarket was in Panama in February and we won't see another until we reach New Zealand in November

But despite our primarily being in Tahiti for chores, we did get to enjoy the parks and waterfront of Papeete, the "big city", along with the odd restaurant, food truck, and bar (the beer wasn't ours!)

On our busiest day, we did back-to-back round trips to Carrefour (the french grocery chain supermarket store). We didn't stow anything in between, deciding that would be a problem for our future selves. Screw them! We were about to head out for a third heavy load when Maryanne suggested we go to the bulk health food store instead. She sold it to me as being easier than a third wagon haul. I misunderstood her to mean the store was closer and thus wouldn't require our usual four-hour return time. What she turned out to mean was that, even the store was only a little farther away than Carrefour, the two-mile trip home would be with a lighter cart. My pre-blistered feet did not care for that. {Maryanne:I'd been to the strore TWICE already and failed to successfully make a purchase, it was either closed with special "School holday hours" or they hadn't yet received the pricing for the items I wanted, so could I "come back tomorrow". Ugh!}

Of course, when we arrived back home, we were exhausted and facing a mountain of food that would have to be squirreled away tonight to make way for tomorrow's next Carrefour haul. After that particular outing, Maryanne declared it to be our last. She then said she needed to do just one more mop-up trip to the health food store and suggested we could divide and conquer if I went to get fuel and our newly-filled propane bottle while she did. My stuff was only half as far away as her stuff, so I practically jumped at the chance.

Just as I got our new petroleum in its place, she called to ask if I wanted to meet her at a place on her route back for lunch. The idea of an enforced half hour of sitting without having to stare at a pile of jobs to do sounded just heavenly.

It didn't work out. The place closed five minutes before we got there and we were greeted with a wall of shutters. Same with the next, and then the next. We were unlucky enough to now be in that part of the day when nothing is open. Groan. We dropped off her cart at the boat and then, on increasingly limpy legs, widened our search for some place that was open. We eventually found one when they were all reopening for dinner anyway. No bother – it felt even better to sit down and replace the day's lost calories.

As we arrived back home, we noticed that the restaurant nearest Begonia – the one two boat lengths away – was putting up decorations. That was strange, we had checked them out earlier and were sure they said they were closed all day today. We forced ourselves to stay up long enough to stow everything away and then crawled into bed exhausted. We were glad the provisioning was done, hopefully for a few weeks or even months, and were looking forward to a day of actual fun tomorrow.

Forty minutes later, the music started with what sounded like a car bomb going off across the street. The adjacent restaurant seemed to be hosting a private function/party.

The music was not just loud, it was front-row-at-a-stadium-concert loud. We tried earplugs, but the vibrating walls, mattress and pillows kept us awake. Eventually, we gave up and decided to try watching a movie or something. That didn't work either, because even with our best speakers turned up to eleven and all our doors and hatches closed, we couldn't hear anything coming out of them. How can the partygoers possibly socialize in such a din? I popped my head out and saw maybe eight hundred people, about half of which were screaming with their mouths right in front of the ear of the person next to them. Fun!

Dance club music is pretty repetitive. Maryanne and I eventually got tired enough to sleep fitfully through it as if we were on a loud airplane or something, or perhaps a dragon with a really loud heartbeat.

At 3am it stopped with such suddenness that it actually jolted us awake with a surge of adrenaline, as if we had been leaning on a door that someone had suddenly opened away from us. When we finally realized what had happened, we breathed a collective sigh of relief and laid our heads down in the cozy new silence.

Then the cleanup started. Slamming tables and chairs and the loud shouts of the temporarily deaf are actually harder to sleep through than the rhythmic thump-thumping of dance music. Worst was the balloons. To clean up five thousand balloons, you start by popping them. It sounds like gang warfare out there!

Fifteen minutes after the last two staff shouted goodbye to one another, our alarm went off. Time to have fun!

Ooh, I don't want to have fun anymore! Can't we just sleep in instead?

Yes, of course we can, but we're not going to because we came all this way for this and this is our one day to enjoy it. Today is Heiva Day!

Unfortunately for us, this year's Heiva sporting events have been moved from adjacent Pā'ōfa'i Gardens to a much less convenient park on the other side of town. Maryanne had previously decided that, to get some exercise and halve our bus fare, we would be getting there on foot.

The two-hour walk was nice for getting our blood flowing after that miserable night, but it was along what I have since decided is the worst road in Pape'etē. It runs through an industrial strip and the experience of walking its shoulder is one of clouds of exhaust, waves of stinging grit, and irritating two-stroke motor noise. It was with great relief that we finally turned off into the jovial, family reunion atmosphere of the Heiva grounds.

We arrived first at the javelin throwing. This is not what we had expected at all. We thought we would see people throwing javelins overhand, Olympic-style, for distance. Instead, they were hurling slightly smaller javelins, launching them underhanded. The crazy part was that they were not shooting for distance, but were aiming for a target – a lone coconut high on a pole. Each player had maybe ten javelins to throw and they would be lucky if they hit the coconut once. The event was timed, which meant all the participants were shooting at the same time, filling the air with flying projectiles. As if a distant coconut wasn't small enough, the target is divided into zones, with higher points awarded for getting closer to the top. At the end of the time limit, the coconut is very carefully lowered and the points are recorded as each javelin is removed.

Traditional javelin throwing, was followed by a dance and drum performance

Maryanne and I ended up finding a spot to sit in the grass near the throwing line for the kid's coconut. They didn't hit nearly as often as the adults, but when they did, they were all jumping up and down and smiles. One kid hit it twice, then ran triumphantly to his dad, jumping into his arms. They both had big smiles the rest of the day.

Next, we wandered over to the copra harvesting event. In this case, it was the women's contest. They work in teams of three and the goal is to be the fastest to bag up the meat of a hundred coconuts. One woman splits the nuts with an axe, while being careful not to lop off a foot, then she tosses them to the two others, who scoop the meat out of the shells. When they are done, they all gather it into a pile and then load it into a burlap sack. It's hard to make a direct comparison, but they seem to be about fifty times faster on a per coconut basis than Team Begonia. We are probably much more worried about making a big mess and Maryanne is particularly good about cracking them so that the milk doesn't get wasted.

One thing that we noticed with this event and all the others is how friendly all the competitors are with each other. When the first team finished, they went to cheer on the next, and then the next until the whole event ended in a big, smiley, group hug in a mashup of team colors.

Once the coconut shrapnel had been cleared off the field, we watched a haka and traditional dance exhibition before the stage was given over to the stone lifters. This is just what it sounds like: The participants pick up a big stone and lift it onto their shoulders, while the judge stands by timing with a stopwatch. It was getting hot sitting out in the direct sun, so we only watched the women before moving back to a shady spot at the javelin field. It was a thing to see. I'm pretty sure all the women weighed less than I do, but they were clean-and-jerking stones that weighed more than me to shoulder level in just a few seconds. That's a handy skill to have if you like to keep your motorcycle on the top shelf.

More events ran into the afternoon, but Maryanne and I needed to get home in time to change and head out to the auditorium in Pā'ōfa'i Gardens, where we had tickets to the singing and dancing competitions.

I've said much about the Heiva before. We were lucky enough to be here for a third time. We absolutely love it and this year was the best of all. When the lights came down, the drums started beating and dancers started flowing in from each corner of the stage, the crowd roared to life with applause.

Well, almost.

On this particular night, seats were getting scarce and it was unlikely for last-minute buyers to be able to get seats together. Such was the case of what appeared to be a mother, seated two rows down and a bit to our right, and her son of upper teenage years, or possibly early twenties, who sat right next to me.

This guy irritated me right away by immediately taking up more space than the confines of his seat, as if the whole row was his personal lounging area. He practically sat on top of me, as if he hadn't noticed the guy in the colorful Heiva outfit in the next chair.

Every performance at the Heiva begins with a very long speech in Tahitian. Often, these are grandiose and seem to have the sky itself as the intended recipient. I admit, this part can be a little bit boring for those of us who have no idea what is being said. While the rest of us tried to sit patiently while not checking our watches too often, the guy next to me fidgeted and sighed and generally acted like every second was torture, all while being unnecessarily pressed into me and sweaty. The seat on his other side was still empty.

When the speeches ended, the music came up, and the dancers finally filled the stage, that's when the guy whips out his phone and starts sending insipid texts to someone on the other end.

Sup

Nothing...Sup with you (Apparently, the youth think punctuation is a waste of time)

Nothing

Cool

Then they had the same exchange forty different ways.

What's goin on

Nothing...You

Nothing...You

Nothing

Cool

Hey...I was thinking about some of my life choices and I was hoping to talk about them with a close friend and trusted confidant

What

Nothing...Sup

Nothing...Sup with you

Nothing

Cool

Excuse me, I thought. Did you not notice Polynesia's best dancers and musicians putting on their big, once-a-year show right in front of you? Can't you do that literally anywhere else, so I can have my personal space back?

He could not. The whole first dance, the only time he looked up from the phone in his lap was when he lifted it up to take a selfie with the crowd behind him so that he could show the poor sap on the other end that he really was doing nothing.

Cool

Fortunately for me, he left during the singing performances, along with many of the others in the audience. When they started filing back in for the next dance, he didn't return. Too boring, I guess.

He really missed out. We later found out the next troupe won the award for best performance for the whole 2025 Heiva. It was incredible. The stage, which took up the whole arena floor, was filled with as many dancers as would fit. There was something like four hundred of them, all dancing energetically and in unison, and all wearing amazing, elaborate costumes that doubled their heights. One of the absolutely delightful things I noticed about fifteen seconds in was the smell. Four hundred floral arrangements had just paraded in, filling the air with the scent of flowers and fresh-cut leaves. Wow!

We loved the Hieva performances- here we are not permitted to take photos so these pics are from the official facebook page. Each dance group tells a story through several different presentations and costume changes - it's better than broadway!

We got home just before midnight. The restaurant next door was mercifully silent and dark. We slept in just a little and then had an ‘easy' day of jobs at the boat. My three items were: Clean the speed wheel, fill the water tanks, and wash the exterior. Maryanne had the first two done for me by the time I was done checking the weather forecasts, so it turned out to be even easier than I thought. We were both done in plenty of time to clean ourselves up, take a sunset walk along the quay, and enjoy a nice dinner out.

In the morning, Maryanne was keen to get some fresh bread, which often sells out by eight or nine o'clock, so she left me aboard to nurse my first cup of coffee over the weather charts while she headed out.

Bastille Day parade photos (top two and are from official facebook page since I couldn't see a thing) and Dance/Drum show (where we finally found a viewpoint)

As it was also Bastille Day, she decided to check out the parade route on her way home, which was only two blocks from Begonia. I was rushing to get things done so I could join her when she texted me to say not to hurry. She told me there was nowhere to stand out of the sun and that the crowds were so big that all she could see was the backs of a lot of people standing at attention through gaps in the crowd ahead of her. We decided instead to meet up for a meal and then return in time for the fruit races.

Traditional Fruit Carring races - it's way harder than it looks just to carry the fruit, let alone run with it! There was such a good vibe from the crowds and competitors it was a joy to be there

This is another one of those events that just boggles the mind. The race starts, the participants run about ten meters to pick up their loads, which, depending on the division, can be anywhere between thirty and fifty kilos of fruit lashed to a bamboo pole. Then they take off running for another kilometer and a half with them slung over a shoulder. Again, it was all good-natured competition with the winners lining up along the course to cheer on those behind. The most amazing feat of the day was when a Māori woman came from behind the lead pack and won by an enormous margin by effectively running double the speed of the others for the last half of the race. The roar of the crowd would not have been out of place in any of the world's great arenas. Well, that was pretty cool. We had delayed our departure from Pape'etē for an extra day to see it and I'm glad we did.

---

Paofai Gardens Park wall location >> On google maps

Papeete Marina location >> On google maps