Pape/ete means water basket.

The boat stays in Tahiti until the work is done!! This is proving quite costly both in time and money but as we still have half an ocean to cross, getting things working properly is a must. At least here, there are good engineers with access to the right parts though some of them have to be freighted from New Zealand and May is a very frustrating month because it’s full of holidays…Pentecost, Spring Bank holiday etc….. so every weekend becomes a long one. We also have to spend a lot of time just waiting around for engineers etc to arrive and they seem to spend a lot of their time stuck in traffic jams or trying to find a parking place. At least there is plenty of water though via the hose so I can splash around on the boat washing things down and keeping cool at the same time. It heats up quite dramatically here during the day compared with other places we’ve been to and cools down to “extra layer” temperature around 4am each night.

But, hey..the cheese is wonderful!! I’m even getting used to the poly extruded starch that they call bread in France…though it can be hard to find if it’s after midday and the local sandwich bars are very reluctant to sell them even they can only throw them away if they’re not made up into sandwiches. Strange!
The other day, being Sunday and therefore no workers around, we decided that it was high time to do the obligatory island tour…so I booked a full day’s tour, with lunch, in a 4x4 which took us around most of the island …and across the middle. Definitely not for the faint hearted, or pregnant ladies or those with bad backs. We bumped, splashed and crashed our way up the course of a steep valley right into the centre of the island driving through the worst roads ( engineered by the French army ) I’ve ever seen. We had to cross the river several times on our way up into the highlands and were told that other tours had cancelled that day’s trip because it had been raining hard since the night before making the roads quite treacherous. Large chunks of road had fallen into the river in several places and eventually we had nowhere left to go because a landslide had completely blocked the road (a photo may or may not accompany this piece)…so we couldn’t cross the island completely as there is only the one road and a couple of footpaths. I think we were a little fortunate that the landslide happened earlier and not as we actually drove along that stretch!? The rocks which make up Tahiti are very young (less then one million yrs) and although very hard, they are very friable, so shatter and crumble (lots of the minerals simply dissolve in water) very easily. The dramatic mountains look perfect for climbing but this is impossible and very dangerous to attempt so all the peaks remain virtually untouched and unexplored and very green too. The crumbly rock is why very little of the carvings done by the ancient islanders have survived in most of these islands.

The whole island like others across the Pacific is cooling and shrinking after the cessation of volcanic activity (just a few thousand years ago in Tahiti’s case) and will eventually disappear beneath the waves leaving just the rim of the crater which will then become a coral atoll…… I know this because I studied these things but our delightful guide, Alain was there to tell the rest of the group. So, basically, if you want to visit Tahiti or the other Society Islands, you’d better do it quickly!!

Everything grows madly here and many introduced species of plants are causing havoc as they spread and engulf the native flora….not very good for the future even though some of them are very pretty like the tulip tree from India with its bright vermilion flowers which stand out amongst all the green in the vast valleys of the interior.

It was a splendid day out marred slightly at the end unfortunately…we had stopped on our way back to the coast to stretch our legs. There was a definite smell of something very dead nearby and on investigating over the side of the road into the river valley, I saw a puppy lying among some rubbish bags….it wasn’t dead but wasn’t very well and only moved its head a little in response to Alain throwing it some bread. It obviously had dead brothers and sisters nearby. Quite horrible. Impossible for us to do anything either as the valley slope was very steep and unclimbable. I only hope it died quietly in the night. People can be very callous…..sad.

So, back to the boat and Monday dawned with more work being done on the electrics…the wiring on this boat is very complicated and something has been connected wrongly by someone in the past which may be the cause of many other problems. There is a very good all round boat repair man who speaks very good English, Patrick, who is trying to sort it all out once and for all….It would be rather nice to arrive somewhere with everything working for a change…but then as people in the sailing world everywhere will tell you, “it’s a boat”…so what do you expect?

We were surprised and delighted the other evening when Scot Free turned up and moored next to us. we last saw them in Santa Cruz, Galapagos when we were both stuck with engine problems etc. Debs and her Texas Man, David entertained us royally last night... I lost count of the number of empty bottles/boxes of the red stuff! Then earlier this morning, we were hailed by Sharon and Nigel from Honalee whom we last saw again in Santa Cruz. They are shortly off by air to NZ so we will arrange a farewell dinner I hope soon. This is one of the nicer things about being stuck somewhere....If we stayed for another month or so, even Pete (Troutbridge) and Pam and Jim ( Delicado) might catch up.... I suppose I must also hope that this won't happen as it would mean we were seriously stuck and they could even overtake us from then on! There would also be no money left at the rate it's currently being spent on the essentials like cheeeeeeeez!!

I am now going to sit and wait while some photos upload and it may just cost me another beer...at nearly £4 for a small glass.....Eek. I therefore hope they will be "appreciated"??