Bye Bye Taiohae and Nuku Hiva

At last, we managed to pull ourselves loose – quite literally since the anchor was buried well after the last 1.5 months – from Taiohae, Nuku Hiva’s capital. It’s not that we didn’t want to leave earlier (believe me, we did!), it’s that we still needed to do things to allow our departure. Like scraping and cleaning Irie’s bottom for three days and getting nauseous while doing so. What a dirty mess that was; the green beards flowing and sticking with the boat bouncing up and down, the barnacles being stubborn to let go of their hold. We also had to buy some more vegetables, probably the last ones for a while, and continue some online duties.

When we were ready to leave, it rained. All day and night. Just like the weeks prior. The following day, Nuku Hiva entrapped in clouds, a sight we were used to; the sky looked bluer off shore. The wind predictions were on the high side, but we would put two reefs in and let the east winds push us to our destination. The reduced sails did their job, but the wind came from the southeast instead, so there we had to go again… upwind! It was a wet and quite boisterous ride, Irie flying and jumping along at 6-7 knots. We reached Ua Pou, 27 miles south of Nuku Hiva, fast and in time for lunch, and hoped for some rain to clean the decks. This is our sixth and last Marquesan island before we continue on.

As seems to be customary in this archipelago, Hakahau is another choppy harbor with inconvenient shore access. Once again, we are living on a hobby horse, attached to two anchors to limit swinging room (with the gusty winds we are always worried to hit our neighbors) and to be faced into the swell. We are bouncing up and down, being pushed back and forth between the two rodes. Once again, it takes us a while to try some different configurations to leave the dinghy safely for our excursions onshore. The people are friendly, the church yard has pamplemousse and breadfruit, the locals practice rowing in their outriggers every day and we have discovered the biggest, most modern store of all of the Marquesas. Now the reports of stocking up in Ua Pou before heading to the Tuamotus make sense! It is exactly what we plan to do, after obtaining butane (a half a day’s event), focusing on more work stuff and checking out the view from the top of a hill.

Arriving in Ua Pou

Hakahau anchorage

Daily rowing practice

Massive breadfruit tree and lime trees (in the back) near the village cemetery

Change of Scenery Needed

Even though the supermarkets have a decent amount of (expensive) stuff - one of them is even air conditioned – and there are a few nice walks in the area, it is time for a change of scenery. The traffic and buzzing cars are overwhelming and during the (long) weekends, it gets very loud. Local guys like to park their cars along the edge of the bay and turn their massive speakers on, faced towards the boats, blaring incessantly loud music into our cockpits. One car doing this is annoying, but when there are a few playing different disco tunes at the same time, it gets substantially worse.

Mark, Liesbet and Leili

Mark and I hiked to Baie Colette with the family on Iona and got a ride back to town with a friendly Marquesan fisherman. Along a rocky beach, protected from the sharks by a reef, local families enjoyed an afternoon of swimming and hanging out, some of them bathed their pretty horses in the seawater. We paid another visit to the main church, adorned with beautifully carved wooden structures and panels. One evening, together with some friends, we splurged on cocktails during happy hour at the fancy hotel, located on the opposite side of the bay.

Baie Colette

Stocked up on some fresh produce and fresh baguettes, Mark and I are off to Daniel’s Bay for a few days, to be away from the crowds and enjoy a peaceful anchorage.

 

The sharks are still circling and fighting for food scraps at the main dock

Expensive cocktails ($7), even during happy hour

The flags rise, to commemorate the end of WWI on November 11^th

Tiny kittens along the road to Baie Colette

Taiohae Bay seen from the west

View from the bed of a rickety jeep, on the ride back to town

Local guys swimming with their horses

Arthur with one of his prized animals

Wooden preacher’s pulpit

The Scoop in Taiohae

Mark and I have been in “the capital” (of the Marquesas) for almost two weeks now and most of that time has been spent online. Stuff on the internet to-do-lists accumulates over the months and slowly but surely we are ticking some items off, like health insurance and boat insurance dealings, sending full size pictures and articles for writing assignments, making the layout of the previous blog posts a bit better :-), research for boat and other  reasons, necessary behind the scenes work for the Wirie, and so on. Trying to shake off that zombie feeling you get from sitting hours behind the computer, we went ashore frequently to take care of some doctor, pharmacy, hardware store and supermarket visits. The town of Taiohae is very spread out, so it takes a while to walk to some of the shops, but the locals are very friendly, offering rides when they see a protruding thumb along the side of the road.

The hardware store was a bit of a disappointment and the bank machine only gave out bills of 10.000 francs ($110) – which they refused to change in the adjacent bank for smaller bills without the receipt (which Mark never asks for since it is a waste of paper) - but other than that, you can find quite a bit here, non-cruising related. For necessary boat parts, hiking shoes and Tevas, we will have to wait another six months until we reach Tahiti. Maybe… There is a cool church, and some tiki sites, and a walk along the big bay is pleasant, but hot. The anchorage is on the bottom of a collapsed volcano, so the surrounding “wall” (= jagged hills) is quite picturesque.

The rumors of sharks are true. Apparently, the bay is “filled with hammerhead sharks”, which we have not seen yet. But, presence of the grey shark is a fact. Every time the fishermen get back to the dock and clean their catch, they toss the unwanted fish parts over the side, into the bay, where tons of hungry six foot sharks, violently snatch them up. Once, Mark and I just arrived ashore in our dinghy when that happened. The trashing of the grey beasts created waves in the water and the splashing with their tails got us soaking wet! We try to take quick showers and avoid the seawater when we are bleeding. We did dare to be in for an hour or so on a clearer day, because Irie’s bottom really needed scraping and cleaning. Since the sharks get fed daily, they shouldn’t be hungry outside of their meal times, right?

Just like in the good old Caribbean days, we do take it easier on the weekends and try to have some fun. Last weekend, the guys – and girls – from SV Iona joined us for a walk to the “Sentinels”. It was good exercise to climb the well-kept and nice trail up a hill and the view was worthwhile. On the way back, we saw the cemetery lit with candles and filled with singing voices. The celebration of the dead had just finished by the time we arrived down there.

Every evening during the week, a local group is practicing their singing, drumming and dancing skills for the festival coming up in mid-December. It promises to be a fun and spectacular cultural event. We still hope to make it back to Ua Huka for that. There are a few restaurants around, but so far, we have only tried the yummy and relatively affordable food at “the snack” closest to the dock. A decent plate of poisson cru (raw fish cooked in lemon juice with some veggies) with rice and avocado costs about $5.50. A visit to the fancy restaurant is still on the agenda!

City hall in Taiohae

Beach right off town, close to the shark feeding "platform"

Tiki site - site of one of the first Marquesas Art Festivals

What do we have here... a big grey shark!

 
 You don't want to go swimming here!!!

 
View of the Sentinells, with Ua Pou in the distance
 

The Small Pleasures in Life

Here we are, rolling back and forth a little bit, in the big bay of Taiohae (Nuku Hiva), the capital and biggest city of the Marquesas. The water seems cleaner than in our previous environment and we are anchored off a small beach. We hope to go for a refreshing swim over there later, and assume – based on the amount of Sunday swimmers and beach goers – that the waters are relatively shark-free, despite the rumors. For the first time in a while, we are not the only boat in the anchorage. As a matter of fact, we count about 20 other sailboats, some of them said to be “residents”. We are ready to socialize, hang out with old friends (Kril, Iona and Pitufa are here) and meet some new people.

The beach in Taiohae, seen from Irie

Taiohae bay and "city" ashore

The main reason Mark and I are a bit excited to be here is because we have high hopes of this place. We haven’t been to a “real” town since we left the Galapagos, and it has been 9 months already, since we left Panama City. Our main hopes revolve around convenience and availability of stuff. We are looking forward to some decent grocery shopping and lots of fresh produce, finding a good doctor and dentist, going out for a drink with friends, having dinner in a restaurant again (we have a “mysterious” friend who will take us out to dinner virtually, and we have some postponed special occasions to celebrate) and spending heaps of time online to catch up with the world, our social life, and research. It sounds like we might be here a while and if you consider the following, you might understand why…

It has been:

-        Over a year since we went clothes shopping (Belgium and the US, summer of 2012)

-        Three months since we ate a local meal in a restaurant (Rikitea, Gambier islands)

-        Nine months since we went out for an “international” (worthwhile) meal (Panama City)

-        Nine months since we managed to buy something “marine” like to fix a boat issue (Panama City)

-        Seven months since we visited a bar (Isabela, Galapagos)

-        Six months since I last used a normal flush toilet (Galapagos restaurant)

-        Seven months since we shopped in a decent grocery store (Santa Cruz, Galapagos)

-        Nine months since we shopped in a big, western-style grocery store (Panama City)

-        Nine months since we rode on a bus (Panama City) => there are no buses here either

-        An eternity since we had fast WiFi to do research => we hope this is available here!

-        One and a half months since we saw a bank and used the ATM (Atuona, Hiva Oa)

-        Three weeks since we were in an anchorage with other boats

-        One and a half months since we could – barely – use Skype to call our parents

-        Three months since we took a warm, pressurized shower (Gambier) => no plans to do or find that here

-        Many years since I took a warm bath => definitely not possible here

-        Seven months since I ate a real ice cream (San Cristobal, Galapagos)

-        Three months since we docked our dinghy with ease – no dragging up the beach or using stern anchor or taking tides and local boats into consideration (Rikitea, Gambier) => Hanavave in Fatu Hiva (2 months ago) was quite easy as well, most of the time

-        Nine months since we stepped foot in an air-conditioned building (Panama City)

-        Seven months since we bought produce at a decent vegetable market (San Cristobal, Galapagos)

-        Four months since we last used a washing machine (Gambier) and nine months since we used a washer and dryer (Panama City) => too expensive here

-        Four months since Mark finished his soymilk to eat breakfast => since then, he’s been on dry granola or bread

Time to enjoy some small pleasures in life! Unless we are expecting too much, of course… :-)

South coast of Nuku Hiva

The other side of Taiohae Bay