June 28 – July 3, 2008: South Pacific
On June 25th we headed to legendary Bora Bora about 30 miles west of Raiatea and Tahaa. We were looking forward to returning to these two islands with Mark because so far they had been the best of what French Polynesia had to offer. The islands had enough of an infrastructure to make life pleasant without the commercialization and tourism to take away the magic. But we were looking forward to seeing what Bora Bora had to offer. Visually it is a stunning is island but unfortunately except for the clarity of the water and the diving, it ended up being very anti-climatic, more about that later.
We dropped anchor off Bloody Mary’s at Point Raititi and soon found ourselves in the middle of Bora Bora’s annual Heiva celebration pirogue race. The 48 year-old multi-year champion lost out to a 17 year old. The Heiva coincides with Bastille Day but since French Polynesia as never gotten its independence they had to call it something else. It goes on for weeks and has inter-island competitions with events ranging from pirogue racing to traditional dancing. It is not to be missed! 
We quickly settled in and were eager to do some diving and exploring the island. Both the diving and snorkeling were magnificent. It was like swimming in an aquarium. As it turned out it was some of the best diving we’d be doing in the South Pacific. It was like swimming in an aquarium.
As it turned out it was some of the best diving we’d be doing in the South Pacific
Bora Bora is losing its coral though because of global warming and a creature called a Crown of Thorns. It is a type of starfish that eats coral and has no natural predator other than the Trident shell (that’s the shellfish whose shell you see the natives blowing in the good ole days). The Trident was very good eating and now they are virtually extinct giving the Crown of Thorns free rein.
Bora Bora is the Monte Carlo of the South Pacific with a virtual who’s who of yachts. This is Tom Perkins personal watercraft called the Maltese Falcon. We’d be on its tail since the Marquesas having caught up with it in Papeete and now Bora Bora. Here it was being chartered for I believe only $25,000 a week. Its next port of call is San Francisco.
The smaller vessel to the stern off the Maltese Falcon is a Russian industrialist owned power vessel called Ice. The satellite tracking domes are something else. What I learned on this trip is that there is always someone else who has a larger boat.
If you can believe this, there’s not much of a town on Bora Bora. The town is called Vaitape and consists of one medium size grocery store a post office, gendarmerie and a few souvenir shops. There was more to see and do on Raiatea and Moorea. The World War II ruins are nonexistent and like everywhere else in French Polynesia everything except the French bread costs a fortune. There are though a bunch of really nice bungalow hotels built over the water that cost you $1,000 a night.
We quickly settled in and were eager to do some diving and exploring the island. Both the diving and snorkeling were magnificent. It was like swimming in an aquarium. As it turned out it was some of the best diving we’d be doing in the South Pacific. It was like swimming in an aquarium.
As it turned out it was some of the best diving we’d be doing in the South PacificBora Bora is losing its coral though because of global warming and a creature called a Crown of Thorns. It is a type of starfish that eats coral and has no natural predator other than the Trident shell (that’s the shellfish whose shell you see the natives blowing in the good ole days). The Trident was very good eating and now they are virtually extinct giving the Crown of Thorns free rein.
Bora Bora is the Monte Carlo of the South Pacific with a virtual who’s who of yachts. This is Tom Perkins personal watercraft called the Maltese Falcon. We’d be on its tail since the Marquesas having caught up with it in Papeete and now Bora Bora. Here it was being chartered for I believe only $25,000 a week. Its next port of call is San Francisco.
The smaller vessel to the stern off the Maltese Falcon is a Russian industrialist owned power vessel called Ice. The satellite tracking domes are something else. What I learned on this trip is that there is always someone else who has a larger boat.
If you can believe this, there’s not much of a town on Bora Bora. The town is called Vaitape and consists of one medium size grocery store a post office, gendarmerie and a few souvenir shops. There was more to see and do on Raiatea and Moorea. The World War II ruins are nonexistent and like everywhere else in French Polynesia everything except the French bread costs a fortune. There are though a bunch of really nice bungalow hotels built over the water that cost you $1,000 a night.
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