June 16 - 24, 2008: South Pacific

Raiatea and Huahina (S 16 44’ W 151 25’), (S 16 42’ W 151 2’)

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We pulled into the cover of Raiatea Carenage with the winds still blowing 25 knots out of the east. We found a mooring ball and were well protected allowing us a good night’s rest. On Tuesday the 17^th we decided to head straight to Huahina. It was less than 20 miles from Raiatea and was reputed to have some to the best remote anchorages in the Society Islands. We anchored in a place called Pointe Teapaa and as you can see we were not alone.

This was a small exclusive cruising ship accommodated maybe 50 passengers. They quickly took over the beach with recreational activities, snacks and a jungle massage tent and put on entertainment that evening for their guests while we watched from our deck. On the Thursday we powered up the generator to charge the batteries and discovered it wasn’t putting out the proper amperage. This was the second generator incident I had within the last month when it overheated in Moorea. As I was to find out later this was only the beginning of things to come. Unfortunately decided to cut short our stay in Hauhina and didn’t get to our hoped for destination, Point Tiva (reputed to be one of the best remote anchorages in French Polynesia). We headed back to Raiatea Carenge where they had an extensive shipyard to get our Panda generator repaired.

As it turned out the capacitors went bad. Fortunately I had brought spares so the repair was done in a few hours. With the generator working we decided to explore Raiatea and Tahaa to find the best spots to take Mark when he joined the boat in July.

This is the Apoomau River at the end of Faaroa Bay. We took our dinghy up the river for about a kilometer

Near the Bay we had lunch at a small hotel run by a Marquesan woman

Faaroa was a nice bay and a good anchorage. We were the only boat. I lose my boat hook overboard as a reminder we’d been there. We motored back to Uturoa and were able to tie up at the city’s dock, provision and see the town. It was a convenient and pleasant enough town but expensive like everywhere else in French Polynesia.