Raiatea

Raiatea is historically and spiritually a center of Polynesian culture. It has the largest and most significant marae at Taputaputea and was the source of many voyages of exploration to other islands of the South Pacific. This made it an important landfall for us. The fact that it lies only 12nm west of Huahine made it even more compelling.

This is Baie Hotopuu, which is very convenient to Taputaputea. The bay is a bit tricky to navigate as it is generally deep (90+') but has numerous reefs and shoals and becomes quite shallow and murky toward its head. A major advantage of the bay is it's very well sheltered, since the pass is narrow and does not allow swell to enter, a great feature since it's on the windward side of the island.

This is Mt Rauhotu. We thought it bears a curious resemblance to a rather hairy face. Note the "lips" on the face which is looking to your right.

Here's one of the marae at Taputaputea. It is made of slabs of coral, unlike the Marquesas and Tahiti, where they used basalt. The raised slabs at the head is called an "Ahu" and functioned at an altar.

Here's another. The smaller stones sticking up are said to mark where people are buried. The higher slabs, beside the ahu at the rear, were usually used as backrests by the chiefs.

Raiatea is used by some for hauling out and/or storage during cyclone season. There are a couple of marinas and boat yards on the NW side. There are moorings and an anchorage as well on the NW side by the Moorings base, but holding is poor if anchored. The airport is the only one I can recall which has a boat dock next to the passenger terminal. Naturally, this was discovered after walking a mile or so from the Moorings marina to the airport. The convenience of the airport is another nice feature, as packages are easy to obtain; you can FedEx a package to Papeete and call the office there and have it shipped to any island in French Polynesia with an airport.

Another nice feature of Raiatea is the large Champion grocery store on the NE side. This may seem trivial, but in a place where produce is hard to find, a store with lots of cheap bread as well as lettuce is a major boon to the ocean traveler.

This is the north side of Raiatea as viewed from Tahaa. The lagoon is a couple of miles across.

Tahaa

Pronounced "Ta-ha-a", this is a very nice island and very well-sheltered behind the lagoon it shares with Raiatea. There are numerous anchorages near the motus (islets) on the reef; we only tried one anchorage on the island itself. While there are many bays which might work, they tend to be deep and only feasible to visit if on a mooring. We spent a couple of nights on a mooring in Baie Apu, on the SW side, where there's a nice little resort called Marina Iti. It has Internet service and will take trash of you're on one of their moorings.

This is Baie Apu. The water here is about 120' deep, so a mooring is well worth $10/day.

This is a church on the west side - classic French colonial architecture.

We anchored near 2 motus. This one is Tehotu, which as you can see is infested with over-water bungalows. The water here is crystal-clear and every color of blue you can imagine.

A close-up reveals the legendary island of Bora Bora, about 25nm NW.

This is the beach on the island that contains the Vahine Island Resort. It's on the NE side of the lagoon and quite idyllic.

Here's the admiral standing on the ironshore that's found on the windward side of the island.

Here's the boat anchored off "Vahine" island.

After the pretty views seen above, the weather turned nasty, with winds of about 30 kts making even the lagoon choppy and no fun. After hiding in Apu Bay for a couple of days we decided to head for our last rendezvous with French Polynesia, the fabled island of Bora Bora.

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