DAY 26---RAIATEA, FRENCH POLYNESIA

 

We are actually docked, no tendering, today on the island of Raiatea.  Another mostly sunny and hot day for my tour.

Historical/Background Info:

        Raiatea is the second largest of the Society Islands (Tahiti is the largest) with a population of around 16,500.  This mountainous, volcanic formed island is has a maximum altitude of over 3000 feet.  It is 12 miles north to south and 10 miles wide in places for a total of 65 square miles. 

        The island’s economy is based mainly on agriculture with exports of vanilla, pineapple, and coconut.  Pearl farming is also an important industry.  There is less tourism here compared to the other islands in the archipelago making it a quieter and less developed in tourism compared to Bora Bora and Tahiti.  It does have some hotels and an airport.  There are several yacht charter companies and is visited by cruise ships from time to time.

TODAY, FEBRUARY 1ST

                                                                        Sailing in 

                                                         Several of these sand bars on sail in.

                                                           Our welcoming committee.

      This is the guide on our "Sacred Island by Le Truck" tour.  He was pretty much worthless.

There were two Le Trucks on out tour.  This is the guide on the other bus who did all the talking at the two stops on our tour.  

                                                             Faaroa River on the island

Our first stop after a very long, hour, drive was at a, what was supposed to be a botanical garden.  Not much of a garden and you had to walk down over 30 steps to the garden.  Many on our bus did not go down the steps.  Marcia was on my tour truck and I sat next to her.  I took her camera down the steps with me and got some photos for her too.  It was REALLY hot with no breeze so I was sweat wet and very hot.

                                                Above are some flowers I photographed.

                                                             Picture of my finger too.

                           This is actually a huge extinct volcano with the rims all around us.

After another long drive we arrived at our second stop.  It was the Marae Taputapuatea archaeological site.  It is a Unesco World Heritage Site

                                                                           Marcia

This was where the islanders worshipped back in the 1600's.  There was no building as they worshipped in the open air.  Worshipping the sun, wind, water, and rain.

                                                      Let me know if you can read this.

            Looks like a pile of volcanic rocks to me.  It had sea shells and other things on it.

        Ok, it is 9:30 pm and I have not been able to upload the last 16 photos that I took today.  The ship's internet is REALLY bad.  They are working to repair it and I believe the parts and technicians will be flown to make the repairs.  Not sure when that will be.  In the mean time everyone on the ship is NOT happy, included yours truly. 

        I am going to publish this now and head to bed.  I'll put the rest on tomorrow's blog.  If I can't do it on board I will do it at a wifi place on shore in Papeete.  We sailed at 9pm tonight and will be docked in Papeete tomorrow morning.  This is the end of the first segment of our world cruise.  I think 60 segment folks will be disembarking and another new 60 will be embarking tomorrow.

        I had a tour scheduled for tomorrow but cancelled it after today's "tour from hell".  We had a nice evening with cocktails as usual and dinner in Compass Rose.  There is basically no entertainment night so we retired and I am working on getting this posted.  Really getting tired of this no internet crap!!

DAY 25---RANGIROA, FRENCH POLYNESIA

 THIS IS TUESDAY'S (JANUARY 31ST) POST AS WE HAD NO INTERNET AGAIN YESTERDAY

We are anchored today off Rangiroa atoll.  Mostly sunny skies and 82 degrees already at 7am.

Historical/Background Info:

        Rangiroa is the largest atoll in the Tuamotu Archipelago of which there are 78 coral atolls scattered over several hundred miles of the Pacific Ocean.  It is also one of the largest atolls in the world.  Tahiti is 220 miles to the southwest.  An atoll is a “ring shaped reef, island, or chain of islands formed by coral”.  The Rangiroa atoll is a flattened elliptical ring of land 50 miles long and a width ranging from 3 to 20 miles with a big lagoon in the middle.  The lagoon has a maximum depth of 115 feet.  The population is over 2500.

        The economy is based on black pearl farming.  In the lagoon, black pearls are produced from marine cultured black lip pearl oysters.  Tourism is also important as scuba diving is world class here.  Fishing is also done mainly for local consumption but they do export some to Tahiti.  Believe it or not, some wine is produced here in two grape harvests per year.  There is no water here so the people living here have to collect and store rainwater in tanks.

        We visited the island when on our 2017 world cruise.

YESTERDAY EVENING (MONDAY, JANUARY 30TH 

 L to R:  Buddy, Karen, Eddie, Exec chef John, Lyn, then us.  The two other couples live in the Ft Lauderdale area.

                                                         Executive Chef John Pugh

          Chef with Eddie & Lyn Zito.  We've cruised with Eddie and Lyn several times before.

They gave the chef a recipe for this crab stuffed lobster.  Chef John personally made it for us last night.  I can't tell you how delicious it was.  Rebecca and I could only eat half of it however.  Fried calamari was our appetizer.  Again delicious.  Great evening!!

They called this "Grandma's Lemon Meringue Pie".  Certainly not like the grandma you and I know.

                     We have front row stage right seats for "Blazing Boots" production show.

Orchestra's drummer, acoustic guitar, and bass guitar were on raised part of the stage next to us.  They accompanies the sound track recorded for the show.  Great job!

This is our favorite show and have seen it on several other cruises several times per cruise.  The cast was great.  One of the singer/dances, Page, was a cast member on our 2022 world cruise.

TODAY

 

This is the Aranui 5 half cargo/half passenger ship.  It came out end of 2015 and can carry 256 passengers with a crew of 64.  It's home port is Papeete and sails around the Marquesas Islands.

                            Today's tender gangway is set up forward of our balcony.

                                              This is where we spend most mornings.

             I just got off the tender and heading to meet my tour, "Discover the World of Pearls".  

                                    Head on look at Mariner anchored in the lagoon.

                                                    Usual little shops on the tender pier.

                  Beautiful colors of aqua and blue of the lagoon waters near the shore line.

                                     Here is another tour available today.  "Glass Bottom Boat".

    Shore line here is mostly volcanic rock but there are some nice beaches on the atoll.

                                                          My unair-conditioned tour bus.

              Philip gave us a very good explanation on how the black pearls are cultured.

This man was implanting a very small pearl seed and then a small part of the shell in the pearl sac of each oyster.  A very delicate procedure.

They are then hung in these wire cages and placed on a long wire in the lagoon.  It takes 18 months for the pearl to mature and be harvested.  The wire cages are taken out of the lagoon every two months and cleaned before replaced back in the lagoon.

                                              This shows the oysters in the wire racks.

LAST EVENING (TUESDAY}

        At 6pm there was a Krew Kappers show in the theater.  This is where some of our talented crew members do a show of singing and dancing.  We did not go to this one but will go to the future shows as there is one at the end of every segment of the world cruise.  Our first segment ends in Papeete, Tahiti, on February 2nd.  Anyway, Rebecca had to go at 6pm down to the doctor to get some more cough medicine.  She was only one there so that did not take long.  We then had cocktails at the Mariner Lounge bar.

                        We both started with this cream of cauliflower and potato soup.

          Here is our special order veal parmesan that we split and still could not eat all of it.

                                                    I loved this pecan pie cheesecake. 

        There was no show.  They had a "Beatles Night" dance party in the Horizon Lounge which we never go to.