The Society Islands. Tahiti, Moorea, Huahini and Bora Bora

Friday July 17th 2015

Bora Bora

It has been a few weeks since our last posting and I'm happy to report that there's been lots of activity onboard Amelie to tell you all about!

In Tahiti, we welcomed our visiting crew: Sonia, Alexis and Olivia Lambrinoudis from Calgary. They came onboard Amelie on July 1st, (Canada Day !), bringing with them lots of goodies from home, including a brand new Canadian flag for the transom!  It was so nice to see friendships picking up right where they left off as 15 months of separation just melted away in seconds!  

Olivia and Meghan in Tahiti

On top of all the great “stuff” the girls brought with them, they also brought much laughter and good times. We appreciated their enthusiasm and willingness to try new things. It was their first time on a sailboat and during their two week visit we took them on three separate crossings (including one overnight). They embraced the whole experience; the seasickness, the heat, living with constant sticky/salty skin, and more than a few wet and wild dinghy rides! They made us a couple of special suppers and deserts too! Our two weeks together just flew by and before we knew it, we were standing on the dock in Bora Bora waving goodbye as the shuttle took them across the Bay towards the airport! We will miss them very much !  

Moorea: More Dancing and,  breakfast with the Stingrays !!!

After leaving Tahiti, our first stop was Moorea where we enjoyed sharing a great dance performance with our guests.The girls were pulled up from their seats to join in the fun and got an impromptu lesson from the dancers. The next day we set out to find “Sting Ray City”, a place just south of where we were anchored which was rumoured to have many stingrays which you could feed. At 7:00 am, armed with cameras and tins of sardines, we set out to find them. 

After a 20 minute ride, we found a mooring ball in a shallow sandy area. There was no doubt that we were at the right spot when our dinghy was surrounded by stingrays, attracted by the sound of our outboard motor, they clearly were used to this and they came hungry ! 

Meg and Olivia getting an impromptu dance lesson, Moorea

Meg tries out her new grass skirt

Beautiful dancer, Moorea

a dozen rays and a few reef sharks greet us (near Moorea)

Meg feeding the sting rays

Mark getting the sardines as an eager ray waits

Meg shares a moment with a sting ray

Three very hungry rays huddle around MC

Hello !

As you probably know, stingrays get their name from the long barb found on their tail. This barb is used in self defense and can be quite painful, as a friend of ours found out when she inadvertently stepped on  one while in the Galapagos. For this reason people generally tend to stay away from them. I knew all this when I jumped in, enthusiastically that morning. I also knew that if I kept my feet still on the ground I probably had very little to fear. After all, I came bearing gifts! What I was not ready for was that my enthusiasm to meet the rays was no match to THEIR enthusiasm for sardines!  As the rest of the crew watched from the dinghy I was surrounded by 3-4  rays,crowding all around me, sliding up my legs along my body  towards the surface of the water, it was surreal! Their pushing and shoving jolted me into teacher mode: ”One at a time, no pushing!”  I commanded, although it made no difference. In time all the rays got their share of the fish they came for. Things calmed down enough for the rest of the crew to jump in and try it too!  We all got plenty of 'up close' time with the rays, the rays allowing us to stroke their silky soft wings and the roughness between their eyes. I won’t lie; when I first felt their tails brush up against my leg (like sandpaper) as they passed by, I had a few chills, but was it ever worth it !  Just, Wow, so cool ! Blacktip sharks and remora fish were also present but dared not get in the way of the hungry rays, they just added to the incredible decor that surrounded us in the crystal clear water!

Because their mouths are situated on their underside....the best way to feed them is to hold the sardine FLAT on your hand underwater and wait for one to come up...and that’s when you feel the ‘vacuum cleaner- like suction’ as they quickly make the treat disappear.  Sometimes you had a younger/more eager ray come right up to you..and I mean RIGHT up to you, cimbig up your chest, mouths out of water, wings flapping on either side of you, in that casr, te best we found to do was to simply let gravity do the work, as we just let the sardines drop into their mouths.

Twice I got my finger caught in the rays mouth, luckily they don’t have teeth, but it was still a rigorous snap- like getting your finger caught in a drawer-and it leaves you quite surprised (as you can see from the look on my face in the picture below). All in all, it was an experience of a lifetime for everyone I think, leaving us with a thrilling adrenaline rush and the wonder one only feel after close encounters with wild animals. 

1- "There you go cutie". 2-"Ooooh, he's got my finger!"3- "It's Ok, it's ok..., finger's still there!"

Who-a-what now ?  Huahini !

We had quite a few opportunities for good snorkelling in Huahini, the next island we stopped at. We saw plenty of colourful fish inclusing many large anenomes, complete with clownfish (aka Nemo) darting in and out, twice we spotted a large octopus, out in the open, between the bombies, and some neat little pipefish (related to seahorse). We also saw a garden of underwater tikis carved in stone. No one knew for sure how the tikis got there. Some say they were thrown in the water by the missionaries who did not approve of them but more probably is that they were placed there more recently to attract tourists. Huahini, like all the islands of French Polynesia, was a beautiful, pristinely clean island with pleasant people and a good selection of cheese and pastries, but soon we had to pull anchor again a better known island, with a famous name was just beyond the horizon, beckoning us to her.

Sonia and Alexis

Meg, Sonia, Olivia and Alexis enjoy a dolphin visit

Meg, Olivia and Alexis prepare to drop a message in a bottle

Alexis, enjoying the clear waters near Bora Bora

Bora Bora: the legend, the reality

There are certain visions that come to mind when you hear the name, hues of light blues as far as the eye can see, white sand, grass roofed huts barely hovering over the surface of the water they stand in, yep, that’s sounds about right ! Bora Bora does not disappoint! In the sunlight, after our many days of rain, it really did offer us breathtaking views of an enormous-never ending-lagoon and a collection of all the blues I have ever dreamed of. Anchored in 10 feet of water, the shallowest we have ever dared to anchor in. We were alone and it really felt like we were in the world’s largest swimming pool. 

Unknowingly we had anchored very close to a great spot to swim with MANTA rays, it became obvious the next morning when we spied one tour boat after another stopping with a group of eager snorkelers, so we grabbed our gear and headed out towards them, it only took a tiny bit of convincing our guests that Manta rays were not going to crowd us like the sting rays had, and that they are harmless, even though they are HUGE (much larger than the sting or eagle rays we had seen so far). 

It has been said that swimming with Mantas really is like dancing a ballet, if you can imagine these graceful and strangely alien looking beauties as they slowly glide below you. Dark and mysterious, it was a real privilege to swim with them, again, and THIS time, we got to really watch them, at our leisure as the visibility was terrific. I found it fascinating to see them unroll their “curls” to form a gateway to their mouth below (the curls are usually rolled above their heads). They do this when they are feeding, it seems they do this in order to gently corral little fish into their large mouthes as we saw many venturing in. We loved this experience so much we got up even earlier the next morning to do it all over again, and this time, we got there before the arrival of the zillions of tour boats! 

From our arrival in Marquesas a few months ago, to the secluded Tuamotus and now the exciting Society Islands, we have truly enjoyed French Polynesia, even more than we had thought we would, it is not hard to see why some sailor stay for many seasons, our 90 day permit will expire at the end of this month and soon we will be headed towards Tonga.Until then, we are sending you big hugs from the four of us here onboard AmelieIV

Meg and Manta

Meg and Manta

Meg swims with two huge mantas (7 foot wing span)

A huge Manta Ray, Bora Bora

'Dancing' with the Mantas

Mother daughter fun

The totem at the Bloody Mary restaurant, Bora Bora

Our dinner at Bloody Mary Restaurant, Bora Bora

Bora Bora feels like the clearest of swimming pools

Crystal clear water allows us to see our anchor chain and anchor!

Clown Fish Bora Bora