Sailing the South Pacific
"When all you care about is here, this is a good place to be..."
As I sit here in New York in the wake of one of the worst blizzards in the city's history, I really even further appreciate the perfection of the South Pacific...
After leaving the atolls, we sailed to some more islands, ones that haven't quite sunk to atolls yet. In Huahine we did an island tour where we learned all about the local fauna, explored some ancient ruins from the original Polynesian settlers, and saw some blue-eyed eels that live in the river on the island. At the next island, Raiatea, we kayaked through a river that runs through the middle of the island – it felt like a scene from The Heart of Darkness, all dense jungle, overcast misty sky, fallen branches that we had to duck under and the random screeches in the distance that you can’t quite place.
By far my favorite stop, though, was Bora Bora; the island is clearly famous for good reason. On our first day we spent the morning on a snorkel tour. At the first stop, the water was waist deep and as clear as glass and stock full of stingrays and sharks, which had no problem rubbing right against our legs as the guides threw chum into the water for them... (Eek!) Needless to say I screamed a lot but at least got some decent videos of the creatures. At the second snorkel stop the water was only slightly deeper and we floated around above coral and various fish and some of the group even saw octopi, though I didn’t happen upon any. Then at the third snorkel stop, though I was too tired to get in the water, I watched from the boat as a five foot barracuda swam in and out of the snorkelers and I thanked my lucky stars that I’d chosen to sit that one out because I just may have had a heart attack if that thing had come near me… After our snorkel excursion, we cleaned up and headed off to a helicopter tour over the island, which was so so incredible. Even though it was only 15 minutes, we saw every single color of blue within that one lagoon, we saw the morae (small islands) that surround the main mountain in the center of Bora Bora, and we could peek down at the luxury bungalow resorts (yes including the one where Kim Kardashian apparently lost her diamond earring). That night, our cruise ship hosted a beach party on our own private island for the night. We watched the beautiful sunset, ate some local food, then had a show of traditional Polynesian dancers and fire dancers – an exciting sight to be sure. On our second day in Bora Bora, we took a jet ski tour around the island that turned out to be a great way to explore the waters as we sped around from resort to island and past various sights. I heard that Bora Bora can get boring, and I can see how that might happen since there isn’t much to do there, but hell was it beautiful. I would love to go back someday and just laze on the beach or paddleboard over the stingrays or just to sit and look out at the bluest of blue lagoons I could ever imagine.
(I wore a white ruffle cami top from Band of Gypsies, tropical print Tolani silk shorts, neon pink striped Soludos espadrilles, a gold layered Orelia necklace and a gold Orelia ring, Alex + Ani bracelets, and a lovely handmade flower crown from a friendly local Polynesian woman.)
