Nuku Hiva

 The ship stayed in the bay overnight, as we were scheduled to be in Nuku Hiva today and we took the tender ashore shortly after breakfast.

It's not a huge town and there is not that much to see - but it's pretty, set in a flat area surrounded by mountains. It looks like the town and bay are in a caldera, the south side of which collapsed to let the sea in. We walked up to the big Tiki next to the wharf.

Then along the sea front to the Notre Dame Cathedral, made from local stones and wood.

And then back along the sea front. There was a very small market (for both vegetables and souvenirs) by the wharf but nothing worth buying. Lynn returned to the ship while I had an unaccustomed burst of energy and walked further around the east side of the bay and back. It was hot and humid today, so that was our limit.

We were both on board in time for lunch and the ship headed south at 2pm. We're crossing back to the Tuamotu group so will be at sea tomorrow, too. In the afternoon we read in a shady spot on deck, eventually retreating to our cabin.

We did comparatively well in the trivia quiz before dinner. Ate too much, of course, but went up to the lounge for a while for the evening entertainment (but snuck out half way through).

Nuku Hiva (not Hiva Oa)

 Today was scheduled to be Hiva Oa, the next substantially sized island along from Futa Hiva. We'd arrived by the time we woke up, but while we were still in bed they announced that the swell (about 2m) was too substantial to disembark to the tenders. It's been coming from the South East the whole trip, and Atuona, the main town, is unprotected from that direction (while yesterday we were in the lee of Futa Hiva).

So there was some headscratching and aborted plans, then a decision to head to Nuku Hiva, where we'd be going tomorrow anyway. This left us with most of a day to kill. We went up to the Yacht Club to have breakfast and read, then went and found the whirlpool on the bow deck.

Naturally at lunch we ate and drank too much, which led to us sleeping through much of the afternoon. By the time we woke we'd reached Taiohae Bay. So we were tendered ashore and at 5.30 there was a dancing demonstration - much as you'd expect, it seemed a fairly good one. There was some of the dreaded audience participation, but owing to the preponderance of Americans on board there were plenty of volunteers.

We made it back to the ship - despite being in a sheltered bay there was quite a swell and it was slow going, getting people from the tender to the ship, and the tenders and the lifeboats, so enclosed and tending to be humid when you're stuck in them for a while. Anyway, we had the usual nice dinner and then there was dessert and music on deck, which was very pleasant.

Futa Hiva

 We were just anchoring when we woke today, at the village of Omoa in Futa Hiva. The whole island is a big volcanic outcropping and very vertical. There are two small towns, both on the West side and each in a narrow valley. Omoa is the southern village.

We had a quick breakfast and went ashore on the first tender. It turned out that Omoa is mostly one road, headed up the valley, with a few small side roads, a couple of guest houses and a general store. So that didn't take long and we took the boat back to have lunch.

In the afternoon we were booked on a tour that took us on the road to Hanavave. So everyone piled into a series of twin-cab Hiluxes and they twitchbacked up the mountain, across the ridges and then down into the next town. Each end of the road was concreted, but the middle was really a muddy track. The scenery was spectacular, jagged, mountainous and green.

Hanavave was probably an even smaller village.

After a snack provided by our driver (who spoke only French) we went back the way we came.

We gt back to the ship late afternoon and had plenty of time for a drink and quiz (did okay) before dinner.