Well, I seem to have come full circle. My first cruise started here in Papeete in 2002 and here we are again 12 years later.
Early this morning in the nautical twilight of dawn we pulled right into port and berthed opposite the hotel where I had woken up to with great excitement all those years ago to the sight of the QE2 rounding the same headland and coming into the harbor.
Of course the town would have had to have changed since then, the little harbor is now concreted in with Cruise ship berths and now the ships are so close to the sides of the bay and each other that you could almost reach out and touch them from the comfort of your own balcony let alone walk from one to the other without the aid of a gangplank.
Most passengers exited the ship in great excitement to tours around the island, the waterfalls, the blow holes, the interior mountain scape and the many Black Pearl factories and duty free stores that were advertised in the Port terminal. Unfortunately a lot came back disappointed having believed that the whole of Tahiti would be made up of white sandy beaches and palm trees as in the brochures and postcards and with most complaining of the high cost of everything on the Island. Particularly the Black Pearl which they were all expecting could be picked up for the price of a medium sized gin and tonic.
Well, of course it has to be expensive here, its French and they are holding onto this overseas territory with all the might and tenacity that only the French can display.
One of our lady companions from the Lobby Bar turned up tonight with a terrific looking necklace of what looked like prune sized black pearls around her neck. Alas by the time we had finished our second drink there was a slight dark stain forming under her décolletage as the color slowly washed off from her necklace and she retired early to refresh herself and reconsider the practicalities of buying bargain black pearls from a “man on the beach”.
I spent the day walking around the city, now pushing its boundaries and growing up into the hills and forest around the once sleepy hamlet. It has now become a frenetic town driven by the commerce of the port and tourism and but has lost the charm it once used to hold. Its hard to picture the Island and People that so beguiled and bewitched Flecture Christian and the Bounty sailors through the society that now inhabits the Island. The Missionaries saw to that. On arriving on the Island they were scandalized by the freedom and liberated culture that they found and immediately set to work to reign in “the work of the Devil” that they so often found in the South Pacific and the culture and people still suffer from that today. They have a lot to answer to those original religious zealots.
One terrific bright spot on our stay today was to be found behind the ship in the square where a night time food market thrives. Set up each night around 7pm a number of trucks arrive and throw open their back doors to reveal fully functioning kitchens offering a wide range of choice for the diner which reflects the multicultural society that Tahiti boasts, Italian, French, Asian, English and Japanese amongst them. Along with the locals we mixed and mingled till the wee small hours enjoying the band and dancing until it was time to retire to the airconditioned comfort of the ship. Its hot here even at 11pm at night.
I had once experienced the same wonderful smoke filled and vibrant atmosphere in Marrakesh in an old one thousand year old town square, all that was missing here in the South Pacific was the snake charmers and smell of hasheesh.
We departed for Moorea at 5am. The ship moved so slowly and gently from the dock it was barely discernible and many of the passengers had no idea we had moved until they awoke the next morning and opened their curtains to find us in Cooks Bay Mo’ore’a surrounded by huge and sharp mountainous volcanic peaks and a stunning turquoise sea.
Now this is more like it.
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