Report #1 USA

I'm sending this from AOL because my regular email won't work here in the hotel.  Don't send any mail to this address.  I won't get it.  Reply to RodNL@charter.net

 

Dec 29-31 The Trip Begins.  After driving 13 hours on the 29^th and 10 hours on the 30^th we arrived safely in Allentown, Pa.  The evening of the 30^th we had dinner and visited with my cousin Darrell and his wife, Connie.  We had the traditional Pennsylvania Dutch New Year's dinner, pork and sauerkraut with mashed potatoes.  It was fun to catch up and share a great meal.

 

Author's Note:  For those of you who are new to this journal, anything written in italics is usually non-travel related and sometimes very politically incorrect.  If you might be offended, please skip over anything in italics.  In this case it's a personal note.  Darrell is my double cousin.  His mother is my mother's sister and his father is my father's brother so we are cousins on both sides of the family.  When my mom died he and my Aunt Irma took me in until I finished high school so Darrell and I also lived together for a while.  I think of him more as a brother than a cousin.

 

On the 31^st we drove our rented Dodge Journey, a mid-size SUV, into Manhattan. 

 

Automotive Note:  I don't know how reliable they are but the Journey is a great car, smooth, quiet, stayed where you put it in the lane, unaffected by wind, comfortable and for a large, square, tall vehicle got an average of 24mpg on our 1,700 mile trip.  Only minus was the rearward visibility.  The center mirror was only good for the lane directly behind you.  Fortunately the side mirrors were large and could be adjusted to show the right and left lanes to the rear as well as vehicles not yet visible at the side of your car through the windows.  If I were ever in the market for a vehicle of this size, and given that they are proven to be reliable, I would consider this car.

 

I dropped Diana off at the hotel, the Doubletree in the financial district, and then drove to mid-town to return the car.  The trip up was pretty easy but the return trip by taxi was long and slow.  Preparations were being made for New Year's Eve in Times Square and police checkpoints were up everywhere.  They weren't checking anyone yet, it was only 2:30pm, but the barricades were up and only one lane of the street remained open.  Later they will close that lane and the area will become pedestrian only.  It's cold and windy, 32 degrees and gusty winds up to about 20mph.  Pretty raw.  The streets were already crowded with bundled up people.

 

The throng is multi-everything, linguistic, national, ethnic and cultural.  On the street you see it in the faces, posture and the gestures but in our hotel you hear it in the accents and languages.  I'd say I've been in the elevator with maybe 35 people in my various trips up and down.  I greet almost everyone while I'm traveling especially in close quarters like an elevator.  Of these 35 people only 4 have been identifiably US.  The rest have been Germans, British, Chinese, Russians, Hungarians, Southeast Asian (probably Laotian), Indian (Asian type) and Caribbean islanders of several kinds.  I'm pretty good with accents but for some of them I have to hear certain words.  For example, to differentiate Australians and Kiwis I like to hear the word 'pen'. 

 

When I was teaching at UNT I had a student from New York named Oswald.  He was a sturdy but small black man and after talking to him for several days I told him over lunch I knew which island he was originally from.  He gave me his best smile and said that he didn't think I could.  When I said St. Kitts, his eyes got big and his jaw dropped, as he asked, "How did you know?"  This was early in our cruising career and we had been on a number of cruises in the Caribbean Islands.  I'm pretty sure he thought I'd say Jamaica because at that time they made up the largest contingent from that area in NYC.  Our visit to St. Kitts had been one of my favorite stops at that time and I spent a lot of time talking to the locals.  The accent is similar to Jamaican but much less harsh and slang filled, more lyrical. 

 

If you've never been to the ball drop in Times Square, it's insane.  The crowd is huge and the problem is there are few if any restrooms.  Usually they bring in some portable toilets.  The real problem comes after midnight.  The subway system is totally impacted and it could be hours before you are able to get a train to go anywhere.  If you ever want to do it, get a hotel very near Times Square so you can walk home.  With the crowd, that's sort of a problem too early on.

 

It's been a tiring three days so we ate at the Chipotle across the street and retired to read and watch football.  The meal we often get at the Chipotle in Irvine costs about $16.  Here the same meal is $22.  Welcome to NYC!

The show buffet.

7421 Sushi display.  It represents most of the sushi they’ve served at lunch during the cruise.  No all at one time but 3-4 at each meal, plus sashimi. 

7424 Poached salmon with lemon baskets and a salmon sculpture.

7426 This octopus is presiding over an assortment of pates and tureens.

7433 A pair of owls is watching over the roast beef.

7436 This turkey has taken a page from Carmen Miranda’s hat design book.

7444 Even the bread table has a bit of attitude for the show buffet.

Home again, home again clipity clop. The King Neptune Ceremony.

7247 The Midships Lido Pool set up for the Neptune ceremony.  The ‘operating tables’ are covered in black skirts.  The new Shellbacks that are not dunked gather on the right among the bears.  The colorful tubs hold the meringue like substance that the Pollywogs are smeared with.  They are being paraded into the jail on the far side of the pool.  You can just make out the rope that strings them together.

7642 Here’s a pollywog kissing the fish under the watchful eye of the pirate cohort.  At the top left of the picture you can see the Officers who decide the fate of the Pollywogs.  The girl kissing the fish is a singer in the ship’s case as is the blond girl second in line.  The taller blond is one of the dancers and the girl in the white t-shirt, last in line is one of the ship’s librarians.  I found out later that she wasn’t looking forward because she’s afraid of fish.

7367 After kissing the fish, the pollywogs visit the operating tables.  These unlucky newly minted Shellbacks are headed to the Bear Pit to sit in the sun.

7386 The Shellbacks who were unlucky enough to receive the ‘stink’ vote are huddled around the bears.  You can see the lucky ones who got the ‘sink’ vote in the pool on the left.

7389 King Neptune and his Queen. 

 

Nov 28, 29, 30, Dec 1, 2, 3 – At Sea.  Wow, six days at sea to prepare for the return to reality.  Not bad.  Once we get north of the Equator the seas may not be as smooth as they have been for most of the trip.  We’ll be bucking the prevailing winds and currents, plus it’s almost winter up there and I know that some storms have been churning up the waters off the west coast. 

 

11/29  Well, we crossed the Equator last night and since we’re still near it we’re in the “Doldrums”, a zone that was feared by sailors in the days when they actually sailed.  Ships would be ‘becalmed’ for days and sometime weeks unable to make any progress on their voyage.  The winds and seas here are usually very light and this is no exception.  That’s good since today we are being visited by King Neptune and his queen.  The King Neptune ritual has been honored at sea for a very long time.  The earliest known written description is from 1823 but is believed to have derived from rituals on Spanish, Portuguese and Italian ships from earlier times.  HAL ships observe this ritual once a voyage, no matter how many time you cross the Equator.  On this cruise, we crossed four times and they held the ceremony on the last crossing heading back to the USA.

 

Crewmembers that have not previously crossed the Equator are known as ‘Pollywogs’.  During the ceremony, the Pollywogs are initiated into the Solemn Mysteries of the Ancient Order of the Deep and become ‘Trusty Shellbacks’.  On HAL ships, this is accomplished by a humorous ritual in which ‘pirates’ lead the pollywogs onto the deck in simulated bonds.  They put them into a ‘jail’ to await judgment.  They are brought in small groups by department before a panel of the ships officers.  A judge, in white wig and black robe, reads out the charges against each group while King Neptune and his queen make humorous remarks about the group.  Navigators are accused of running in circles, room stewards are accused of hiding in our closets so they can make the bed when we get up to use the bathroom at night, chefs are accused of putting extra calories into the food, etc. 

 

After the charges are read, they are found guilty and the first step is kissing a large fish they’ve put on ice at the side of the pool.  Next, they are taken to tables where ‘doctors’ and ‘nurses’ smear them with colored meringue like substances.  They wind up looking like a mixed serving of sherbet.  After they are well coated, the officer panel is asked if they should ‘sink or stink’.  If the vote is ‘sink’, they get to jump into the pool, rinse off and soak in at the end of the pool.  If the vote is ‘stink’, they have to walk down to where the bear sculptures are at the end of the pool and sit in the sun.  The coating applied starts to harden and gets pretty ripe, hence the stink.  Everyone has a good time, including the pollywogs.  They ham it up in the jail by yelling and screaming while the pirates give them orders and throw cold water on them.  Probably feels good as it’s always done near the Equator and it’s always hot.  Most of them have more trouble kissing the fish than with being coated with meringue. 

 

At the end of the ritual, the ‘stink’ shellbacks jump into the pool as well as most of the pirates.  The rule is, ‘never wear a non-waterproof watch or carry your wallet if you’re involved in the ceremony in any capacity but the staff officers’. 

 

12/2  Today we had another HAL tradition, the show buffet.  Once a cruise they have a fancy buffet where all the chefs go out of their way to create not only delicious but also attractive food.  They carve vegetables and ice, mold butter and chocolate, bake bread in ornate shapes and create small tableaus that reflect the places and things we’ve seen during the cruise.  They open the area for pictures only for an hour and then everyone has to go out and get in line to go back in to eat.  I usually go to take pictures but not to eat.  I go up to the Lido for lunch.  Today’s buffet was superior.  The vegetable carvings were the best I’ve seen. 

 

Dec 4 – Long Beach, CA, USA.  This should be a very easy disembarkation.  Our friends Shirley and Ken are coming to Long Beach to pick us up.  We’ve selected the latest possible disembarkation, 10am, so they can avoid getting involved with rush hour traffic.  The side benefit of that is that we can get up later and go to breakfast at a reasonable hour.  It’s not as good as it could be because they are ending breakfast at 8am rather than the usual 10:30am.  The ship is not boarding any new passengers and everyone is getting off.  The ms Amsterdam is sailing up to San Francisco to go into dry dock for two weeks.  After all, things have to be first rate for the World Cruise, but odds are some technicians and vendors will still be aboard trying to finish their jobs.

 

Shirley and Ken swooped us up at the cruise terminal that once housed the Spruce Goose until Evergreen moved it up to McMinnville, Oregon.  It makes a good cruise terminal, easy to get into and easy to get out of with lots of space for displaying the offloaded luggage.  Short ride home and it was as though we never left. 

 

 

Nuku Hiva - More Pictures

7122 This is the Taipivai Valley and Bay.  You can see the little village of Taipivai spread out going up the valley.

7125 This is a closer shot of the black sand beach at the end of the bay and the river flowing into it at the top of the beach.

7129 Looking down on Taipivai Bay.  You can see the two legs of it on either side of the middle hill.  Just to the right of the peak of the hill you can see another bay going off to the left.  That’s Tai Pi Bay.  The point of land farthest from the viewpoint is Tikupo Point.  Melon Headed Whales gather there in spawning season. 

7147 Diana and our driver-guide

7232 Sailing away from Nuku Hiva, six days at sea and then Long Beach, USA.  That’s my wildest shirt.  It batik from Saint Lucia.

Taiohae, Nuku Hiva, The Marquesas - A long way from anywhere.

7054 The black sand beach in Taiohae, Nuku Hiva.  The tallest mountain on the island, Mt. Takao is the hump in the distance about an inch in from the left.  It has the grey rock face.

7075 This is the carving above the baptismal font in the cathedral.

7110 This is the Amsterdam in Taiohae Bay on Nuku Hiva.  You can just barely make out the small semi-circle of dots that are the sailboats anchored there.

7120 Your intrepid travelers at the overlook.

 

Nov 26 – At Sea.  A restful day as sea after four days in port in a row.  I've gotten spoiled.  That's just too many port days in a row.  Or maybe it's just that I've gotten older.

 

Our entertainers were a Beatles tribute band.  They call their show 'Paperback Writer'.  They're pretty good.  They mimic their Beatle pretty well.  You could easily tell who was who.  Of course, each Beatle was very distinctive so it wasn't that difficult a task.

 

Nov 27 – Taiohae, Nuku Hiva, Marquesas Islands, French Polynesia.  We've been to Nuku Hiva several times but this is the first time the ship has offered a tour.  They only have one.  It goes to the island's interior and that alone was enough for us.  Previously there was no choice but to spend your time in Taiohae.  Nuku Hiva is the largest of the Marquesas Islands in French Polynesia, a department of France in the Pacific Ocean. 

 

In 1595 Álvaro de Mendaña de Neira stopped at Fatu Hiva and named the islands Los Marquesas after the wife of the Viceroy of Peru.  James Cook likewise visited the south in 1774. There is little evidence that these visits led to the introduction of diseases, perhaps because slow passages inhibited the diseases aboard the ships.  It seems that it was the commercial shipping, taking on sandalwood, and the whaling ships that brought the epidemics that killed nine out of ten Polynesians.  The Marquesas was a whaling station, even though there were no whales nearby.  This happened because the females were so friendly; they would swim out to meet the ships.  The great decline in population was after the doctors left because whaling declined.  There was nobody to treat the infected natives.

 

In his science fiction novel Paris in the Twentieth Century, written in 1863, Jules Verne describes Nuku Hiva as one of the main stock exchanges of the world of 1960:

Quotations of countless stocks on the international market were automatically inscribed on dials utilized by the Exchanges of Paris, London, Frankfurt, Amsterdam, Turin, Berlin, Vienna, Saint Petersburg, Constantinople, New York, Valparaiso, Calcutta, Sydney, Peking, and Nuku Hiva

 

Herman Melville hid from the authorities in the Taipivai valley in the eastern part of the island and wrote his book Typee based on his experiences with the indigenous people there.  In 1888, Robert Louis Stevenson's sailed to the South Pacific on the Casco.  His first port of call was at Hatiheu, on the north side of the island.  Nuku Hiva was also the site for Survivor: Marquesas, the fourth installment of the CBS reality show.

 

When we sailed into Taiohae Bay, I was surprised by the number of sailboats anchored there.  Normally there are either none or at the most two whenever we've been here.  Right now, there are at least 16.  The Marquesas Islands are the most remote island group in the world.  There are no continents even close.  When people sail to the South Pacific from the North America they usually sail down the coastline to somewhere near the Galapagos Islands in South America and then head west to the Marquesas.  It takes days to reach them by a powered boat so depending on the winds it will take at least weeks to reach them.  Most make landfall here and then rest up for a while and take on provisions before heading down to the Society Islands and Tahiti.

 

Our tour will take us over the mountains and into the where Melville hid out.  We are going in a caravan of vehicles, mostly mini-crewcab pickups.  Most of them have five people per vehicle, three in the back and two in the bucket seats.  We're in a Toyota CRV and there are just four of us, D and I in the back and an idiot from Pasadena up front with the driver, who also happens to be our guide.  Not many people on Nuku Hiva speak English and we are lucky that we're in the guide's car.  When we reach a stop, everyone gathers in a group and she will be making the explanations.

 

I was going to visit the Cathedral in Taiohae as I have every time we're here.  It's an unremarkable building with a remarkable interior.  Everything is hand carved from native wood, the pulpit, the stations-of-the-cross, the Crucifix, the picture above the baptistery, the pews and even the cathedra.  The cathedra and the pulpit are very large and each appears to have been carved from a single piece of wood. 

 

Religiosity note:  The presence of the chair of the bishop or archbishop is what makes a church a cathedral.  In the ancient world, a chair was the symbol of a ruler (throne) or teacher (we still say that a person is occupying the Smith Chair of Economic as Yada Yada University).  The bishop's role as teacher and presiding official within the church was recognized by his chair.  In church nomenclature, this chair is known by the Latin word 'cathedra' meaning 'seat'.  For those of you who are fussy, it actually comes from the Greek καθέδρα, meaning seat or bench.  It's one of those Greek words that was Latinized (transliterated into English) but retains the same pronunciation in both languages.  We use the word Cathedral as a noun but originally it was an adjective, 'cathedral church' borrowed directly from the Latin 'ecclesia cathedralis'.

 

Ok, fun with church definitions time is over and it's back to the touring. 

 

One man carved all these furnishings in the early 1970s and it just happens that he's the godfather of our guide.  He died shortly after she was born so she never really knew him but the family has kept his memory alive.  Apparently, he was a very devout man and saw this carving project as a small way he could show his appreciation to God and the Church.  Everyone in every carving is Polynesian.  His use of symbolism is both clear and yet subtle.  The figure of St. Peter is carved into the main post to the right of the cathedral's door.  You know it's Peter because he's holding the keys to the Kingdom that Jesus promised he would have.  Between Peter's legs he carved a very subtle fish net motif with a multitude of fish inside, honoring not only Peter's previous job as a fishermen and the fulfillment of the statement "Follow me and I will make you fishers of men" but also fruit of the church in reconciling people with God.  I would like to have met him and discussed some of his choices in the way he represented various scenes from the Passion of Christ.  Perhaps the fact that the locals do a lot of fishing influenced his decision.  I've seldom seen Peter anywhere else with a net.  Usually he's just holding the keys.

 

One different feature of the cathedral's building is that it's not completely enclosed.  The walls that normally would go all the way to the roof are only half-walls.  The top part is open and covered with a decorative, but very open grill.  In the walls that would connect to the gabled roof, the triangle formed by the roof's slope is open with widely spaces posts to support the roof.

 

The carving over the baptistery shows John the Baptist standing in the Jordan River during his baptism of Jesus.  Both men are obviously Polynesian, the Jordan looks more like a lagoon and the plants along the shoreline are local plants.  The only trees visible are palms.  It's a great carving and beautifully composed scene.  The only object it has in common with other paintings and carvings I've seen of this event is the dove of the Holy Spirit.  It looks like a regular dove.  The composition is not significantly different; it's the people and the local that are unique.  As I said, I visit this church every time we're here because I find it so unique and also a peaceful place to sit and ponder.

 

After our guide gave us some historical information on the cathedral and time to look around, we mounted up and headed into the interior of the island.  The road in town and part way up the hill going out were older and concrete.  The cars we're riding in are privately owned.  Some owners are also driving but others are rented from the owners and being driven by others.  Here in the island, a driver's license is seen as an optional and unnecessary luxury and many people don't have one.  HAL requires that all drivers be licensed and that necessity produces the rented cars.  Most of the drivers of the rented cars don't own a vehicle that meets HALs standards, crewcab pickup or SUV, and that provides the licensed drivers for the rented trucks.  Spreads the wealth a little.  Our driver/guide is in her own CRV so she's getting the driver fee, the car fee and the guide fee.  She's the highest paid person in the caravan.

 

Our first stop was on the slopes of Mount Muaka, at a little over 2,800 feet, the second tallest mountain on the island.  At a bit over 4,000 feet, the tallest is Mount Takao a little north of the center of the island.  From the overlook, we had a great view of Taiohae Bay and the city.  It was a beautiful sight.  I looked to me as though we're about 1,800 feet up the mountain.  We had been a bit higher but the viewpoint was part way down the other side approaching. 

 

The Amsterdam was a nice contrast to the blue water of the bay; the city was clearly visible on the bay's shoreline.  In the foreground, winding up the mountainside the switchbacks of the road we'd traveled were also clearly visible.  It was a sight I'd been waiting 22 years to see.  Our friend, Louie, took a picture of D and me sitting on the berm at the edge of the overlook with the bay in the background.

 

From there we continued into a small valley and the climbed the next mountain range to an overlook that provided views of the Taipivai Valley and the large twin-forked Tai Pi Vai Bay.  (Apparently, the locals use separate words like the Vietnamese, but in English we concatenate them, much as we do Viet Nam (Vietnam) and Ha Noi (Hanoi.)  The longest fork of the bay is bordered at its terminus by a black sand beach.  On the east end of the beach, a river that flows down the valley enters the bay.  If things go as they usually do, it's called the Taipivai River. 

 

From the lookout we drove down into the valley, crossed the river on a bridge and came to the village of, you guessed it, Taipivai.  We drove through the village and along the eastern shore of the bay to Houmi.  At the beach, they had prepared a table with tropical fruit for us to snack on.  Some of the locals set up a table with some crafts and carvings on it.  As I've said before, the Marquesasians do the finest, most detailed carving in the South Pacific.  I couldn't resist a carving of a Manta Ray.  The prices here are much better than in either Tahiti or Moorea, no middleman or shipping involved.

 

The ride back was as pretty as the ride out but no stops.  Our guide is preparing to start her master's degree in tourism.  She's headed to England for a semester abroad.  Her English is very good and it will get better there.  Back at the pier, we did some looking but no buying.  I did mail a postcard to us.  We sailed away just as the sun was setting.  Very pretty!

 

Our entertainer was Jeff DeHart, a comedian and impressionist.  We've seen him before and his show is funny so we went again.

 

Rangiroa - More Pictures

6894 This blue clam was part way open.  I love these guys.

6940 At lunch I saw this from the Lido Deck.  Couldn’t resist the colors.

6947 From any distance the islets of the Rangiroa Atoll are just slivers of white and green in a blue ocean.  Up close, they’re a tropical paradise.

6969 The owner of the pearl farm is pointing to a part of his crop still in the oyster.

6977 This worker is harvesting the first crop pearls and implanting the larger second bead in those which produce a good color, round pearl.  They’ve got the prize DNA.

Rangiroa, Palliser Group of the Tuamotu Archipelago, French Polynesia - Undiscovered, except for SCUBA divers.

6841 Like I said, there’s great numbers of fish here.  The Scissor-tal Sergeants are familiar but the silver fish with orange and yellow highlights I don’t recognize.

6846 A parrotfish of some species, nibbling away at the coral.

6875 The obvious fish in the center I’m not sure of either.  At the left in the crevice you can see a brown fish with blue fins and dots on its body.  I’m not having much luck here recognizing species.  Could be a grouper.

6877 Raccoon Butterflyfish of some sort, against green coral. 

6892 I think this is a Wrasse of some type.  There are lots of yellow wrasses.

 

 

Nov 25 – Rangiroa, Palliser Group of the Tuamotu Archipelago, French Polynesia.  Rangiroa means ‘vast sky’ in Tuamotuan and it’s the largest atoll in the Tuamotu Islands as well as one of the largest in the world.  It ranks about third.  It’s part of the Palliser group.  Avatoru, where we are anchoring is located in northern part of the atoll.  Rangiroa has about 415 motus, islets and sandbars that have an area of about 65 square miles.  There are approximately one hundred narrow passages, they call hoa, in the circle of land that makes up the atoll.  The atoll’s lagoon is about 50 miles long and ranges from 3 to 20 miles wide. The landmasses range from 300 to 550 yards wide.  The total circumference of the landmasses around the lagoon is about 124 miles.  The lagoon has a maximum depth of 120 feet and covers 560 square miles.  Because it’s so shallow, the currents that come in and out through the passes combined with the winds sometimes create interior storms.

 

The population of the atoll is about 2,500. Its main villages are Avatoru and Tiputa on neighboring islands.  All the other villages are under 500.  They are separated by the major Tiputa Pass the way we entered and exited the lagoon.  Rangiroa is a major underwater diving destination because of its lagoon's clear blue water and exceptionally diverse marine fauna.

 

It is believed the first people arrived on Rangiroa around the 900AD.  The first recorded Europeans to arrive to Rangiroa were Dutch explorers Jacob le Maire and Willem Schouten during their 1615-1616 Pacific journey.  During the 1950s, the economy of Rangiroa was driven by fishing and the production of copra. The inauguration of the Rangiroa Airport in 1965 allowed rapid development of the tourism industry as underwater diving facilities and hotels were built.

 

Today we are going snorkeling again and then to visit a pearl farm.  The islands do not appear to be part of an atoll.  The lagoon is so big that it has its own horizon.  You can see the islands near you but if you are on a side near the middle, you can’t see islands on any of the other three sides.  We will be swimming near the Tuputa Pass in an area called The Aquarium. 

 

First up, into the water.  A short ride on the tender got us to the pier.  There was a man in a racing outrigger paddling alongside the tender trying to catch a ride on the wake.  Unfortunately, the tenders go so slow that there’s no wake to ride and not even something to race as he could easily outpace us.  At least he got a workout.  He accompanied every tender leaving the boat and returned beside the new one coming in.  Despite the lack of competition or the ability to surf with us he seemed to be enjoying himself, waiving and smiling at each tender load of tourists.

 

Once we were on the pier is was just a short walk to the dive boat and off we sped.  Our driver/guide told us to stay on one side of the boat when we were in the water.  The reef is very close to the current created by the tidal flow and since the tide was going out, he didn’t want us to be caught in the tidal flow and race through the pass into the open ocean.  Actually none of us wanted that either.  Once we were in the water it was pretty clear to see that his request was easy to follow as the reef was in sheltered water away from the current.  From the look of the surface water, you would have had to swim quite a way over barren sandy bottom to get into the current.  Still I think he was wise to warn us, as there’s no telling what some people will do. 

 

I wish the tide had been further out because the bottom was fairly deep over most of the reef.  Not very good for pictures as the colors are mostly green after a few feet of water separates you from your subject.  Still there was a plentiful supply of live coral and more fish than I’ve encountered anywhere on this trip.  Quantity wise that is.  There were large groups of fish patrolling the reef, scissortail sergeants, Raccoon Butterflyfish and a fish I don’t recognize.  Not as much diversity as in Bora Bora but lots of fish.  I did see some parrotfish nibbling on the coral.  I hadn’t seen any of them before on this trip.  I also saw a boxfish or puffer and several other fish that I’m not sure I know the exact species, one was a triggerfish.

 

The snorkeling was great but soon it was time to head to the pier.  Our guide asked us if we wanted to try to find the dolphins that he’s seen that morning.  To do that we had to go out through the Tuputa Pass into the open water.  We all said that we’d like to take a look so out he went.  There was quite a bit of swell and some waves on top so the ride was up and down once we were outside the protection of the reef.  We did manage to find two of the dolphins but they quickly grew bored with us and swam off.  Our guide had to be careful turning the boat around to head back in because if he was caught on the side of the swell with a wave on top it could broach us.  His seamanship skills were excellent and he turned us back through the slot and into the lagoon without incident. 

 

Back at the pier we took the tender back to the ship for lunch.  I didn’t see anywhere near the pier to get even a snack.  After lunch, it was back on the tender for another ride in to the island again accompanied by our outrigger racer #22.  I guess he’s been doing that all day.

 

We boarded a bus heading out to a pearl farm.  I’m going just to ride around the island a bit and the farm visit should be interesting.  We haven’t visited a working pearl farm.  The drive along the island was interesting.  On one side, you have the ocean and on the other side the lagoon, both easily seen almost all the time.  We passed the airport just after a mid-sized turbo prop Tahitian Airlines plane landed and we could see the passengers heading down the stairs and across the apron to the terminal.  We also passed the atoll’s college and satellite telecommunications station. 

 

After about a 25-minute drive we arrived at Gauguin’s Pearl, the largest pearl farm on the atoll.  The owner met us at the bus and took us to a pavilion where he’s set up to explain the pearl farming process.  He had some sample oyster shells on display as well as the methods for hanging them in the water.  He showed us the beads they use for seeding and the strips of mantle they put in to provide the DNA for the pearl sack.  He demonstrated how far they could open the oyster’s shell to work inside it.  If they open it too far the oyster is damaged or the shell may break and that’s the end of that oyster. 

 

Black pearls are now a big business on the atoll.  Technically, they are not black at all but come in a variety of colors from almost black to almost white.  I like the pale blue and green ones best but there’s a golden color, called Champaign, which is very rare and beautiful.

 

Mikimoto developed the process of growing cultured pearls in Japan and they use essentially the same technique here with a few adaptations.  A bead made from pure nacre is placed in a black tip oyster along with a slice of mantle taken from another pearl oyster.  This slice will form a skin around the bead quickly and that will deposit mother of pearl on the bead.  The odd thing is that no local oysters have shells thick enough to make a decent sized bead so the beads are made from oysters in Louisiana that have very thick shells.  It’s actually an allergic reaction to the foreign matter and the skin and mother of pearl is a rejection response.  It takes 3 years for an oyster to get large enough to ‘seed’ and the development of the pearl takes another 2 years.  At that time, the oysters are opened just a bit and the pearl removed.  If it’s a good pearl, round with good color, they put in a larger seed ball and let the oyster go another 2 years.  This only happens in about 5% of the oysters.  After the additional two years if the larger pearl is good when they remove it, they put in an even larger ball and close the factory to go celebrate at the local bar.  This third level is a very rare event.  Even though they start with a perfect, round bead, only 20% of the pearls will be perfectly round at the first harvest, the second and third are about the same percentage but since color is also a factor you get in the end you’re talking about 1 or 2 in hundreds of thousands.

 

They employ more than 50 local workers.  This has a big impact on the economy of an atoll with only about 2,000 people.  There’s a school for pearl farming and a research center on pearl oysters here.  It’s the center of black pearl farming.

 

The process goes like this.  The oysters that are ready to be harvested are collected by a boat and brought to the work area where they are hung in narrow pools with circulating seawater to keep them in good shape.  The strings are brought into the shed one at a time.  The first worker cleans the shell of all the exterior growth with a large knife.  He puts it into a box where the next person pries the shell open about a quarter inch and puts a wooden wedge into it to keep it open.  This gives the oyster time to relax in that position so the next man can insert his spreader, removes the wooden wedge and opens the shell about three-quarters of an inch (about 2cm according to the owner).  He the uses long thin tools much like a dentist’s, to reach in and harvest the pearl.  He washes and inspects the pearl and places it in a water-filled container.  If the pearl is round and good color, he inserts the larger bead for the second harvest, removes his spreader and places the oyster in another box.  From there it goes back to the other side of the shop to be tied onto a new line to put into the tanks and await its trip back out into the lagoon to the farm site. 

 

Another man in the same shed as the harvester was seeding new oysters for their first pearl.  The only difference between the two is that this man puts in a seed pellet and a piece of matrix to provide the DNA.  The harvester only has to put in the larger seed because the DNA from the initial matrix has already affixed itself to the pearl sack.

 

The oysters can only be out of the water for 20 minutes so from cleaning to rehanging in the pools must not exceed that time limit.  The stringers use a different color string for the oysters of each seeder or harvester.  That’s so they know who performed the seeding in case there are problems or unusual successes.  After we observed the process, the owner invited us inside to see some of his products.  The product is closely controlled.  All newly harvested pearls are sent to government graders that measure them and determine the shape and grade information for each pearl.  In general, the shapes they use here are round, semi-round, baroque, semi-baroque and circled, listed in order of desirability.  The grades are A through D.  In A less than 10% of its surface is flawed, B is 10-30%, C is 30-60 and D is over 60%.  These D grade pearls are often sent to carvers who etch designs or pictures into the pearl increasing its value. 

 

He had hundreds of pearl in small boxes by shape, grade and color.  The A+, less than 5% of the surface flawed, round pearls were the most expensive and the large ones or those with rare colors were downright outrageous.  A 20mm, green, round A+ was the most expensive at over $100,000. 

 

Not much is wasted.  The oyster meat is edible and served in restaurants on the island.  The shells are purchased by a Chinese firm that makes buttons out of them. 

 

The species of oyster they use is protected by law and the only way they are able to get new oysters is to hang these bottlebrush like affairs in the water during spawning season.  The oyster larvae that are caught in the brushes are theirs to use but any that make it to the ocean floor are protected.  As I mentioned before, from the time they catch them it’s about three years until they are ready for the first seeding. 

 

Rangiroa has another rarity.  It has vineyards.  No other place in the world does.  The vines grow on the edge of a lagoon beside coconuts, and produce two harvests per year.  The winery is located in the heart of the village of Avatoru near where we are docked and the grapes are brought to the winery by boat.  This is also unique.  The vineyards were started in 1992 when testing began to see which grapes could adjust to the area.  The vineyard is Domaine Dominique Auroy.  Rangiroa was selected for very good reasons, no grapevine pests and the fact that it’s close to Tahiti. 

 

Two important sites on the atoll are the Blue Lagoon, which is a smaller lagoon formed on the southwestern edge of Rangiroa and the Pink Sands.  These are sandbars located on the southeastern portion of Rangiroa.

 

It was a very interesting and informative visit.  Fortunately, we purchased a silver-green-blue pearl on Bora Bora in 1991 and Diana is pleased with the pendant we had it made into so she doesn’t want another.  I’ll say this, the prices were much lower in 1991.

 

Soon it was back to the ship.

 

Our entertainment was the ship’s cast in an encore of ‘Take a Bow’.  I like it the first time and as I said before, they are improving with each performance.  They started out good and now they are better.