Marquesas Diary, Tahuata

Arriving at Tahuata on Monday morning, after our unplanned overnighter, was blissfully uneventful. Just a few other boats in the bay, and our anchor worked exactly as it should.

Population 600 on the whole island, spread out among 4 or 5 villages. We made three stops on Tahuata, the first one being the small village of Hapatoni, where we met Erikaii, a master carver mentoring a group of students in the traditional arts of carving – wood statues (tiki), coconut shell bowls and calabash, mother of pearl images of birds and women, and also bone carving. Not whale or other animal bone -human bone – the bones of ancestors. As Erikaii explained, bone carvings are made from a small section of humerus or tibia, sometimes a femur – tubular, usually on the small side, about 2 or 3 inches long – and these small sculptures are used for personal adornment “to keep our loved ones near”. 

No stores or any noticeable commerce in Hapatoni. It wasn’t possible to buy a thing, not even a sculpture from Erik or his students. The village economy seemed to consist of copra – collecting and drying coconut, used for making coconut oil – and fishing for local consumption.

Next morning we went ashore at Vaituhu in search of baguette and fresh vegetables. It’s the largest village on the island – meaning, it has a store and a post office.  A harrowing experience for Bill who decided to stay with the dinghy out of abundance of caution -thank goodness he did or we almost certainly would have lost our dinghy. In the process though, Bill had a few terrifying moments when big waves came in and tossed him, dinghy and motor all up together onto the concrete dock – for a few minutes, he was trapped there, with the tie line having tightened by the force of the tossing and the dinghy filling with water. Bill really could’ve used our help in those moments, but Shawn and I were completely oblivious to what was happening there at the dock, just 100 metres behind us. And all of this on a relatively calm day. Another lesson learned – these steep volcanic islands are as challenging as they are beautiful – not only a challenge at times to securely anchor the boat, and but getting safely ashore is not always simple.

On the topic of getting ashore, I digress to tell you a little bit about our dinghy. It’s quite old and, on this journey, it has taken a beating. Before we left Mexico, it was already a bit leaky, and had to be pumped up now and then, but we thought it would do the job on this crossing and we could wait to replace it in New Zealand – Captain Bill has his eye on a non-inflatable version made there in NZ that is in his view better than even the best inflatable. Unfortunately, in thee meantime, our dinghy has become a regular nuisance, requires pumping up before every little use – not only every day before we go ashore, but then again before we return. And I will add, admittedly it’s not the worst of it, but it’s also shabby and ugly – a bit of an embarrassment at the dinghy dock, which is the main place you meet other cruisers – not that Bill gives a hoot about dinghy fashion, and frankly nor do I – except maybe just a smidge. If we could replace it now, we’d jump at the chance, but there is no such thing for sale here in the Marquesas. We’re now hoping to find a new inflatable in Tahiti.

In Vaituhu, we were in search of baguette and fresh vegetables. But to no avail. Wednesday’s baguettes were already sold out by 11 am, and no more to be had until Saturday. Oh brother. So, we grabbed everything there was in the fresh vegetable bin – which consisted of six onions, c’est tout!

On our way back to the dock, another carver who called himself JB beckoned us to come see his work. It wasn’t much, just a handful of small pieces made from (animal) bone and horn, including stylized fish-hooks that were traditionally used to catch barracuda – I’m not sure why you’d ever want to fish for barracuda, but that’s what he said. So I removed little stainless steel necklace with diamonds, and replaced it with my new bone-carved fish-hook necklace – feels like I’ve crossed over – a little less Bay Street, a little more bay.

Our last stop on Tahuata was an anchorage just north of Vaituhu, called Baie Hanamoenoa. A little playground really, uninhabited, and just around the corner from Atuona, Hiva Oa where we’d made our first landfall 10 days earlier. Gorgeous white sand beach, chrystal clear water. It rained as we approached the bay, which gave Turtlebones a welcome rinse with fresh water- but the rain didn’t last long, it never does. Soon we were out in the scorching hot sun, walking the beach, swimming, having a fun frolicking kind of day. Tomorrow we would set out for the more northerly islands of the Marquesas group – Ua Huka, Ua Pou and Nuku Hiva.