No broadband. No photos. Sorry!
Ask a kid to draw you an desert island; the Tuamotus are about as close as you get.
It is a 3-4 day sail from the Marquesas to the Tuamotus and the less said about it the better. In short, next time you wish a sailor ‘Fair winds and following seas’ remember to put the emphasis on the following seas part. But we got here in one piece.
The pacific atolls of the Tuamotus are old volcanoes, sunk beneath the waves so that all that remains are their rings. These rings form clusters of little islands, or motus, in circles in the ocean. Between the motus are reefs. Imagine a loosely spaced string of pearls, each pearl is a motu and the string is the reef, some of the gaps are deep enough and wide enough for you to successfully navigate a yacht through. Once inside you are protected from the waves of the ocean and if you can get behind a motu covered in palm trees even from the wind.
Inside the atolls is an oasis. Flat, calm waters, the horizon on all sides dotted with islands and palm trees give the illusion of almost being in a lake. The atolls are lined on the inside with beautiful sandy beaches and coral reefs. This makes for great snorkelling and challenging navigation. There is no commercial nor military reason to survey these remote dots so many of them are uncharted or poorly charted. Also the coral reefs can form ‘bommies’ which are coral towers about the size of a house, which stretch from the sea floor (about 30m inside the atoll) unto a foot below the waters surface. Just underwater, so you can’t see an breaking waves and just the right high for hitting your hull (plastic breakable thing) against them rather than the keel (metal hard strong thing). So we move about in four hours in the middle of the day when the sun is over head and you can see through these crystal clear waters. If you move slowly and keep a good watch it is not dangerous, but not a good place to be complacent.
The reward for these conditions is isolation and incredible beauty. Every view is postcard worthy. Every island deserves a top Hilton hotel sprawling over it and yet none do. It is simply too remote and lacking in touristy things to do. Instead a little old lady has her simple home, backing onto a perfect white sand beach. Her house is a single story bungalow, with a tin roof and brightly painted doors which could do with a second coat. The windows are open or often missing, as eaves are long and low blocking the rain and the breeze is welcome. She rakes the leaves that fell on her stretch of perfect beach in the afternoon and tends to her garden. When she is done she sits on her back porch with her polynesian print curtains flapping in the breeze and watches the sun set on paradise. Tourists would pay a thousand bucks a night for a room with that view.
As the old lady sits a local family play in the sea, mum, dad and two kids are swimming in the beautiful clear water. They give a friendly wave and a big smile. Behind them on the one main street though the village the other kids play on their bikes. Riding up and down outside the main store, elder kids keeping an eye on the younger ones but with so few cars there seems little need. Teo runs between them, chasing and laughing as they share a commonly understood game of running and chasing.
The locals are welcoming to visitors. Always with a ready smile and a simple gift. Walking back through the village, from the ‘end of the road’ we were approached by a cheerful man working in the garden outside his house. He’d seen us walking the other direction 10 minutes earlier and being a one road town knew we would be back soon enough. He’d spend the time between husking three coconuts for us, one each, a presented them as we passed. Unlike in the caribbean there was no expectation of reciprocation, no hopes of money, it’s just what it’s like living in a community that is completely dependant on themselves and internal support.
We spent our time in Kauehi between the village and an lovely anchorage on the south coast. We were lucky enough to find a group of American kids boats anchored off a palm tree lined motu. The island had everything we needed, coconuts ready for eating, a fire pit built by a previous cruiser and even a concrete table which served as a nice place to put food before we grilled it over the fire. We spent many days and night just idling time away on this island. Heading ashore sometime after boat school and lunch, in a dingy full of bows and arrows, kites and snorkelling gear. Evenings were spent cooking food over the fire pit, usually bread wrapped around a stick or tinfoil parcels of fish and the last of our fresh veg.
During the afternoons the kids roamed wild, building forts, flying kites, throwing tomahawk axes (supervised) and archery filled the hours. Then they started collecting wood for that evenings fire, or collecting hermit crabs and building them a ‘house’ out sand, twigs and palm fronds. One evening we even managed to make an open air cinema. A Norwegian friend of ours who was also anchored in the bay had a very nice portable projector TV and combined with the projector screen we have on Itchy Foot, my laptop and other boats speakers we all watched a movie by starlight and the glow from a bonfire.
Teo has mostly been hanging out with older kids, two boys and two girls ranging from about 11 to 14 but they have welcomed him into their gang and not too old to love sitting playing lego onboard Itchy Foot for an afternoon. We’re hoping to keep in contact with these families as there is a good chance they will also be spending the cyclone season in the Marquesas too.
But our time in Kauehi has come to an end and it’s time for a new atoll.
