Travels

10/22/01 - Once again, the night before was an early one, what with us being lulled to dreamland by the sound of the water splashing against the posts of our hut, so this morning we were both up for the sunrise. This was now a ritual. Sometime around 5:30 every morning we were dazzled by the spectacular light show, courtesy of mother nature. Then maybe back to bed for a little while, and then off to breakfast. Another buffet, at the Motu restaurant. No need for details here, except to say that there was plenty to choose from -- not quite the variety as the Moorea hotel -- but the food was tasty. They had the stations set up at various tables in random parts of the one-room, open air restaurant. After fueling up for the day ahead, we took a walk up the path to the "summit" again and looked around. Along the way we encountered several geckos, and Meagan always wanted to stop and check them out. That's my girl! We took a few nice pictures here -- one of which was the two of us, the only time I ever used the timer on that APS camera. I also like the shot of the thatched rooves on the motu, and the vast array of shapes and sizes.

We put in some good unproductive hours in the morning -- a lot of sunbathing on the deck for Meagan, and a lot of snorkeling for me. Not that snorkeling is unproductive, but we both put in our fair share of loafing. The very first time I put on the snorkel in Bora Bora, I saw my first manta ray. Its wingspan must have been 10 or 12 feet. It was enormous, and it just glided casually and elegantly past the bungalow. Unbelievable. Later on I discovered, in a coral head right off our deck, a moray eel popping its head out of a hole, waiting for some grub. The snorkeling was one of the best parts of this vacation for me. I hadn't really done it before so I'm no expert, but the little bit I had been didn't even come close to being as exciting as it was in FP. In Bora Bora, and especially in the Coral Gardens where we were, the lagoon is alive with creatures. In addition to the moray and the manta, I'm fairly certain I saw a stonefish -- you know, that ugly rock-looking fish that Brooke Shields stepped on in The Blue Lagoon. Luckily I didn't step on this guy. If you stood still in the water for just a few seconds, you would find yourself surrounded by trumpetfish, and little translucent skinny fish that followed you around. I saw wrasses, triggerfish, Napoleon fish (I chased a 4-footer around for half an hour!), lionfish, squirrelfish, tobies, boxes, tang, grouper, angels, idols, banners, pipes, butterflyfish, and on and on and on. I spent a few hours ogling the creatures of the blue lagoon every day. It was a blast.

Toward noon, we headed out to the main island again, and made our way to the scooter-rental hut down the road. We procured a 2-seater for twenty-four hours, at a cost of roughly $50. This allowed us to once again explore the whole of the island, and all it has to offer. The island of Bora Bora is even smaller than Moorea, and took about the same time to circumnavigate by scooter as Moorea did by car, counting the stops along the way. We opted for the counter-clockwise route. There isn't a whole lot going on on this island at all, until you get to the village of Vaitape, and then again in Matira point (which is where we started). But suffice it to say that there is no shortage of spectacular natural sightseeing all the way around. We stopped many times for photo ops, and in these pictures you will notice the dramatic variety of colors in different parts of the lagoon. As I mentioned before, the road goes all the way around the shoreline of the island. There are a few roads that branch off this main road which lead to residential areas, but they are well hidden, and none too inviting for two tourists on a scooter. These roads are all extremely steep and treacherous-looking, and we only ventured off onto one of them. At one point we came upon a church, just about halfway around the island. This would probably have been a few miles north of Vaitape, near Faanui. We found what looked like a fairly major intersection (for Bora Bora), and being the intrepid scooter-driver that I am, I took the turnoff. Right away we saw the homes of many Bora Bora locals, families, fathers, mothers, children all hanging around, working on the yard, playing, etc. From the adults it seemed to me that we got some very unwelcome and unfriendly looks. Maybe those looks didn't mean anything at all, but we had grown accustomed to overwhelmingly warm greetings from the locals in and around the hotels and restaurants, so this threw me for a loop. We both felt a certain amount of hostility, and so it wasn't long before I gave up my adventure and turned around back toward the main road. Eventually we came to the village of Vaitape, where it's all happening. This is as close to a metropolis as it gets here. There are many shops, an internet cafe, a big Chinese department store, post office, and what have you. A little further on we found the Top Dive resort restaurant, which we heard was great. We took a look at the menu, checked out the shop, got back on the scooter, and headed back toward our hotel for a dip in the lagoon, and to get ready for dinner.

Our dinner travels on this night only took us as far as the other side of the lagoon. We went to La Perouse restaurant, at the Sofitel Marara. I'm sorry to say that I don't remember what either one of us ordered, but I think that's because it was a buffet again, and in that case I had one or two of everything. I was really becoming a seafood eater by this time. I tried all manner of raw fish on this trip, which is not like me at all, but I knew I could count on it being super fresh, and therefore bacteria-free. And it was good! Poisson cru was becoming one of my favorites.