As if to make up for the boredom and monotony of my Pacific crossing the last week has been a whirlwind of activity, shady deals and cultural diversity: from Polynesian men with tattoos covering half of their faces, and a transvestite waitress who wore her lip liner in an evil clown style, to an alcoholic pearl dealer offering me his hand in marriage.
Since my last blog I have been on land not once but three times, having spent a few days in Nuka Hiva in Les Marquises, 24 hours on the tiny coral atoll of Ahe in the Tuamotu Archipelago and the best part of a week in sunny Tahiti.
In between land the sailing has been approximately the same, water in all directions and saltiness all round. Salty hair, skin, and clothes, I am always salty, like some kind of delicious bar snack. In fact it occurred to me this week, during another of my deep thought night shifts that I share quite a lot with the humble peanut of late, salty, dry roasted by the sun, and a brilliant accompaniment to beer. This dream was shattered though when curiosity got the better of me and like the filthy and disgusting individual I am I licked my arm, only to discover that I am far less delicious than I had hoped. 
The arrival of land on the horizon couldn’t have come at a better time as I was seriously beginning to doubt my own sanity (as demonstrated by the peanut analogy and by the worrying fact that I caught myself pulling faces at my own reflection while on the graveyard shift). However, Nuka Hiva is a tiny island with an even tinier town so my few days there were a slow reintroduction into the world of civilisation.
Though small and quiet, with only one restaurant and 2.5 shops, it was amazing to have more than four people to talk to, and more than 44ft to move in one direction. On the downside I did have to shower and at least consider brushing my hair. That’s one thing that I definitely don’t miss about civilisation, I’ve grown quite fond of the semi hobo look, so much so that I continued modelling my vagabond chic on land, embracing French Polynesian culture by eating brie and baguettes, and drinking red wine while sitting on the beach, barefoot and dirty like a shipwrecked sailor.
I celebrated the big 23 in style and spent my birthday traipsing through the jungle with the heavily tattooed descendants of cannibals (seriously, Google it) in order to see what I am assured is the third highest waterfall in the world. Standing at 310 metres I suppose it was pretty big, but I was more interested in swimming in the pools and re-enacting an advert for new improved herbal infused all natural essence of aloe organic fusion key amino tropical jungle protective conditioning shampoo. While I busied myself with this important task I failed to notice that the pool in which I swam was also home to a family of massive eels, with savage pointy teeth and evil Wayne Rooney faces. My vision of paradise came crashing down around me as I ran screaming from the pool. You will be pleased to hear that I escaped wound free, and none of the locals tried to eat me during my stay so all in all it was an amazing birthday, and not one I’ll forget in a hurry.
Our departure from Les Marquises was not nearly so epic as our next stop was a mere 4 days sailing. However, a few nights of bad wind slowed our progress considerably and threatened my sanity once again. One night, during a particularly boring 2-4am lookout shift, while cruising at the daredevil, batten down the hatches, man over board speed of 3 knots, I watched with horror as a cloud, yes that’s right, a cloud, overtook us. I was only able to console myself with the fact that this turbo charged boy racer super cloud looked a bit like Africa on the radar. There’s nothing like some endless boredom to kick start your imagination.
Luckily we managed to catch some good wind during the day and we did eventually make it to Ahe, one of the largest landmasses in the Tuamoto group of islands. It seems ‘large’ is a term that is applied quite loosely when it comes to Pacific atolls as from the beach at one end of the island I could see all the way to the other side.
Having exhausted the island’s major attractions and reluctant to get back on the yacht I wandered aimlessly down the street, chasing crabs, and looking at the amazing selection of food in the shop, including “celebrity sausages” (insert your own sausage worthy celebrity here). As I turned a corner an extremely drunk man waving a tea towel tried to get my attention. As I got closer I saw that this was no ordinary drunk man but a drunken man with a bag of pearls. So I went over to say hello.
With one hand on a can of Heineken and the other resting lazily on a huge pile of pearls, the man looked me up and down, peering at me through one eye. He squinted through his drunken haze, and then declared “very beauty…” he paused, whether for effect or to remember the word in English I’m not sure, and then he triumphantly proclaimed “FULL, very beautiful!” Quite what he hoped the outcome of this would be was not made clear, perhaps he envisioned me offering my body in exchange for pearls, I’m not entirely sure. Either way once he realised that I was not going to be forthcoming in offering myself as a prostitute he fell back on safer ground. “Whisky!!!” he exclaimed, laughing to himself and pushing the pearls towards me “one bottle, one pearl”.
The moral questions raised by trading alcohol for pearls are ominous. Besides the fact it’s probably illegal the man in question looked like he could do with a night off the booze, but it seems this local man was just out to make a quick buck and who am I to turn down a bargain. After an hour of turning down marriage proposals and the promise of “beucoup enfants” I walked away with a pocket full of pearls. Luckily (for me) I had bought a bottle of Mexican tequila as a present for someone in Australia and was able to swap it for 6 shiny pearls. So even though I will be arriving empty handed down under I will look fabulous (darling) in my pearls. Now that I’ve got my hands on some treasure, and the fact that I climbed the rigging this week means that I am back on track in my pursuit of piracy.
Just when I thought my week couldn’t get any better I arrived in Tahiti which is one of the most culturally bizarre places I have been. This is a place where men wear 1980s style scrunchhies in their hair, old ladies with traditional flower headdresses eat McFlurrys, and everybody, young and old, men and women, wear Oakleys and board shorts as if they might catch a narly wave at any moment (should that be gnarly or are surf dudes too cool for silent Gs?)
I must take off my proverbial hat to the Tahitian tourist board that has done a sterling job of promoting Tahiti as some kind of beach paradise, which it is not. It’s more of a neon hubbub in the middle of nowhere, a strange mini France where people play boule and drink red wine in a concrete jungle better suited to central London than the South Pacific. I love it.
After a day of hitchhiking (which is ridiculous easy seeing as though there are only about two roads) I made it around the entire island and saw most of the sights. The following day, having failed to find my beach paradise I decided to do the right thing and visit a museum, if nothing else this was a good opportunity to spend time away from the rest of the crew. Don’t get me wrong they’re a good bunch but 44ft is so small. In fact if you’ve got the space, stand up now and walk about 20 steps. That’s it. Anyway, the God of fun was looking down on me and while hitching to the museum I was picked up by a gang of students who’d just finished their final exams. To cut a long story short, the nicest beaches are hidden from tourists, I never made it to the museum and I am mildly hungover. Three cheers for student banter. My sanity is at least partly restored.
We set sail again tomorrow for Nui which no-one, including me has ever heard of. It is over 1000 nautical miles away so you’ve got at least 10 days to recover from this blog.
Lots of love Kate
p.s. I saw a partially blind cat with a pearl as a fake eye. That is way bling yo.
Thanks to Carol Esther for the amusing peanut people photo
At the risk of incurring the wrath of Tina Turner’s legal team, I thought it was appropriate to post a picture of the teeny tiny singer in celebration of Loco2’s achievement in being named one of the twenty best travel websites by the Daily Telegraph.
At the risk of incurring the wrath of Tina Turner’s legal team, I thought it was appropriate to post a picture of the teeny tiny singer in celebration of Loco2’s achievement in being named one of the twenty best travel websites by the Daily Telegraph.
