Bora Bora Nov 11

It was eighteen miles around the island of Bora Bora. The land was typical of the others we have visited with mountains and jungles. The bay was awesome. The turquoise and blue and white glistened in the sun.

Our guide was a Irish lady whose French husband is on a four year assignment on Bora Bora. What duty!! She wondered out loud how she will adjust when she goes home in a few months. She gave us lots of information about Tahiti and French Polynesia. But the colors of the sea stole the show.

We stopped to buy a couple of lava lavas, walked along the beach, wandered through the grocery store, went black pearl shopping and had a drink at Bloody Mary's bar.

The show was The Nelsons. Pretty good entertainment!!

Papeete, Tahiti, Nov. 10

Pape ete, it's two words, pape and ete. All the vowels get pronounced. Pape means water. Ete means basket. It is the capital of Tahiti and really of the South Pacific as well. It is France in the same way that Hawaii is the US, except that they use Tahitian francs – 75 francs is a dollar..

We went off to a lagoon tour today with about 40 of our closest friends. The seats are built for much smaller people, so you do sit close.

The day was beautiful, sunny, a slight breeze, hot, but not too hot until you get on the beach. The beaches are black sand, not white, and the sand gets very very hot. I was not too interested in the swimming because the black sand reminded me too much of copper concentrates and it seemed like swimming in the concentrates thickener. I'll pass on that.

We went to Pointe Venus where Captain Cooke came to make the astronomical observation of the transit of Venus. From his data, combined with that of astronomers in Europe, it was calculated that the distance to the sun is 150 million kilometers. There is a little monument there, but somebody stole the brass plaque about ten years ago.

It is also where Capain Bligh landed in Tahiti with his ship, the Bounty. There is a monument to that, as well. On the monument, he is listed as Lieutenant Bligh. The “captain” part is just because he was commanding the ship. Fletcher Christian is listed as “Master”, and there were two others of that rank.

On the way to Pointe Venus we saw some spinner dolphins, only one of them actually spinned. These were very small, about 4 ft long, and not very active. I don't think anybody got a good picture of them. I got a pretty good shot of a bird that followed along with us for a while. I thought I saw some people camping on a little bitty island called a “motu”, but it was just a trash pile instead of a camp.

The scenery was beautiful, we had a good view of “the diadem”, a crown shaped mountain up the valley from Papeete. Then it was back to the ship for a hamburger and a swim in the pool. All in all it was a very relaxing day.

We skipped the night time entertainment. It was a magician we had seen just about 3 weeks ago. He was good but we have to get up early again in the morning to visit Bora Bora.

Moorea, Nov. 9

Our tour guide was very grumpy and she thought she was Mario Andretti.

There really isn't a lot to do on the land part of Moorea that we visited. It is gorgeous, though. It could have been interesting, even though the weather didn't really cooperate. It was overcast with occasional light rain – nothing severe, just not the beautiful sunny day you hope for.

We went on a land tour for two hours in an eight-passenger truck. Along the way we saw a morai (a pre-Christian temple), the Belvedere Lookout, and a small muddy plantation of pineapples. Then it was high speed to the black pearl store, driving past beautiful and romantic scenery, but at such speed that neither photos nor appreciative viewing were possible. She didn't stop for pictures, she didn't even slow down. She was in a big rush to get us to the black pearl store (so she could get her commission, I suppose.).

She ranks as our absolute worst tour guide, ever, anywhere. Her name is Christina and she works for Albert's Tours.

Sea Day November 8

Sea days are rest days for us. We aren't involved in trivia or games, we just rest up for the next stop. Today we slept until noon, had a burger and pizza for lunch and then took a nap by the pool. It was a perfect day.

All the pools except the one on the aft deck were closed because of the movement of the ship. The water was really splashing around. Anyway, they emptied the pools and used the time to clean and paint them. It was interesting to watch. I hope they will all be open tomorrow but we are going very fast in order to get to Moorea on time. Speed and wind make for rock and roll.

After dinner we saw a show. We were on the front row for Jenifer Green singing Shirley Bassey. During “Hey Jude” Jenifer held the mike up to Jack. He sang the chorus. Who knew he could really sing!!! She even said, “Not bad!” I was soooooo proud:)

The Samoas Nov 5 and 6

Our visits the second time to the Samoas revealed little new. We had a good time at the beach and at a small farm in Apia and we enjoyed seeing the western side of Pago Pago.

The clean up from the tsunami continues to move along at a fast pace in Pago Pago. They are yet to do much rebuilding except at Tisa's, where they have added a new deck across from the bar overlooking the sea.

Pago Pago American Samoa Nov 6

Apia Samoa Nov 5