Papeete, Tahiti

My first view from our balcony about 6:00 am was the sun rising over a dark low mountain.  Papeete (pah-pah-eh-the) is a volcanic island, the capital of French Polynesia.  Once a small fishing village, it is now the capital and an administrative and political hub for the South Pacific’s archipelago. Here are my first photos.

 

Brian joined me after a bit, and the photography improved.

And now in full light.  These photos also show the reef.

And another closer look at the town. 

His sharper eyes also caught this movement in the water.  If you enlarge the photo another 100 times beyond this, you will see a fin.  I had hoped for more water activity as we came into port, but was disappointed. 

This green hill that looks felted intrigued me.  I assume it is a small volcanic peak, but it is not treed like the others. 

The Pilote boat arrived and we were brought into port. 

There were three finger piers of sufficient length for our ship.  And docked next door to us was the Paul Gauguin Mata Ute.  This cruise line specializes on tours in French Polynesia.  Gauguin lived in Tahiti from 1890 to 1893, and some of his finest paintings come from these years.  Lycee Paul Gauguin is in Papeete.  We could see many trucks loading provisions onto the ship – the white truck in this photo – but no people coming or going.  It left port later in the afternoon.

Ferry service is available to Moorea (and possibly other islands) and we saw many of them.  The Aremiti 5 we saw from the ship balcony.  Many cranes on the dock behind this Tauati Ferry indicate a busy freight dock.  So many products would have to be imported to this small island.

As we left the ship, there was an emergency crew drill taking place, and we saw several of the crew in their life jackets at various posts waiting further instruction.  There was also an emergency call for the medical response team.  I don’t think the two were related. 

These women were entertaining us as we got off the ship.

In the talk about Papeete that Kez gave, she said there were always local people on the pier offering various tours, and all feedback was that they were sincere and honest.  We had investigated tours offered by the ship, but nothing was available by the time we did so.  We thought we could take a chance on even a taxi, the charge for four of us would be less than four tours (ranging from $125 to $300 each) and possibly just as informative.  

Inside the immigration service building, there were many kiosks selling jewelry, pareos, t-shirts, perfume, baskets and black pearls.  A woman selling pareos had several beautiful lengths of fabric dyed with flower and leaf patterns that were sufficiently large to be good quilt backings.  Carol and I debated, but decided they were too heavy.  Another woman had embroidered fish panels in frames.  I could not resist one of those, especially since she took it out of the frame for easier packing. It will be added to other fish art in a bathroom. 

We browsed in this area for a while, and attempted to connect to the internet.  Outside this building on the square there were lots of people offering tours.  We agreed with Hanahana for a tour around the island with stops at popular sites for $80 each.  Nearby was a kiosk selling phone cards, and Brian bought one that would give us service here and tomorrow on Moorea. 

The Marche de Papeete is an island must-see.  The bottom level has an extensive fruit and vegetable market.  Dresses, jewelry, black pearls, t-shirts, wood carvings, vanilla; perfume, oils and soap;  handwoven baskets, bags and hats. We browsed for a couple of hours.  The main level here is very crowded; the mezzanine was less busy.  Wes is in the first photo on the right. 

There were several stalls selling flowers.  This is not the arrangement I bought, but is similar.

We walked up a street across from the market thinking we might have lunch. To our surprise the first shop we saw was a fairly large fabric store.  And next door another one.  And then another one.  There were some beautiful fabrics with colourful flower and fern motifs.  We browsed.  Not finding a possible lunch spot, being burdened with flowers, and with the ship close-by and easily accessed, we returned to it for lunch. 

There were eight people on our tour in a mini-van.  Our tour guide did not have a good grasp of English – French and English, and in recent years a return to Tahitian, are spoken here and taught in the schools – so we did not always get expansive details. 

This first stop was at Venus Pointe to view this lighthouse, which is in a park where there is a black-sand beach.  The lighhouse was built in 1867 by the Scottish lighthouse engineer father of Robert Louis Stevenson. There were many families here, possibly because it was a Saturday, and possibly because it is the most popular beach on the island. There is also a memorial here to the HMS Bounty; this island a setting in Mutiny on the Bounty movie.    

Our second stop was at the Fa’aruma’I Valley Waterfalls.  The main waterfall drops over 300 meters.  The surrounding jungle is lush and green as one should expect in a tropical monsoon climate.  The Legend of the Three Waterfalls - stop me if you've heard this before - is all about forbidden love betwen the daughter of a powerful chief (forbidden from seeing men) and her lover Ivi.  The gods helped them escape and to be together forever by covering them with two waterfalls.  The third one separates them from the world. 

Next we stopped at Vaipahi Tropical Gardens.  It was reminiscent of Kauai as there were chickens with baby chicks on the grounds.  There were signposts identifying various trees, and a large lily pond.  Our driver cautioned us it was a very short stop, so no real time to read the information on the vegetation.

Our last stop was at Fern Mara’a Grotto Caves, three natural caves hollowed out of rock.  People were bathing in the first of these two fresh-water spring pools under ferns and mosses growing overhead.  

The second one looked less attractive, but the cliffside greenery along the path was lush and lovely.   

This area was the most built-up on the island, and we were in stop-and-go heavy traffic for about 30 minutes until we reached the dock.  The market stalls were still open in the admin building, and we browsed a bit more before returning to the ship.  The woman at the stall where I bought the fish textile was showing off a quilt she was making.  It was very big, and had exquisite applique work of flowers.  I expect she had lots of time to work on it during the day as she waited for the cruise people to come by her stall.  Because tomorrow we dock at the sister island, Moorea, which cannot be more than 15 minutes away, all aboard time for us is 10:30 pm so we could have explored more. 

We had a quick dinner and went to the theatre for the evening entertainment, a Folkloric Performance by the Tahitian Cultural Expressions that came on board from Papeete.  This group, formed in 1986, is one of the oldest and most respected dance troupes in all of French Polynesia.  It was a beautiful presentation.  (This photo was copied from another Discovery Princess guest.)