Wednesday, March 15, 2017 – Huahine

Today Bill still felt really awful, but we had managed to sleep about 8 hours the night before, which was much needed and made both of us feel more human. We had breakfast at the pension—the usual fare, but this time with different fruit including something that doesn’t translate into English very well, called a star apple, and French Polynesian grapefruit, which is less acidic and bitter and more sweet than the grapefruit in North America. We think it tastes similar to a pomelo.

Breakfast.

Teps' son loves Miri Miri, the kitten, and Miri Miri's mother pictured here.

We walked to the pharmacy and April asked the pharmacist to see if there was anything she could take for her swollen feet and ankles. He said there wasn’t much a pregnant person could take, but suggested that she wear flip flops instead of more constraining shoes like runners while her feet are swollen. He said that the heat and humidity were undoubtedly not helping. He also advised her to drink tonnes of fluids. This is difficult as April already has to go to the washroom all the time as a result of being pregnant.

We walked into Fare, looking in a touristy shop along the way, and then went to the Super Fare Market where April tried on flip flops and chose the most comfortable pair. We also picked up a baguette, drinks, and some lovely French cheese for lunch. We then walked back to the Pension along the beach. We had lunch early at 11 AM. The two pension cats joined us and begged vigorously for pieces of cheese. While the mother cat tried to take the sandwiches right from our hands, the kitten was much more mild mannered, choosing to beg from the floor with the dog. The kitten let us hold him and pet him, which made for a lovely calorie free desert.

Pension Meherio

Another view of our home away from home

One can use bicycles for free

For showering off after the beach.

Sharing lunch.

Miri Miri the kitten (he loves to be pet so they named him Miri Miri which means caress in Polynesian).

Mother and baby hopefully waiting for more food.

The pond by Pension Meherio.

Pension Meherio is surrounded by beautiful flowers that Teps, the owner, planted (his degree was in agriculture).

Tiare flowers smell like a heavenly gardenia.

In the afternoon we fell asleep in our room but were awakened by a torrential downpour and what sounded like a little bit of thunder. We hung around the pension until the rain stopped and the sun came out again. We walked to the beach and turned right to walk the short distance to Treehouse Pearls. We visited this pearl vendor, Ray Marks, when he just had a plastic table and a hand painted sign by the beach 9 years ago. The place is considerably fancier now with a treehouse retail shop that displays various black pearl jewellery pieces as well as loose pearls. This is an obvious increase in overhead, including staff (Ray was not around).

April tried on several black pearl necklaces, however, we left empty handed as the pearls offered were mostly baroque or circled and we were not impressed by the prices, plus there were very few loose pearls available for purchase to create a piece of jewellery (usually a more economical option than buying a pre-made piece).

This necklace, in a lariat style, had 218 black pearls on it.

April felt the first sign of a cold coming on, a very sore throat and a stuffy nose. We rested at the pension after the trip to the pearl shop. It was pouring with rain again and it was very, very humid and hot. We spent some time composing blog entries.

Pouring rain.

You try looking this effortless while perching on a edge of a swinging door.

We did not have to go out to find dinner, as Teps, the owner of the pension, ordered pizza for the guests staying here. April had a shrimp pizza with garlic which turned out to be shockingly good, as the shrimp was cooked perfectly (the chances of this happening at home would be almost zero). Bill had a Hawaiian pizza that he also thought was good. We only made it through half a pizza each and saved the rest for lunch the next day.

A giant hermit crab came into the kitchen at the pension and Teps told us that he has one twice as big that lives under his house.

Pizza for dinner.

The guy on the pizza boxes puts special toppings on his pizza.

Sunday, March 12, 2017 – Rediscovering Papetee

We have returned.

Our cab dropped us off at the Hotel Sarah Nui. The jolly cab driver entertained us as he drove us into town by singing at the top of his lungs to local ukulele-filled Polynesian music on the radio. We also learned that he was from the Marquesas islands, had taken a Tahitian wife, and had three girls and two boys. He had a Marquesan wooden necklace that he showed us and when he dropped us off he showed us a beautiful carving he was working on that was sitting in the back of his Dacia Logan.

The Hotel Sarah Nui is a small hotel located near to the centre of Papetee (the capital of Tahiti). We chose it for its close location to the harbour, where there is a square where the Roulettes (food trucks) come to serve dinner at night and for its walkability to the local market.

We tried to check in when we arrived at the Hotel Sarah Nui, however we were not able to check in yet as it was only about 7 AM local time (currently French Polynesia is 3 hours behind Pacific Daylight Time, as French Polynesia does not observe daylight savings time, which created confusion for our sleep deprived brains as daylight savings time took effect the same day we arrived). Check-in time for this hotel is 1:00 PM. Our room was not yet ready. So, we stored our bags with the hotel, brushed our teeth in the lobby bathroom, and left the hotel to wander the Sunday streets of Papetee.

We were shattered from the series of three flights, not sleeping much overnight on the third flight, and by the complete change in locale. We had obtained a map from the hotel, however, it was unnecessary, because it was very simple to walk to the harbour front. We stopped by an ATM by the hotel and tried to get more money out, as many places do not accept credit cards, and some of our accommodations that we will be staying at later in the trip only take cash. It proved to be almost impossible to withdraw money from this ATM either. It would only allow us to have a small amount of cash out on one of our cards, like the other ATM (but not doubt the bank fee will still be high).

We first walked to the tourist office, which is located along the harbour front. The office was not yet open, however their washrooms were, which April was very thankful for. After, we went to the local market. As it was a Sunday, the upper floor of the market (which has most of the non food related items such as souvenirs), was not open. We were able to browse the produce stands, however, and we bought some lovely little local bananas to eat (a bunch of about 10 was about $1.00).

Moorea in the background.

Dramatic skies.

We stopped by a patisserie that we used to go to during our last trip to Papetee. We had a croissant, and pain au chocolat and an Orangina. We also bought a piece of cake to eat later to belatedly celebrate April’s birthday. We tried out a couple of ATMs on our way back to the hotel and continued to have no luck withdrawing cash.

Mmm mmm pastries.

We returned to the hotel and fought to stay away sitting on couches in the lobby. We still had hours to kill before check-in. Bill called one of our banks to ask them why we were having trouble withdrawing money (we were afraid they had seen the strange locations we were trying to withdraw from and had frozen our accounts), but they knew we were in Tahiti, as we dutifully put notes on our accounts in advance of leaving, and they said there shouldn’t be any issue. We were confused, but had heard that sometimes ATMs run out of money in French Polynesia and as it was Sunday, hopefully we would have more luck tomorrow.

We ordered a couple of cold drinks and two Margarita pizzas from the hotel’s snack bar for lunch and ate them as we waited for our room to be readied. 

At noon, the check-in clerk told us that our room was ready. We proceeded to our room, unpacked a few things, so that we could have a shower, had a shower, and went for a nap. April’s feet were very swollen from the three flights, which is a common pregnancy symptom.

There was a street racing course set up on the streets by our hotel, and for a few hours there were deafening motorsport noises that pierced our ear drums as we drifted in and out of consciousness.

After our rest, we walked from the hotel to the bank machine by our hotel to try and get money out again. We then walked down to the harbour front to Vaiete Place to see what the Roulettes had to offer for dinner. We ended up having pizza. It wasn’t as good as the pizza we had had last time we were at the Roulettes in 2008, but it was still pretty good. We had cold drinks with our pizza and watched the sunset and the beautiful stars come out.

 

It was a very warm and humid evening with the sky going dark just before 7 PM. We admired the full moon rising as we returned to our hotel to get an early night’s sleep in advance of our flight to Huahine the next morning.