Marquesas

Sitting on deck doing the washing up, surrounded by magnificent volcanic ridges and peaks, the small village of Hanavave tucked in the little river flat amongst the rocky outcrops. Tropic birds circle and fly in to their nests on the rock faces in the hills above. A huge pod of Spinner Dolphins have been hanging around all morning, as close as 5 metres from the boat. Every now and then they practise their spinning, I guess that's where they got their name! The babies look only about two feet long, so when they spin it's incredibly cute. Marcel has gone for a swim with them, he says they were friendly, I think they would have been most un-impressed with his spinning ability.
Walking back from the waterfall, all the teenagers are playing volleyball, girls against the boys, doing real warmups and all. The boat ramp is full of the younger kids swimming and splashing. This is Fatu Hiva.
We made our crossing in 23 days, a fabulous time for 3000 miles,arrived in heavy cloud, rain and mist and were welcomed to the anchorage by one of the anchored boats on channel 16 given us directions where best to park.

On our first trip ashore we didn't even get out of the dinghy before we were organised.. well. They wanted to trade, anything... I had a bottle of wine in case, not feeling great about it but we didn't think we had anything else they want, there is no bank so we have no local currency, and anyway, they don't sell fruit, only trade. So we got a walk through the village and a big big bag of pampelmousse, but the giant ones, huge, 5-6inch! plus all the limes we could pick and two breadfuit. Philipe brought our fruit back to the wharf in a wheelbarrow, with his diving gear, and wouldn't let us leave it in the dinghy while we went for a walk. He said the kids would steal it and sell it to people from the other boats! The truth is more likely that Marcel initally told them we had two bottles of wine, so he wanted to make sure we were on the boat when he came by. They called in their dinghy, asking for the other bottle and and a corkscrew. Also asked if Marcel wanted to go diving too..... They did survive, of course, but it felt bad to see them going off diving and drinking. It's a dilemna.. If only we had known what they wanted! Shackles, silicone, life jackets, rope, lures, the list goes on. DVDs of stupid movies, really bad jewelry, plastic beads and stuff they love! Here they probably have real pearls but they are keen on Marcels rubbish baubles.
The mountain ridge behind the village is so high and so shear,they say there is no possible path across. There are another 3 ridges behind, so to get wood from the other side they go around in the dingy.

Today we went with the neighbors Yolo, in their dinghy to the next village down, Omoa, or I should say, the other village. This island is mostly vertical so there aren't many spots to park houses. We have been asked to take some trees to Manihi attol in the Tuamotus, and Cecile in Omoa would organise the trees for us. Cecile was lovely, and sent us on our way with some citrus and a corrosol, whatever that is. We also were able to buy bread, there is a bakery there, so for the first time in a month we ate bread! French sticks of course. I also bought the most expensive vegetables of my life. Four onions, four tomatoes and a medium cucumber for $15! Think I'll stick to fish, coconut and breadfruit from now on.

Fishing from the boat at anchor has been somewhat trying. I lost a lure to something big, the braid broke. Most of the guides on my rod have broken, all my soft plastics have been bitten in half and all I managed to do was land one beautiful silver mullet shaped fish that unhooked itself and bounced back over the side. However, today I set off in the dinghy, which is a little un-nerving, as if I have a big problem and no-one notices I will drift an awful long way before there is any more land. Sure enough, it was only a few minutes of trolling along the shore and I had two nice silver fish, not sure what they are yet. They are slender, like to jump and the frigate bird tried to get one. Sure to be delicious.