Arrived Tahiti Sept 9th after another smooth ride in the trade winds.

It was interesting coming into such a populated island after so much time in more remote area. We anchored for free outside marina taina just a short bus into the city of Pape’ete, the capital of French Polynesia.

I had a lot of mixed feelings when we arrived because i wanted to stay and enjoy the island of Tahiti but i also was anxious to find another sail boat heading further west into the pacific. We went into the city a few times… Papeetee is pretty much just another city. I am updating this so late because internet connections were so bad and/or expensive. We ended up find a small little cafe in an alley where we could buy a drink or ice-cream and get unlimited WIFI time. Even then it was slow. There was also so much to do. Within the first few days it was Tom’s birthday on September 11th. We organized a nice pizza night on the boat and had some friends come and join. I ended up meeting these two awesome guys from the Galapagos who sailed with another boat from Galapagos to Nuku Hiva but then decided to fly to Tahiti to surf. They had just randomly came down to the dock looking for a boat to stay on and i met them and invited them about. Some other friends from the boat Norvik came out too. The captain of Norvik had sailed from Hungary to French Polynesia and was on route to NZ. A really interesting design this boat, the owner actually built it himself!

Tom and the Galapagos boys heading out for a reef surf

Norvik

Anyhow we ended up having a great little party for Toms Birthday. A few days later we said our good byes to Michaela who left on a plane to New Zealand the evening of September 13th. I randomly met a french girl named Marie in Papeetee and invited her out to Karaka. She then invited me with her b/f’s family to tour the interior of the island so Tom, Kim and I went on an amazing adventure with them to some awesome waterfalls!










It was a really rainy day but it didn’t stop us from having an absolutely fantastic time!













We checked out a kite surfing spot on the way back

After our epic adventure it was time to give Tom and Kim some time of their own on the boat so Steve and I took off on our seperate adventures. I ended up hitching south to explore the southern regions of Tahiti Iti, the smaller of the almost two islands that Tahiti makes up.

Some beautiful beaches along the way



Papera: I had set my camp up here at this beach for sunset, made some tomato and brie sandwiches on beautiful fresh french baguette bread. I bought a case of beer and made my way over to some folks playing music further along the beach and offered them some beers. They immediately took me in and got me to pack up my tent and go stay with them, they fed me more and showed me a good night listening to some awesome reggae music.



The next day we went on a great adventure showing me some cool grottos, stopping at friends places and going surfing on a crazy dangerous beach break with a rip tide that kept pushing me into rocks/tree debrison the northern coast of Tahiti Nui.








The drove me all the way to Teahupoo, home of the giant reef break but there was no southern swell the days in spent there.




Teahupoo marks the end of the road on Tahiti Iti, from then on one must walk or take a boat along the coast of the protected lagoon until the lagoon ends and steep rugged cliffs continue until the lagoon continues on the northern part of Tahiti Iti. This coast was epically beautiful! The largest coconut palm trees ever!

I hiked in with my stuff with intention to hike the rugged coastal trail or through the interior. Instead i got welcomed in for dinner from a local family.



Yes we ate Porcupine fish (Blowfish) potentially really poisonous but quite delicious! I made sure the family dug in before i did just to be sure.

The girls picking some fresh Papapya!

The weather came in and we had a few days of heavy rain and they highly recommended i stay and not hike the cliffs. So i stayed a few days and it was great. One of the days was quite nice and i went for a sweet hike with the girls down the coast.



A baby Coconut crab! quite rare because they are so delicious.



The girls were camera shy but they did come around for some good shots!

These girls were tough, grew up out here and were not afraid to catch grabs and rip them apart to use for bate. They even grabbed a moray eel and ripped its head off!

I hiked out with the father and we went into town and grabbed some groceries.

I had an interesting time with this family. They live a great and simple life but i found i stayed a few too days long and they started to assuming they could eat all my food when i offered them a bunch and they ate all my snickers and protein bars while i went to town with the father. They had collected 20-30$ worth of coin in the lagoon from all over the world and they wanted me to try to go to bank and see if they could change it into polynesian francs. I tried but got denied. I was kind enough to buy this family some groceries but then was disapointed to find that my bag

was gone through and my $300 worth of Polynesia francs had mysteriously disapeared… It could have gone missing in many different places. I dont want to blame this beautiful family for stealing but you never know! I definetly learned to keep things like that on my at all times because it could have gone missing on any of my adventures.

Anyhow, i was tired and depressed about my stolen money so i just hoped on the next bus back to Karaka. I was deperately trying to find a boat out of Tahiti further west into the pacific but i also needed to sell my kayaks or figure out something to do with them. I ended up getting a ride with a kayak to Moorea and getting my 2nd kayak sent over with another boat the next day. I was packed and ready to just paddle around Moorea having a good time and searching for a boat further west…