Easter Island - Marquesas
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We are spending our last few days on Easter Island in the Anakena anchorage, because all the other anchorages are too rough. For the last time we are anchoring at the foot of beautiful Moais close to the only sand beach on Easter Island. After a few days of wonder in the marvelous site, diving and chatting with fellow cruisers, we weigh anchor when the weather forecast threatens 40kn of wind to gain as much distance to the gale as possible. Even customs and immigration accept that one cannot come to the main anchorage and drive half an hour to this remote beach to clear us out!
The first two days of the passage bring us some 15kn of wind and we sail half wind to the west, towards Pitcairn, which we would like to visit on the way to French Polynesia. Then the gale sends us first a cold front, winds turning by 270°, a resulting cross-sea and finally 25-35kn southerly winds for 3 days. When the weather forecast indicates that the wind will turn to the North thereafter, we skip our Pitcairn plans, because Pitcairn has no safe anchorages in northerly winds. Instead we head directly to the Marquesas take the strong wind on our stern and have a surprising calm passage under triple reefed sails and make daily runs in excess of 200nm. With the end of the storm we are arriving back in the tropics, the temperatures are rising and we are getting more consistent trade winds. We make landfall in the Marquesas group of French Polynesia after 14 days of passage. Overall, it was a very worthwhile detour going to Easter Island: We have not only seen a truly fascinating place, but could also break the passage in two shorter (and thanks to better wind angle also faster) ones.
Our first stop in the Marquesas, one out of five archipelagoes of French Polynesia, is Hiva Oa. It is a lush island with volcanoes dropping straight into the ocean. We quickly fall into the island rhythm, slow down, are waiting out the frequent rain showers and taking in the few attractions of the island. Some important information for our fellow cruisers: We have subscribed to the Pacific Puddle Jump Rallye, although we never participated in any of their activities. But with their letter, the Tahiti Yacht Club guarantees for our departure and we don’t have to post the usual bond of some USD 1’500.
The Marquesas are the island of the artists: Paul Gaugin has lived on Hiva Oa and we are visiting a small museum dedicated to him. It seems to me that one has to be artist to live here. The landscape is so lush that the fruits fall from the trees and the (French) child subsidy is sufficient to maintain the whole family so that nobody seems to be really working …
Our next stops is Fatu Hiva, which has a spectacularly beautiful anchorage under high cliffs drenched in purple at sunset with the surrounding cliffs giving off bronze reflections. We hike to a beautiful waterfall, which we only share with a few hundred mosquitoes… On the way to Nuku Hiva, we stop for a night in Ua Pou with its picture perfect skyline you can see on many postal cards of the Marquesas.
In Nuku Hiva we are doing some provisioning and fill the cooking gas bottle. We also sail over to the neighboring anchorage in Daniel’s bay, hike through beautiful plantations under steep cliffs to a 600m high waterfall – I told you these volcanoes are steep and high:) – and had the photographer not forgotten to put batteries in the camera, you would have some beautiful pictures on the homepage, too…
French Polynesia is indeed quite expensive, although we didn’t experience it very dramatically: Some basic food like pasta, potatoes and are subsidized and cheaper than in Europe, you can find some good and not too expensive meat from South America and New Zealand. Also, we hardly eating out and there is no immigration fee. The only really disturbing costs are the high prices for internet access.
After the fascination and cultural richness of Easter Island, we enjoy the lushness and quaint life on the Marquesas, but it doesn’t catch us like other places and we move on after two weeks to the Tuamotu Archipelago to go kitesurfing and diving! Maybe, we should have stayed longer in one place and get more the vibe of it, but for that we are still too young :)