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Raiatea, French Ploynesia 12-4-09
By Milt Abel | December 5, 2009
| December 5, 2009We are anchored about a mile from the pier and are staying overnight, leaving in the afternoon tomorrow for our scheduled stop in Moorea on Monday and then Pappete, the turnaround, on Tuesday. Bora Bora has certain cache’ doesn’t it? Any name that’s doubled brings notoriety; the craggy mountain spires covered with lush foliage, the low billowing white and grey clouds that surround those spires, the sapphire blue ocean -all unnecessary. We’d still know about Bora Bora because of that repeated name. Thinking about it, the naming hook hasn’t been abused, has it? Would we listen to him as much if he chose to call himself Sting Sting? Maybe Walla Walla, Washington went too far.
The Island also has the musical South Pacific to raise its profile. Doing laundry yesterday aboard the ship I chatted briefly with a couple from South Carolina who were somewhat disenchanted with the cruise. They liked my show, but were frustrated with the total lack of non-outdoor activities these islands offer. They were singing my tune, because you know me, give me a an air-conditioned Starbucks with an internet connection and I’m happy. But these people were north of seventy in their age and surfing, scuba diving, or just hiking on the beach, in this heat and humidity wasn’t something they were going to do voluntarily -even if it was the last thing on their bucket list, they’d reach for an eraser before a boogie board. They were excited about today’s stop however because of the notoriety of the island from the movie South Pacific, “My husband and I want to visit Bloody Mary’s Bar,” she said. That naming thing comes into play again here as well. Movie or no movie, I’d pay a visit to Bloody Mary’s before I’d darken the door of Hemoglobin Karen’s.
Yesterday, while we were tied up in Raiatea, I took advantage of the tropical beauty and locale by going for a short, dusk swim off a hotel dock about a half mile away from the ship . These islands, at least where Western influence has encroached, lose a lot of their beauty. Walking along the road to the nearby hotel meant strolling past homes with unkempt or undefined crabgrass lawns, not to mention (but I will) unkempt or undefined abandoned cars, barking dogs roped to clothes-wires, and all the while negotiating where to place your feet in the mix of puddle and extra paving gravel while cars and motor-scooters streaked by.
Particularly interesting on this walk were the land crabs. Between the cinderblock retaining walls that ran along most small property fronts and the road’s pavement were hundreds of small holes. I remember from a visit to this nearby hotel a couple years ago, myself and another entertainer had walked down this road and saw dozens of these land crab that live in this little holes. The holes themselves look like well-defined snake holes, smooth and devoid of rubble, some were not so nicely finish, but all showed a darkness of greater depths. This time I didn’t see any land crabs on my way out to the hotel but saw dozens on my way back when I learned the secret in spotting them. They could sense the encroaching footfalls and would scurry into their holes before you got near, but by looking another five or ten yards up the road you could see them darting back into their holes. Some were golf ball size and a few as large as softballs. The larger ones didn’t seemed as frightened and began to just sit there keeping an eye on me, emboldened maybe by their size, ‘I see you, you see me, what are you going to do about it? Huh, punk?’
The water was surprisingly warm, but cool enough to be pleasant. The outside air temperature was around 82 and the water 86. The salt water makes you more buoyant so I laid back in the very mild chop, occasionally spitting out the seawater that lapped over my tucked chin and looked up to watch the clouds turn from white to pink to grey as the sun set behind the high hills beyond the hotel. Better than most Starbucks really.
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