Ok, goodbye to Bora Bora. What an amazing place.

 

Many hotel chains (Four Seasons, St Regis, Hilton etc) have these kinds of properties, with individual units built out over the water.

There were countless blue-lipped clams - small, only about 6” across.

 

This one *is* mine, a brief moment with a spotted eagle ray.

 

These are not my pics of course, they’re just to be found online (I didn’t bring any u/w photography equipment) but gives a good idea of the abundance of marine life and the clarity of the water.

Bora Bora is gorgeous. We went aboard a Bayliner and toured around the lagoon & reef, did some snorkeling with tons of tropical fish, and a few spotted eagle rays.

We’re sailing away from Papeete tonight, but a very short jaunt to Bora Bora. French Polynesia is exquisitely beautiful everywhere you look, but from everything I’ve read and seen, Bora Bora looks like the crown jewel, just impossibly gorgeous. Hoping for good weather, for picture-taking and for snorkeling possibilities.

When we were docked in Manta, Ecuador, the powerful surge did some damage to our starboard side. It’s more cosmetic than actual physical damage, but still looks bad. So here in Papeete we’re docked long enough for the guys to do some cosmetic surgery.

Took a drive around Tahiti, visited a cool cave/grotto, and saw that pineapples will be in supply onboard for the foreseeable future.

Next stop, Papeete Tahiti.

We are (very roughly) halfway between South America & Australia.

Yesterday, we spent most of the day just cruising around Pitcairn Island. CruiseMapper.com showed this to be our sailing pattern - I’m thinking it’s mostly an approximation, as I don’t remember running aground that many times.

So now we’re sailing west again, to French Polynesia, we should arrive at Papeete Monday morning. I don’t think oceans get much smoother than this:

We visited Pitcairn Island today - cruised around it but the shore facilities cannot accommodate many passengers and aren’t suited to receive the ship’s tenders, so we just sailed around, while today’s public room lectures were about, of course, the famous Bounty mutiny.

https://archive.archaeology.org/9905/etc/bounty.html