7 October - Circumnavigating Raiatea

0600 position 16-37S 151-33W. At anchor in 74', mud bottom, Tapuamu Bay

We were sorely disappointed when the Tahaa Mai Tai restaurant never opened
up for dinner Saturday night. I had prepared David with vivid
descriptions of their creme brule, Irish coffee, and the ambiance of
rowing into the restaurant and having Moku pe'a as the focal point of the
view. I'm not sure what happened. We verified with Chef Bruno a couple
of weeks earlier that he wasn't going on vacation, and his schedule shows
him open Saturday nights. Oh well, we shifted to Plan B and had a nice
spaghetti dinner instead.

On Sunday morning we were up bright and early to hike up to the pass
overlooking Haamene Valley and Patio, then returned to the boat for
breakfast and an early departure for Nao Nao motu on the south end of
Raiatea. Lori's fresh baked banana coffee cake made up for missing out on
the Tahaa Mai Tai the night before. We beat the two miles out of Haamene
Valley in about twelve knots of breeze, but then a squall rolled through
and the wind died off. By the time we were off of Uturoa on Raiatea it
was flat calm, and on went the engine. We powered the length of Raiatea
inside the reef before the wind filled in again at 2PM when we turned the
corner, wung out the jib, and ran down the south side of the island to Nao
Nao.

I have a thumb drive with all of my favorite music albums on it, and I
often have it playing on "random shuffle" on the stereo. Lori and I have
slightly different tastes in music, and when a BeeGees song comes on she
snickers and is embarrassed for me. I don't care. I like the BeeGees and
am not ashamed of it. I'm pleased to tell you that there are at least two
of us on the planet that feel that way. We had the stereo playing this
afternoon as we slipped down Raiatea's south shore, and when a BeeGees
song came on David expressed his appreciation. Ha!

We found the anchorage off the south end of Nao Nao to be empty, so we had
it all to ourselves. There just aren't as many cruising boats here this
season. The hook was down at 4PM, we went for a snorkel, and then
relaxed before a grilled ribeye, coleslaw, baguette and red wine dinner.

On Monday David and I were both up at the crack of dawn, and after some
more of Lori's banana cake and coffee, we were off for the Coral River.
The wind had died off overnight, so we powered out of Raiatea's lagoon
through Punaeroa Pass, motor sailed twelve miles outside the reef, then
reentered the lagoon at Papai Pass on Tahaa's west coast. No fish again.
It was two more miles under power to the anchorage off of the Coral
Garden. The sun came out for us during our Coral River dive, and after
returning to Moku pe'a we powered the one mile stretch into Tahaa's
Tapuamu Bay and anchored there for the evening.