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| Good bye, Atuona |
Today is going to be a loooong day. Or more than one day. Because there’s the international date line in there to cross and it confuses me. You gain or lose a day. Lose, I guess, traveling west to east. Because I leave the hotel on Hiva Oa at 11 a.m. on Tuesday the 22nd and I don’t arrive in Tokyo (via Honolulu) until Thursday, the 24th at 6:30 p.m.! First, there’s 3 hours 10 minutes on Air Tahiti back to Papeete. Then an 8-hour layover before a 5½ hour flight to Honolulu, where I’ll have an 8½ hour layover until the 9-hour flight to my destination. You do the math. Because I had a nightmare last night about forgetting something.
I’m one week into this around-the-world trip and I’ve already worn everything I brought. I’ve sprained a toe, gotten a sunburn and almost stepped on a wasp. I’m stiff from the horseback ride yesterday. But I wouldn’t change a thing.
I like the island of Hiva Oa, where lemons, limes and grapefruit grow wild everywhere and you just pick them. I would have enjoyed a rock lobster but the sea’s been too rough for fishermen to go out. Plus the hotel ran out of fresh pineapple because it comes in from another island. And the freighter arrives only once every three weeks. Although there are two boats - two different companies, they don’t stagger their arrivals! As Jean-Jacques, the hotel owner, had explained on my arrival, they do things differently on Hiva Oa.
Yet life here can be comfortable. Las Marquesas have their own government, except for the army, the courts and the airport, which are run by France. A job in one of those jobs pays well. For instance, the fireman at the airport works two hours a day (one or two flights/day, grouped time-wise) and makes 3,000 euros (about $3,700) a month. Product prices are high in Polynesia because most everything is shipped in, but that is still good pay.
Jean-Jacques drives me to the airport. We pass Paco’s ranch. And the land that Brel bought to build on before death changed his plans. (That property was the clearing I saw on arrival and thought was a mine, then saw yesterday on the bridle path around the airstrip.) Hiva Oa is getting to feel familiar.
What will I miss on this island? The smiles and kindness of the Marquesan people, the fruit and flowers. What won’t I miss? The ukuleles, the humid heat and so many roosters.
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| Hiva Oa |
For the moment, I’m in the “snack-bar” at Faa’a Airport in Papeete. So far, so good. A short flight over nothing but water. The ocean was so calm it shone metallic, like liquid silver cut through with dark rivers of currents. In other places the water was so still it reflected the low clouds. Couldn’t help but think of Joni Mitchell: “I’ve looked at clouds from both sides now”.
Now on to the Far East.
P.S. For some more photos of Las Marquesas, go to this website:
https://xdaysiny.com/top-things-to-do-in-hiva-oa-marquesas-islands/
or this YouTube video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TgUrczhvFNY
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