S/V L'ORIENT

This young lady bears a striking resemblance to the Hinano beer girl As our long-time readers recall, we left Moorea (and civilization) on February 1 and charged toward the Tuamotus, Marquesas and "atlas obscura". Both of these remote island groups have precious little in the way of tourism infrastructure; many islands don't have airstrips or docks large enough to accept anything other than a small fishing boat. It's not a coincidence that we've been traveling between islands with populations between 300 and 2200 people. TAHUATA This would amount to a "crowded" anchorage.....two other boats ! Our own white sand beach......living large Not a drone pic ! We walked up here Church guarded by a scary Tiki One of three white sand beaches in the Marquesas Legit old school outrigger in the bay- no plastic va'as for this guy ! When we left Moorea, we bought a lot of provisions, but that was 5 months ago. Most of our food is gone. How about the restaurant scen...

Our new digs; topographically, this place is basically the opposite of the atolls of the Tuamotus Long time readers may remember that SV L'ORIENT sailed 28 days non-stop from Panama to Nuku Hiva in the beguiling Marquesas, arriving in that fateful month of April 2020. During that month at sea, with little to no internet news, we missed the massive escalation of COVID-19 through the world and arrived quite surprised by the state of affairs in French Polynesia. What's that French warship doing in the bay? We are restricted to our boat? Really? Everything is closed on shore? We envisioned our arrival as being a 3-year carnival of alcoholic drinks served in coconuts, Polynesian festivals and food, and lots of water-based recreation. The harsh reality was a bit different........retreating from French Polynesia to Hawaii after only 8 days under the threat of forced repatriation and separation from our boat (and home). Tears were shed as we left the bay past the French warship, sent t...