Huahine – Bay d’Avea and over to Tahaa

Fresh Vanilla before drying

Industry scale Vanilla plantation, Huahine

1000 year old Fish harvesting infrastructure

George, the “Vanilla man”

At Bay d’Avea

Drift snorkeling with our dinghy

Sacred, blue eyed eels

We have now enjoyed a week in the beautiful island of Huahine, Society Island. First three days on a buoy outside the main village, Fare. Lovely, relaxed place. Regularly between 10 and 20 dolphins rush through the anchored boats hunting. Last four days spent at Bay d’Avea at the southern end of the Island. The sailing route from the main settlement Fare was mostly easy with eyeball navigation in some passages. The water clarity and amount of healthy corals are close to what we experienced at Bonaire, a year ago, meaning excellent! The amount of different fish species is great but on average they are very small, maybe we’ve encountered a kindergarten for reef fish. The ocean swell has gone up considerably since we got here and the average height is 3-4 meters. The surf on the outer reef is very impressive and probably more than 5 meters with a distinctive roar. We are using free of charge, very well maintained buoys just outside a big resort. The resort is obviously not more than 25 % occupied and it seems the impact of the financial crash ten years ago is still very visible with much less tourists.
Today we sailed 30 nm over to Tahaa, through the reef passage at Faaaha. Not joking, must be a world record of vowels. The island of Tahaa is located inside the same lagoon as Raiatea. The depths even close to shore are 30-40 meters so not very practical for anchoring. We were lucky to find another free buoy among the many charter catamarans. Hope the weather soon improves. It has been rainy with squalls last three days.