The island of Mooréa is eight miles and one universe away from Tahiti. After living for twenty-four hours a day in the midst of a never-sleeping carnival atmosphere, it was a blessed relief to drop anchor in Papetoai Bay, which many have called the most beautiful in the whole world. Certainly it is one of the most spectacular. The mountain peaks are a vivid emerald green and quite unreal in shape, rising almost vertically to end in a surrealist play. In fact the whole scene, the changing blues of the sky, the glowing greens of the land, the clear, translucent blue and green and turquoise shades of the water seemed like something dreamed up by a Technicolor consultant gone berserk.
From our anchorage just off the palm-lined shore we could see a couple of native houses with woven walls of split bamboo and roofs of pandanus thatch. Beyond the houses, but visible only from the top of the mast, ran the narrow crushed coral road which is the main highway around the island—a distance of some 36 miles. The nearest village, a cluster of a dozen or so houses, an octagonal church with a red spire, and two rather dispirited Chinese stores, was two miles to the east. We walked there, to present our credentials and to buy some supplies. Neither of the stores offered anything in the way of fresh fish, meat, or vegetables, and no one seemed at all interested in our papers, so we settled for four bottles of warm “lemonade”—a sweetish soft drink—a large bag of unroasted peanuts, and a handful of vanilla beans. Then we returned to the boat to open cans for the first time since our Tahiti landfall.
Outside of Tahiti, life was dreamy and time lost its sharp insistence. There was no radio, no newspaper—and not even the possibility of receiving mail. It was a relief not to have one’s anxieties and ulcers churned into unrest each day, as they had been during our stay in Hawaii, where every newscast, each fresh edition of the daily papers, had kept us aware of the manufacture of each new ice cube in the Cold War.
We stayed five days in Mooréa, and would have postponed our departure much longer had it not been for the lure of such names as Huahiné, Raïatéa, Tahaa, and Bora Bora.
From Mooréa, we sailed to Huahiné, about a hundred miles downwind. It was an overnight trip and gave us another lesson in How Not to Navigate, as recorded in the log:
Last night, just after Nick came on watch (2400), I could feel a definite change in the motion of the boat and heard the staysail flapping and the foresail boom swinging. Went up and found Nick working hard to keep the set course but unable to do so.... Noticed the stars weren’t in the proper position and checked the compass. (It is a grid-type airplane compass, on which the course is preset.) Saw at once that course was set for 252°—not proper 292°—and trouble was caused from this and not from a sudden change in the wind direction.
What must have happened: After setting proper compass direction, I presumably forgot to lock the rotating portion and one of the men, at change of watch, brushed against it, changing the course by 40°.... Learned new lessons: (1) Check the compass at each watch. (2) Keep it locked.
To this I added one more rule, just to be on the safe side: No one adjusts the compass but the Skipper.
We spotted Huahiné just at dawn and were able to get a bearing and set a course to round the north end before the island was lost in a series of rain squalls. Working our way through the reef, we dropped anchor off the town, and chalked up another South Seas landfall.
Fare, the port of Huahiné, is a village of perhaps a score of small Chinese-owned stores along the waterfront, including cafés, bars, and a hotel. We were quickly introduced to one of its most charming features. A couple of times every day, one or another of the storekeepers would roll a large ice-cream freezer—hand-cranked—out onto his porch and chalk up a sign on the blackboard in front: Glace en vent!! This was the signal for customers to gather, with Jessica and Ted well in the front rank. First comers—solid ice cream; stragglers—soup!