Bora Bora -- The Epitome of Paradise?

We left the Bloody Mary's area and motored the short distance north past the town of Viatape to the MaiKai Marina, a perennial favorite of cruisers. They have mooring balls, a good restaurant, $2 beers at Happy Hour, and best of all, the fastest (a relative term) Internet in all of French Polynesia.

The MaiKai Marina has an excellent reputation among cruisers for great service and food.

We meet with Winsome (Irwin, Jay and Jay’s friend Kristina), Serenity (Paul and Jen) and Hawaiian boat called Just Drifting for a long Happy Hour at the MaiKai. It is such a beautiful setting with an infinity pool leading out to the beautiful islands with the setting sun in the background. Also, dinner and appetizers are quite tasty I might add.

We spent the next few days doing the normal stuff:  shopping at the SuperU, doing laundry, and getting the boat ready for varnishing. We purposely didn’t schedule much for our Bora Bora stay knowing we just wanted to hang loose and get our personal batteries recharged and get organized for our 5 month haul-out.

The southwest side of Bora Bora is a cruiser's paradise.

On Oct. 18th we headed north around the top of Bora Bora (but inside the barrier reef) and then due south to visit the southeast corner of the island. Cruisers had all raved that this was the place to be so we thought we’d check it out.  Looking on the charts the passage looks very daunting, with shallow water and reefs everywhere. But after talking with Winsome and other boats we learned it wasn’t all the bad, and with some very specific instructions of where to go we had a nice trip around the backside of the island where all the luxury resorts are located.

The technique is to go down the east side staying just off the over-the-water bungalows of the various hotels. The water is fairly clear of bommies (small reefs) and maintains a 10-12 foot depth most of the way with a nice sandy bottom.  Reminded us of the Bahama's and all the shallow turquoise waters. 

These speedboats operate all day and night ferrying hotel guests to various locations on Bora Bora.

The first couple of nights we anchored between the St. Regis and The Meridien, with their hundreds of bungalows all arranged like little houseboats at a marina. Because many of the hotels are located on the motu reef side of the island it means all transportation is via boat so there is the constant flow of taxi, tour, and resort boats going in and out at all hours of the day and well into the night.  

Just west of there is a small marked dingy pass through the reef that leads to some great snorkeling over huge underwater coral beds. At certain times the big manta rays come up in the deep water alongside the reef to feed. We didn’t see them but it was cool to cruise along the edge of the reef where it drops down to about 80 feet of deep blue water.

Clare and Meryl on a nice hike around the southeastern motu in Bora Bora. Raiatea is in the background.

These woman seemed to have her priorities in order.

We then moved as far south as we could to the far southeast corner of the island, anchoring in about 10 feet of bright white coral sand. For 9 days we hung out with Eye Candy, Plastik Plankton (Austrian boat), and French Curve. Some days we stayed on the boat, some days we hiked around the motu, and most days we explored various places to snorkel. We had one interesting day when a big charter cat with seven 40-ish American ladies and four older men anchored. The men soon took off exploring in the dingy, and the women, whom I’m gong to assume had consumed a lot of alcohol, pumped up the music, and whooping and yelling, did a rather impressive strip tease.  We didn’t get invited over for drinks so we’ll never know the full story.

It's along the outside edge of this inner reef that the water flows like a river making for a great drift snorkel.

On a recommendation from Eye Candy, we headed around the southeast corner of the motu to an area where there was an interesting drift snorkel. You go around the southern most point then head northeast to the end of an inner reef where you tie the dingy. Then you walk up about 300 yards along the reef, put your fins and mask on, and jump in. During one of these trips I had just gotten my gear on and was waiting for the others when I saw a set of four large waves coming in. I held on for the first three but the fourth lifted me about four feet in the air then dropped me on the sharp edge of the reef. I didn’t feel much but later that day I had a huge, deep bruise on my right thigh that hurt like hell for about a week.

Back to the drift snorkel:  The first day we did the dive the current was ripping alongside the reef at about 3-4 knots. It was like diving into a fast moving river. You could kind of steer but at places where the coral was shallow you literally had to suck up your stomach to clear the jagged edges of the coral. The fish could swim alongside you so that was cool, but it was very difficult to stop mid stream to look at anything. On later days when we did the dive the current was considerably slower which made it a much more enjoyable dive.

When you have bread in your pocket you make friends with lots of fish, in this case, Sargent Majors. (Photo courtesy of  Eye Candy).

Pacific Double Saddled Butterfly Fish (Photo courtesy of  Eye Candy).

Pretend you are walking along the reef trying to be careful about not stepping on a poisonous stonefish. (Photo courtesy of  Eye Candy).

We had seen a group of tour boats further out on the reef so one day we took the dingy’s out to explore. Coming up on a black buoy we saw more sharks then we’d ever seen, probably about 20 total. We’re sure the tour boats feed them so the tourists can get a show. Further over was some nice coral reefs where we explored for about an hour.  At one point Meryl let out a yell and we swam over to where she was pointing at a fish. We were all about two feet above it but still not seeing it until it made a slight movement. Sure enough it was a somewhat rare stonefish. These little puppies blend in totally to the reef and you don’t want o step on them since they are highly poisonous. Just like in Africa where they have The Big Five game animals to see, I had my own Big Five list for diving, which included seahorse (saw in Galapagos), hammerhead shark (saw in Nuku Hiva), stonefish, frog fish, and whale shark (saw in aquarium in Okinawa). Frog fish are also just about impossible to see so that one may take awhile.

For Tahitians the va'a is the ultimate sport. Hundreds of va'a will race from Raiatea to Bora Bora's Matira Beach on Nov. 4th during the Hawaiki Nui Va'a race.

After a week of snorkeling and socializing on the various boats we headed back to the MaiKai Marina where we finished up the varnishing on the cap rails and are now waiting for the arrival of the famous Hawaiki Nui Va'a canoe race from Raiatea. It's the Super Bowl event for Polynesian Islanders and canoeists (va'a) from around the world will compete. The Tahitians are superb paddlers and usually take 1st, 2nd, and 3rd places. They finish arriving at Matira Beach, just south of Bloody Mary’s, on Nov. 4th and we’re told it’s one of the wildest and craziest parties around. We’ll head down in the dingy and check things out.

[Footnote by Meryl]:  We will soon have to leave Paradise and head back to Raiatea in about another week. It seems obvious why so many people love coming to this beautiful island with its green majestically shaped mountains at the center and the surrounding turquoise swimming pool waters transitioning to darker aqua and then dropping into a still darker indigo blue color as the water deepens.  To really enjoy it here as cruisers you have to be willing to ignore all the negatives the crowds bring and realize the locals are catering to the wealthy and we are just the small fish in the sea. But there is lots of room for many fish here in Bora so enjoy!