Papeete, Tahiti

Our last day in Tahiti. We had a walking tour scheduled at 11:30. It was pretty hot and humid. We first went to the Hotel de Ville, or Mayor’s Office. There were some interesting Tikis in the garden. And a rooster wandering the grounds. From there we walked a few blocks to the local market, which is more a tourist market than a local one. Lots of black pearls for sale in every price range.. Glad I bought my earrings in Moorea. We decided to opt out of the rest of the tour. It was hot, we were covered in sweat, and hungry. So we went upstairs in the market to a restaurant. It wasn’t much cooler, but we both had a salad. They were so huge we couldn’t finish them and cost $20 each! As we were eating, it started pouring rain. We were so glad we weren’t still on the tour! We’d be soaked.
After it stopped raining we made our way back to the ship. We talked to a vendor on the pier who would give us a 2 hour driving tour around part of the island. There were 6 of us interested in going. They wanted cash but we could only pay with credit card. They had no machine for the cards, so they agreed we could charge when we got back. We had a nice drive along the coast once we went around at least a dozen round abouts. I was getting carsick from all the round abouting! We stopped at a beautiful waterfall. There was a pretty fast moving stream before the path to the waterfall. It was sprinkling so we didn’t stay too long.
‘After a while of driving next to the ocean, he turned around and headed home. We saw all kinds of houses right on the ocean. We stopped at Venus Point Park, a famous surfing beach. I got some black sand for my collection. No shells on this beach. There were surfers galore in the water and on the shore. The waves were pretty good. Our driver is a surfer and told us the waves come from Hawaii, this time of year. He also said the French Olympics for surfing will be held in Tahiti. We got back to the pier and the woman was not there with the charge machine. Our driver called her and she came in a few minutes. She had told us it was broken, but the only problem was that it wouldn’t print a receipt. We didn’t care, we just wanted to pay and get back to the ship. As we were walking to the ship, Bunny realized she didn’t have her back pack. She turned and started running as best she could to the van. When she got to the parking lot, she asked one of the young Viking workers to run and get it, which they did and it was still there. So our day in Tahiti was not without a bit of stress.
‘At 6:00, there was a performance by O Tahiti E. They were a group that did Polynesian dances. They were very good. Then we went to dinner with our friends Beryl and Ben. We went with another couple from Ohio. It’s nice to have varied groups at dinner.
‘Now we’re in the room crashing.

-photos: I forgot to include the lovely 80 year old I talked to the day before, , waterfall and stream, Venus Point and black sand beach, a group of players greeting us as we left the boat. And a couple market scenes. One of then has a picture of a cat sleeping in on a display table.