Huahine

An anthropologist named Paul took us for an island tour of Huahine, showing us maraes (ancient places of worship built by the Polynesian people where they had human sacrifices!), the museum, ancient stone fish traps, great views of the island which is effectually two islands connected by a bridge, and the sacred blue eyed eels, which do bite as Mike found out! Paul explained to us the history of French Polynesia and Huahine as well as the political, social and economic situation of today in such a way that even the boys were interested in the stories of Captains Cook and Bligh and we have to remember to watch 'Mutiny on the Bounty' when we return!
We had a couple of rainy days in Huahine and then headed back through an opening in the reef, across the open sea to the other side of Raiatea, to a bay with a river flowing into it. We met a local, paddling his outrigger canoe, who invited us to tour his family's plantation the next day which we did. We headed out in our dinghy in the pouring rain! The river was shallow and almost like a cave along some stretches where the vegetation hung far over the water from both banks! We followed Jim to a little dock where he showed us a small garden with pineapple and sweet potatoes, and a hillside covered with noni and coconut trees. He showed us greenhouses full of vanilla plants, then led us further up the river to another area with ginger, bananas, papaya, breadfruit, cocoa beans and star fruit, which Rory ate a bunch of! After some fresh coconut juice, we followed Jim to his friends place, who picked us some grapefruit, guava and lychees. Despite the rain we were all very happy with Jims tour; his English wasn't great but we managed to learn quite a bit and the coconut juice was cool and refreshing!