Travel with Indigo

This is perhaps the strangest of all the island groups in the South Pacific. Lying east of the Society Islands, they are arranged, as are all the islands in this part of the world, along a northwest to southeast axis. Also like all the other islands, they are formed from ancient volcanoes. What makes them odd, however, is that their founding volcanoes have over many millions of years simply sunk beneath the sea leaving only the fringing reefs mounted on undersea plateaus of basalt now grown up into flat, palm covered white sand motus. Where the volcano once stood is now a very large lagoon. The Tuamotus are classic atolls.

To get the flavor of these odd islands, we visited Apataki in the northwest end of the chain.  To enter its lagoon it’s necessary to pass between two of the numerous enclosing motus through a deep water cut. The one the captain chose is on the north end of the atoll. Prevailing southerly swells and winds cause water in the lagoon to stack up and, under pressure, to blast through the cut at up to seven knots.  As we approached from seaward, it looked like a white water rapid, a boiling cauldron of angry sea. The captain steered us carefully down the center of the narrow channel and added power to keep us from being swept sideways and out of control.  The cut is only about two hundred yards long so we got through it quickly.

We all had the eerie sense while in the cut that we were passing through a strange portal into another ocean. That is because the lagoon is so enormous you can’t see the enclosing motus on the other side. You know the sea is different. Its color and wave action are like that of a lagoon rather than an ocean, yet not being able to see  the other side leaves you wondering if there is one.

About three miles into the lagoon the captain anchored alongside one of the motus in a beautiful spot from which we snorkeled among the many coral heads. I took the tender and went exploring and promptly came upon one of the local fishermen with his wife and two sons. In butchered French, I asked him where he lives. He pointed across the lagoon in the direction of the atoll’s only village, population 430, with tiny airstrip. He also proudly showed me his second home, a squat box made entirely of corrugated tin sheets, which he uses on extended fishing trips. It sports an unlikely satellite dish antenna for the TV he powers with a tiny portable generator. His boat is a fine, tastefully painted open fisherman with new outboard engine. Apparently the fishing business has been profitable.

The Tuamotus are ideally suited for pearl farming, with their large protected lagoons flushed clean by the tides, and pearl farms they have in abundance. Some lagoons are so clogged with the buoys from which hang strings of pearl oysters that it’s nearly impossible to navigate through them. But the business has brought prosperity of a sort to islands that otherwise would be destitute. If you wander into one of the many black pearl shops in Papeete or Bora Bora you will be struck by how many pearls there are. Great bowls the size of giant clam shells are filled to overflowing with the things. Room partitions made from strings of pearls hang all over the stores. They are plentiful and more are produced in the pearl farms of French Polynesia every day.  Yet despite their over abundance somehow they remain very expensive, especially for the high quality, perfectly round and lustrously colored pearls.

After a few days anchored in Apataki’s sea-like lagoon, we decide to return to Papeete to refuel and take on stores and provisions in preparation for the next leg of our voyage. This one will take us to the Cook Islands, a four day trip west of Tahiti.