Tahiti says no to cruisers

The Society islands all have a barrier reef around them and there are only a few places where there is a narrow passage though the reef, called a ‘passe’. After a night on anchor behind the reef in Vaiare in 2 meters of water we sail through Passe Vaiare at Moorea to Tahiti.

We try to anchor temporarily near marina Taina but immediately an offical comes: you have to leave now, anchoring is forbidden here. I explain the situation that we have to change our anchor chain near marina Taina. He repeats: NO you have to leave. We try to find an anchorage more north but every usable place is taken. Night is approaching fast. Out of options we anchor in the middle of a mooring field. Luckily nobody comes during the night.

At first daylight we return to marina Taina and anchor again with all fenders out. In the dinghy to the marina office. Loading 250kg of chain in the dinghy is clearly not a good idea so my question is: do you have room for 1 hour for us while Tahiti Yacht Accessoires changes our anchor chain? NO is the answer!

Michel of TYA walks with me again to the marina office. After a long discussion we have permission to come alongside for maximum 30 minutes at the superyacht dock. Together we exchange the chain in under half an hour (thank you Michel Balzer of Tahiti yacht accessoires for your great service and invaluable help). We anchor at the airport anchorage near the ‘TASC FBO’ mark, see upper left corner.

In the morning a boat from the port authority arrives and orders us to leave. They state ‘you are in the channel, you must leave immediately and its forbidden to anchor. One official says: you must take a mooring and pay at marina Taina. The other offical says: anchoring forbidden in Tahiti, you must go to Port Phaeton.

They leave and we look at eachother: what to do? Sailing to port Pheaton, 60 km South, is no solution as Stella will fly out from here in two days time! Out of options we prepare the lines to tie the boat onto one of those unreliable looking mooring buoys marked ‘propriete prive Port Autonome’.

After all the work is finished an owner of another Amel waves at me. So I go there to have a chat. He tells me that all the buoys here are private property and we must leave before the owner returns. But he also says: go a bit north, all the boats are on anchor there, its fine!

I tell him that the port offical just told us that it is forbidden to anchor here and we must take a mooring and pay for it or go to port Pheaton. He repeats patiently and shows me a document: all the moorings are private property but you can anchor a bit more north, its OK. I thank him for his help and we anchor again.

The next 2 days I feel unwell from all the rushing, stress and lack of sleep. Not nice to be unwelcome. Tahiti never again, if I could choose.

At the Faaa rowing club we ask the friendly manager if we can leave our dinghy here for a few hours. He nods. We ask: can we please leave our dinghy also here at night because Stella’s flight leaves early. Yes, yes thats fine he says. This area of town is indeed very friendly and welcoming and that is how we know French Polynesia! We scout the complete route to the airport so that we know where to go during the nightly ride.

Getting some sleep between 9 and 2 which would have been great but it was interrupted by a heavy rain squall. I got up and closed the hatches at 01:00. This was nice that it was me because so often it’s Stefan who wakes first and leaps up to do it. This time he was snoring softly but woke very fast to the drumming rain. We swung around dramatically in the squall. It rained a lot. Stefan had to go out to empty the dingy as it was half full of water.

There was a little worry of the engine starting. But thankfully Stefan had repaired a leak in the fuel tank cover the day before so no water got into the tank, it started. It wasn’t actually raining when we left at 3 for the 3 km dingy ride to the rowing club and the half hour walk to the airport. We did made this journey twice before but this time it is dark and the green and red flashing channel markers are confusing. We must have gone off course. Next thing, we found ourselves half a kilometer away from land rocking around, stuck on a reef . Foul luck, we had run aground….

But, count your blessings, we where already in the correct bay. Unluckily we didn’t get off it for ten minutes, as it seemed to cover a lot of ground. Stefan had to go in the water and we did a lot of pushing and rowing. Eventually free of that grinding breaking feeling underneath us we were able to motor the last two hundred metres to our destination. We fear for the bottom of the dingy as it is already old and mended a few times. Such a relief for me to arrive on land though. Stefan went out of his way to deliver me to my flight and to collect his next crew and I am very grateful. He hasn’t been enjoying our stay in Tahiti so far.

“Papeete port control, Papeete port control this is sailing yacht Malaka Queen, Malaka Queen, over” “Malaka Queen this is Papeete Port control” “Papeete port control this is Malaka Queen, request permission to cross the runway, over” “Malaka Queen this is Papeete port control, you have permission to cross the runway, you have five minutes to cross, over” Malaka Queen Papeete port control confirm we have permission to cross, out"

Cool that they stop the planes from taking off, just for us. A few minutes later a 50 passenger ATR takes off and it is well beside and above us.