After Gel and George left us in Fakarava in the Tuamotus, it was time for us to head off to the Marquesas. The following will put the geographic equation in perspective.
On this map, you can see Papeete – our arrival port in Tahiti along with its sister islands in the Society Group to the west. To the east stretching over a vast distance from the northwest to southeast is the Tuamotu Group and farther north and east from there are the Marquesas. The white line denotes our approximate route from Fakarava in the Tuamotus to Nuka Hiva in the Marquesas some 620 nautical miles distant. That represents just about 2.8 days travel time with some allowance for the easterly trades and adverse currents.
We had another group of friends flying in to meet us at Nuka Hiva so it was time to shove off and get there with a few days to spare to put the boat back together, provision, plan our activities in the Marquesas and grab a lay day.
Taking a look at the Marquesas for a second, they are primarily volcanic in origin, steep sided with few surrounding coral reefs. You may recall from prior posts that the Society Group which includes Tahiti is volcanic as well but also supports a significant barrier reef around many of the islands with creates a shallow lagoon between the reef and shoreline. The Tuamotus, on the other hand. are mostly coral atolls – rings of coral reef with a central lagoon and islands and islets (motus) rising from the coral that rings the lagoons.
A few pictures will help to clarify. The first is taken in the pass entering the lagoon at Raiatea in the Societies. The lagoon is surrounded by coral reefs and motus, but there is a high volcanic island in the middle of the lagoon.
This second picture is entering the lagoon at Fakarava. There are motus surrounding the lagoon, but the lagoon itself is wide open. In fact, the lagoon at Fakarava is big enough to hold the entire island of Tahiti within its confines.
And finally, a shot entering Daniel’s Bay on Nuka Hiva. It is clear that the step volcanic cliffs fall directly into the sea.
The Marquesas themselves consist of a number of islands but we found that the ones we liked the most were Nuka Hiva, Tavuatu and Fatu Hiva.
We actually did two sorties thru the Marquesas as we had two sets of guests visit. No matter – the Marquesas always had something new to show us on each visit.
Next time around, we will start with our first visit to Nuka Hiva.
Cheers