Day 12 · Nuku Hiva and Ua Pou: Taiohae and Hakahau · 18 April 2007

Returning to a place is different from arriving the first time.

The first time, you look for what is new.

The second time, you look for what you are about to miss.

Today the Aranui returned to Taiohae on Nuku Hiva and Hakahau on Ua Pou, two main ports we had already visited. The cargo ship needed to collect the empty containers it had left behind and prepare for the next voyage.

The Aranui made 13 trips a year to the Marquesas, and every bit of cargo space mattered.

By now, most of the outbound cargo was gone. In its place were fruits, copra, noni, and memories.

Also, probably more laundry than any ship deserved.

Ice Cream and Internet

We stopped first in Taiohae for two hours. A le truck school bus took us into town, where I went to an internet café to update photos and blog posts.

The children found this less thrilling than I did.

After 45 minutes, we walked the waterfront and stopped for ice cream at a small corner store.

Taiohae was the most developed town in the Marquesas, though “busy” here still meant something very different from the rest of the world. Horses remained a mode of transportation, sailboats filled the harbour, and yacht crews arrived after long Pacific crossings from places like the Galapagos and Mexico.

For them, Taiohae was land after a month of ocean.

I understood why they stayed a while.

Isadore Keeps His Promise

By early afternoon, we were back in Hakahau on Ua Pou.

No sooner had we arrived than someone came looking for us in the dining room.

It was Isadore, our taxi driver from eight days earlier.

He had come aboard to deliver the promised flower stones our children had searched for but not found. He also brought two CDs of his music: one with his brothers and another with his teenage children.

It was a small thing, but it meant a lot.

Travel is full of brief meetings. Most fade quickly. Some return carrying stones and music.

Last Souvenirs, Last Beach

We took all five children ashore for last souvenirs. We returned to a small stand above the beach where Kirsten had found reasonably priced items earlier.

There we found affordable carved necklaces, and even four-year-old Eli was happy to finally get a bone necklace of his own. The woman resized it for him on the spot.

The children beachcombed while I went to the bank to withdraw cash for the Tuamotus, especially since Tikehau would not have a bank machine.

Back at the beach, Jaeden again found the elderly French artist and sat beside him to draw the thatched-roof vendor area.

This became one of the quiet patterns of the voyage: islands, cargo, meals, and my son learning to see by sketching.

Farewell From the Pool Deck

At 3:45 PM, the Aranui left the Marquesas for the last time.

We stood beside the swimming pool and watched the mountain peaks of Ua Pou drift away.

These islands had given us cargo cranes, rough landings, ancient stones, flower crowns, pig dances, black sand, stone tikis, generous meals, and villages that felt very far from everything familiar.

We had explored them as a family aboard a cargo cruise ship.

That sentence still feels unlikely.

And unforgettable.