At Sea – 24 March 2019

Our first of only two days at sea was very relaxing. There was not too much going on and so it was easy to sleep in. Following breakfast, the guest lecturer onboard Josiane Teamotuaitau gave an interesting lecture on “Women of Pitcairn: Lost in History”. She told the story of the “Mutiny on the Bounty” from the perspective of the Polynesian women that were brought by the mutineers to Pitcairn island in the 1790’s. She told the story as related by one of the women many years later and how they were not told they would be going to a remote island in the Pacific. In total there were 12 mutineers, 6 Polynesian men and a number of Polynesian women.

She talked of how they spent a year looking for a place to settle down away from where anyone else would find them. As they scoured the region in search of Pitcairn Island, they soon realize how good of a place it would be as it was not properly mapped and so they spent a considerable amount of time looking before they found it. The lecture only added to everyone’s excitement to discover this remote island for themselves.

The rest of the day was spent napping, reading books and just lounging around. Other than for our lunch, 6:30 pm orientation on tomorrow’s visit to Rikitea and dinner, there was not much else happening on the ship. I wasn’t into joining in on the daily Tahitian dance classes and so I opted for the nap. Besides, we were about to loose an hour of sleep as we headed into the Gambier islands anyways.