Tuamotus, Rangiroa - Jun 2007
The sail from Ahé to Rangiroa was some 90 nm, we left Ahé in the afternoon and sailed slowly for half the way before the wind abandoned us completely! Being stubborn we waited for wind for a day, but then resigned ourselves to the use of diesel, so we got to Rangiroa after two days. We entered Tiputa Pass in late afternoon, luckily there were no hidden dangers and the anchorage was just around the corner. Tony and Linda were already there and gave us some local info. The next day we visited the shore and two small shops which sold a quite good selection of food, and baguettes to order, but little fruit and veg, just onions and garlic. There is a fruit and vegetable stall a couple of miles along the road which we later saw but never visited, called Le Jardin des Iles. Rangiroa is a massive atoll, you can’t see the other side, and it has a hotel or three, dive centres and a bar where a small beer costs over three pounds.
Elaine and Nigel snorkelled a reef which divides the Tiputa pass into two. The current runs at up to 8 knots through the pass so we held on to the RIB, drifted down and then motored back up…..There is every type of fish in the book …then some, but what nearly everyone here dives to see are the sharks, in fact the BBC were filming in the pass the day we arrived. The sharks are used to seeing divers and apparently don’t eat them very often………We saw quite a few on the far side of the reef and one in particular, a five foot black tip reef shark, came and circled us with intent to look like Jaws.!! Elaine held onto Nigel’s arm with both hands while we both trod water and out-stared it. He swam off to look for other smaller people to snack on so we carried on our drift.
One day we organised to join a tour to visit the pearl farm, free shuttle from the hotel and free visit in the hope we spend in the shop! I was really looking for ways to mount pearls, and the background of how they are made, so that I am better informed about what to do with the pearls I traded for in Ahé. The tour involved a look around all the land-based activity, a sit-down lesson on the aspects of cultivation in the water, and a visit to the shop. The black-lipped oysters, which are the only type living naturally in the Tuamotu lagoons, can make up to three pearls in their lifetime of about 6 years. They are held in the water in netting pouches with an outer plastic netting protection against fish and turtles. After two years the oysters are taken ashore and opened up. A 6mm spherical white ball of mother-of-pearl manufactured from thick shells from the Mississippi and treated with yellow antibiotic is inserted into the oyster, along with a tiny 1mm square mother-of-pearl graft taken from a black-lipped oyster. The colour of the graft gives the final pearl its colour. The oyster moves the inserted matter to its appendix and the oyster is left to grow for another two years. If the pearl is successful, another “blank” of similar size to the harvested pearl is inserted. This time no antibiotic or graft is necessary, and in another two years again the pearls are harvested. A few oysters get to do a third stint, with by then quite a large blank and an even larger finished pearl. “Failed” oysters are used for food and for making mother-of-pearl jewellery. The farm is the largest on Rangiroa and probably all the Tuamotus, employing about 60 people. Most of the pearls are exported to the Far East. Only 10% are sold within French Polynesia. The farm shop had finished jewellery and “design-it-yourself” pearls and mountings, which are probably pretty good value. Prices were still more than our budget, but I left with some photos and ideas for the pearls I have. I settled for buying a cheap mother-of-pearl pendant from a stall at the hotel - I couldn’t leave with nothing!
Nigel windsurfed several times but rarely had good enough wind to plane much, the best wind being near the pass and the sharks … We sent some postcards from Rangiroa, which took about two weeks to arrive in England. Finally it was time to leave the Tuamotu atolls and head for the civilisation of Tahiti.