Moorea (Update 27)
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Update from Colin Philp
Onboard Uto Ni Yalo
Time: 0320 Hours Tahiti Time (GMT - 10 hours)
Position: 18*12.2'South/149*34.9'West
Distance Travelled: 2988 Nautical Miles

Bula Viti kei Rotuma

We are 330 nautical miles from Raivavae with just over 41 nautical miles to go till Moorea where we will stop in Haapiti Bay for the night. We are doing around 6 knots which will put us at Matauvau Pass just after 9am. Right now we can see the lights of Papeete glowing on the horizon to starboard of us. We are not due to leave for Papeete until the 15th.

Haapiti is on the South West side of Moorea on the opposite side of Tahiti and Papeete. Moorea lies 10 nautical miles West of Tahiti.

It was decided to stop in Haapiti to allow all the canoes to catch up so we can leave together on Thursday morning to Opunohu Bay for the cultural welcoming ceremony. Opunohu Bay is on the North side of Moorea and will take us just under two hours to reach.

Te Matau a Maui is still facing problems with its Solar Engines and will need to be towed through Matauvau Passage by the support vessel, Foftein. It will then tie up along the Foftein so they can complete repairs on their Solar system batteries.

Faafaite has also had issues with charging their batteries and has been out of radio contact for a few days. Thankfully our solar panels are working well now that we are getting lots of sunshine each day and we have not needed to run the engine or generator to charge batteries.

Crew member Lomoloma Mataika leaves Nadi today for Auckland and then Papeete to join us. She is carrying lots of gear for us so we hope Air Pacific and Air New Zealand are lenient with her excess luggage.

Loma will catch the ferry from Papeete to Moorea to join the Uto ni Yalo on Friday.

MOOREA

In the Tahitian language the name Moorea means "Yellow Lizard". Moorea is formed as an equilateral triangle that is eight nautical miles across on the Northern side, which is cut by two deep bays of OPUNOHU AND COOKS Bay.

Moorea has a land area of 132 km sq and the circle island round is 60 km. The tallest mountain is Mount TOHIEA which rises to 1,207 metres and the spectacular Mount ROTUI which separates COOKS and OPUNOHU Bays rises to 900 metres.

Around 12,000 people live on Moorea with many catching the fast catamaran ferry to Papeete each day to work. Three ferries service the island daily carrying a total of 1950 passengers and each doing four round trips between Papeete and Moorea.

Moorea was believed to have been settled around 800 B.C. by intrepid navigators arriving on large double hull canoes from South East Asia. Called Maohi (or Maori), they possessed a rich culture and language before the arrival of europeans in the 16th century.

The Spanish, English and French bought them the first elements of western civilisation including missionaries. WALLIS landed on Moorea in 1767 and called the island YORK Island. COOK arrived in 1769 on board the Endeavour hence one of Moorea's big bays being called COOKS Bay in memory of the famous explorer.

The crew are looking forward to landing on our second island in French Polynesia where we expect another huge welcome.

Vinaka

Colin/Uto ni Yalo

Report by Satellite Phone courtesy of DIGICEL

(A selection of new images from Raivavae can be found at www.fijivoyaging.com)