Commodore
April 2, 2023

Sunday 2 April – a Polynesian Sunday lunch

Amazingly there were about 8 Arc boats in the bay, the rest are making their way over to the Tuamotus or have already arrived. Rowan became chief activity organiser for them with Ed being a handy translator. Jackson’s aunt was organised to give them lunch, I think it was a crowd of 23, and Jackson will take them to the waterfall and the chocolate farm in the afternoon.

We were invited for lunch at 11am as we needed to leave at 2pm to sail back to Nuku Hiva to pick up our Parasail which was supposed to be repaired where the seams have given. Sadly we got a message to say the guy hasn’t managed to fix it yet, so we are heading back to pick it up and do a provisioning purchase tomorrow for our 3 day crossing, plus our stay in the Tuamotus. Apparently there is very little fresh produce available there. We were welcomed by Cecilia, Jackson’s wife and their kids for lunch. Two older boys whose names were unpronounceable, and a baby girl called Harmony Grace. The boys were very good at looking after the baby. The older boy was home from boarding school for the Easter holidays. There was a big fire going with 3 bread fruit cooking right in the embers, on a rack next door was chicken and a big red fish. We all sat in the kitchen and watched the goings on as aunts and cousins joined in. Jackson then prepared the bread fruit on his special bit of wood on top of an old singer sewing machine trestle base. What a performance preparing the bread fruit, made especially with with the vegetarians in mind. They also produced a whole tray of eggs for the girls to prepare an egg dish for themselves. The spread was amazing and a very relaxed communal affair, all started off with a sung prayer which was rather beautiful. We had delicious carpaccio of tuna with spices, raw tuna in rich coconut milk, from coconuts he picked up on our walk yesterday. All accompanied with delicious fried bread fruit chunks, battered fish, roasted chicken and then mashed bread fruit in coconut milk which was a little stodgy for me but they ate with great relish. It was wonderful to watch Jackson make it. We really enjoyed their hospitality, his wife is delightful, she had organised two boxes of fruit for us to take back to the boat. We had taken a non branded Leatherman as a present for Jackson, chocolates and pens for the rest of the family. It was a great experience to see how simply they live, they have a great garden and grow a lot of their own food. Cecilia is a seamstress and had a very smart looking machine and overlocker. Such a contrast in their simple home.

Their youngest son next to the cooking fire

Bread fruit on the fire

Just chicken bones and the whole fish left on the fire

I loved his enormous callipers to move the roasted bread fruit

Cousin holding the hot bread fruit

The bread fruit preparation table, the wood section has to be turned over for use

Jackson with a big stone smasher, the wooden section is turned over and beautifully worn from use

A real art, leaving the centre stalk un smashed so it can be removed

Photo with Cecilia and kids, you can just glimpse the cardboard boxes full of fruit they gave to us as a present.

We returned to PolePole only to discover that the Catamaran Cepa was over our anchor, luckily Simon the Argentinian crew member on Mororo had just dropped the family off and was returning to his boat so he was able to come and pull Cepa out of the way. As we departed we looked back and nearly had a full view of all the peaks, out of the clouds. We had a good 4 and a bit hours of sailing back to Nuku Hiva and with our delayed departure we got into the bay in the dark. Luckily the moon is very bright at the moment and we know the bay which is very big and has plenty of space. It was a little tricky seeing the boats until we were close by, but there was plenty of space thank goodness. Not long before we were all in bed.