Our plane was a 340-300. There are 46 rows in this plane with a 2-4-2 seat configuration - so by my math it has the ability to seat 368 passengers. Thrillingly, there were lots of empty seats on the plane. A number of people would lay down across a row of 4 seats to sleep as one could flip up the armrests between the seats. The flight was about an hour late in departing - so we left about 11:30 pm on Monday night and arrived about 6:30 am Tuesday morning. Adding in 2 hours for a time change, we had about 9 hours of flying time.
Air Tahiti provided us with a substantial snack as soon as we boarded - a pasta salad, bun, cheese, butter and strawberry cheesecake. I watched part of a movie, then decided to move to the two empty seats ahead of us to stretch out more to sleep. We were provided with a good size light fleece blanket and a small pillow for comfort. I was pleased with my choice to wear leggings on this flight and a number of thin layered tops that will be useful in 30 C weather.
I perhaps slept for 4-5 hours. The airplane brought the lights on about 4:40 am and began serving breakfast. I appreciated the juice and the tea - and the fact that our steward offered me both the omelette and the pancake hot entree- but honestly neither one was very tasty. I ate the small fruit bowl - and handed my small croissant and yogurt to join - I have so many food sensitivities that tear their head at breakfast that it is tough to stray away from oatmeal!
We did land and walked down the stairs into the runway to enter the airport - always a statement that you have left the snow behind!! While in line for Customs, we met Nick and his wife Katie who will be lecturing on our ship- the Oceania Marina - for the next two cruises. Nick modestly said, I guess I am somewhat of an expert on the South Pacific. Nick and Katie call Washington, DC home.
Customs was a breeze. We went directly to the international currency exchange to buy some local currency - the French Polynesian Franc (XPF). The most affordable way to buy it was to buy Euros back home in Canada. The exchange rate is always 1 Euro buys and sells 119.33 XPF. So 100 XPF is about $1.25 CAD. (J tells me the math is really 1.54 divided by 119.33 at the time we bought our currency - but that makes me roll my eyes trying to convert in my head!)
We had organized a shuttle to pick us up and deliver us to the Hotel Tahiti Tiare. We found our Tahiti Tours (or Tahiti Travel) greeter by a sign with our name on it and she placed lovely fresh leighs around our necks. Though it was warm - about 29 C a heavay rain shower was falling just then.
As we loaded into the vehicle - Nick approached us and asked if we were going to the Tahiti InterContinental - Oceania’s preferred hotel. We apologized and said we were heading the other direction. They were having no luck getting a cab.
By this time it was about 7 am and traffic was heavy as school starts at 7 am and goes till 3 pm. Our female driver was friendly giving us suggestions of things he to do while in Papeete. In busy traffic, the drive was about 40 minutes from the airport into town.
We checked into our modest little hotel on Main Street. There is no pool and no free wifi - but it does have a stellar view of the ocean from our balcony. The island of Moorea can be seen in the distance!!
Once we dropped out luggage we got directions to walk to the local market. Here we bought 4 little bananas, 5 mangoes and 1 supersize avocado. This would be our sustenance for the day until the food trucks opened for supper. Our French came in handy at the market though many vendors spoke English.
We returned to our hotel room and feasted on the fresh food. Bananas that appear to be ripe here were actually underripe- that would be why so many bananas at the market had black spots on them! Those were the ones we should have chosen!
After our feast- we had a two hour nap trying to catch up on lost sleep from last night.
When we woke up around noon - we made a plan to walk the waterfront and see the sights. We walked to the green space housing the government house, called assemblee de la Polynesie Francaise. Beautiful garden with water features and well cared for. We then headed north to the waterfront where we knew there was a boardwalk. Unfortunately, much of it was under construction to the west of our hotel - but is slated to be completed sometime in 2019.
We collected a rock from the waterfront for our geologist son who will care to identify it!! We walked past a prominent Protestant Church - Anglican I believe, then found the Pearl Museum (Musee de la Pearl). We were unsure how much we would pay to see the museum - but it turned out the price was right and Free!!
Pearls have a fascinating history throughout the centuries- and it looks like Robert Wan brought the pearl industry to a world class standard in French Polynesia. The six qualities of pearls are much like diamonds, but for pearls they are assessed by: size, shape, color, brilliance, purity and thickness of layers of pearl around the nucleus. The museum also had very high end pieces for sale but the people working there made us feel welcome and not at all pressured to purchase.
By the time we left the museum - it was raining a fair bit. We returned to the hotel to freshen up and reload our water bottles. We then set out along the waterfront towards the east wanting to check the ferry schedule to Moorea for tomorrow.
There are two companies offering ferry service to Moorea and the price for a pedestrian to travel to Moorea on the ferry is about 1160 XPF or $14.50 each direction. We will see if we have a clear day tomorrow - and if we do, we will take the ferry to Moorea and make our way to the Lagoonariun to snorkel.
The rain poured in earnest after we checked out ferry prices, so I found a bit of free, slow wifi at the ferry terminal. These posts will be lacking in pictures until we get some free high speed wifi!! Our hotel charges by the hour to use the internet - so I will wait till we board the cruise ship on Jan 31 when we will have free wifi to publish these posts!
We read, prepared this post and played a game of carcasonne while we waited till 6 pm! 6 pm is when Les roulettes opened for supper - they are food trucks along the waterfront. We bought 2 Western Chinese food dishes and a small bowl of rice for 2950 XPF or $37.50 CAD. That is a very affordable meal in French Polynesia! It was tasty and filling!
The sun set while we were eating dinner, and shops had security rolled doors pulled down so I might have felt uncomfortable if I had been alone walking back to the hotel!
We are safely tucked into our room, blogging and reading for the night. We will see what the weather brings us in the morning!
We are thankful to have arrived safely in French Polynesia. Let the adventure, begin!!
No comments:
Post a Comment