Pitufa.at

For Pitufa and her crew, 2018 was a very exciting year. We visited many new places, some of them were rather off the beaten track and some were real nature paradises. We made several new friends with locals and enjoyed Polynesian hospitality over and over.

We started our tour in January 2018 from Rapa Iti in the Austral Islands and we are back in Rapa again, but we were active in the meantime and sailed about 4.700 nautical miles. First our round trip brought us to the Gambier Islands for the height of the cyclone season and then to our favorite atoll in the Tuamotus before we had busy times with plenty of boat projects in Tahiti and Raiatea.

With a newly painted Pitufa we left French Polynesia in July and sailed north to escape the colder winter months in the Southern Line Islands and in Penrhyn in the Northern Cook Islands, where we found an amazing wildlife. Then southward again to Manue, Aitutaki and Rarotonga in the Southern Cooks. After two months in the Cook Islands we left well provisioned and sailed southeast to the Austral Islands and hence returned to French Polynesia. On our tour through the Australs we only missed Rimatara, but we stopped at all the others: uninhabited seabird sanctuary Maria, geologically fascinating Rurutu, friendly Tubuai, beautiful Raivavae, and remote Rapa Iti with its unique culture and stunning landscapes.

Some destinations were quite adventurous and challenging, but we learned a lot, particularly anchoring on outer reefs. We spent many sleepless or at least uncomfy nights rolling and pitching in open anchorages, but it was definitely worth it: we had incredible wildlife encounters, met wonderful people and enjoyed stunningly beautiful scenery.

We wish all our readers merry Christmas and a happy, healthy and exciting New Year!

We are getting ready to leave as there’s a weather window for Rapa Iti coming up. Yesterday we went to say good-bye to our local friends, so of course Pitufa got loaded up with fruit and veg… It’s very tempting to stay and spend Christmas here with them, but we should slowly make our way east as the cyclone season has started.

It’s our third visit to Raivavae, but this year we’re lucky with the weather for the first time–sunny skies make such a difference…
We’ve been dividing our time between writing/boat projects and fun activities with our cruiser friends. Three days ago we hiked up Mt. Hiro, the highest mountain, together: 8 cruisers in a row
To get to the path we had to cross a private garden. Instead of complaining about us trespassing the friendly local couple had a bag of lychees, a few stacks of bananas and some taro prepared for us when we got back down after a fabulous hike with breathtaking views.

We hear reports from Tahiti and Moorea that thefts and vandalism are becoming more frequent. It seems that some sections of the population are getting fed up with the numerous sailboats.

Here sailboats are still rare and each time we get off the boat we have some pleasant encounter. Yesterday we took the dinghy ashore where our friends from Avatar where just getting ready for a bike tour around the island. They discovered a flat tyre and a local girl who had been watching the scene immediately returned with her bike to lend it to them… Today we went to a little minimarket, asked whether they had bread and were told that they were sold out. We bought a few other items and just as we were leaving the shop the salesgirl handed us a baguette–she had taken one from the family freezer and wouldn’t let us pay for it.

These little, spontaneous gestures make life so pleasant on remote Polynesian islands…

Yesterday it was sunny, so we kicked ourselves to some activity even though we were still tired from the passage–you never know how long the nice weather will last in the Australs…
We went to the mayor’s office, didn’t get a map, but some vague advice about hiking tracks. We hitched a ride along the cross-island road–after friendly Rurutu we were surprised how many cars passed by before one stopped for us. The women set us off at the beginning of the dirtroad to Taitaa, the highest mountain.
It turned out that the trail was well-marked, because there will be a sports event in about two weeks here: the Lychee run criss-crosses all over the island and we only had to follow the red arrows up the ridge. At some point we heard a noisy engine behind us and prepared to hop into the ditch next to the narrow trail. When the source of the noise eventually turned up slowly it turned out to be a community tractor with a mowing trailer making the trail even smother for the runners. The driver invited us up, we hopped on the mud guard wings, jiggled and joggled slowly up the mountain holding on for dear life.

The driver set us off where the trail becomes a footpath and we hiked up another steep slope to the highest peak of Tubuai where large boulders are piled up precariously–looking along the ridge we were more than grateful for the ride. We descended according to the instructions of the community worker down the other side of the mountain where the trail leads down almost vertically–those runners will have to be incredible athletes to make it up there…

We got back to Pitufa after more than 4 hours of hiking. This morning it was overcast, the peak invisible in a cloud and we were happy we had done the hike with blue skies. Carpe diem!