May 4 - The End: Moorea, InterContinental Resort, the "Lap 'O Luxury"

May 4, DEPARTURE DAY

Our beach bungalow on the lagoon with snorkeling & A/C

LAP-O-LUXURY The InterContinental Beach Resort was just what the doctor ordered! A beautiful beachfront bungalow that was steps away from a sandy beach on a quiet snorkeling lagoon which connected to the sea. A king sized bed-that didn't rock---, air conditioning and clean sheets...it was wonderful!! We even watched few minutes of CNN, our first TV since Panama, and learned the Dow hit 15,000. The laid back elegance of the resort was just perfect for our three night stay. We slept 10 hours the first two nights it was SOOO relaxing. And it was wonderful sleeping together again (am I getting too personal here?) without feeling sticky and sweaty, made worse on the boat from feeling the body heat radiating from your partner in a too-small berth. 

Moorea

MOOREA is a modest sized spectacular volcanic island with extremely jagged high peaks which had clouds around them. Our chatty elderly female taxi driver told us that the mountain scenes in the Bali High film were shot here, and Jan couldn't stop singing the theme song after that. There are about 2,000 inhabitants spread out over the east and north shores, and a couple of non-descript villages but no real population centers. Very friendly and very laid back. And very scenic. On Saturday we rented a car from the resort, toured around the island, then dropped it off at the ferry dock for our ride back to Papeete and dinner. 

TATOO!  Jan had been talking the entire trip about getting a tattoo when we finished our trip, but always in uncertain, questioning terms.  With much encouragement she finally decided it was the thing to do to commemorate this amazing voyage.  We asked around and learned that the husband of one of the concierges at the resort had a fine reputation for doing wonderful, safe and painless tattoos.  We borrowed bikes and rode the 4k to his "house" by the road and discussed the process and location and design with him, and made an appointment to return the next day for the deed.  Jan awoke the next morning with stage fright but was convinced that it had to be done, "Now or never".  So we rode the bikes again to Roberto's house and she sat for a half hour while a lovely flower design was tattooed on her right shoulder.  When asked what it stands for, we're told it represents love, family and "your story", which in Jan's case is the 5,000 mile voyage across the Pacific.

HEADING HOME We caught the 12:30am flight out of Papeete to Hawaii this morning (Sunday), then switched planes to LAX, and I'm writing this final blog on the flight to Denver where Megan will pick us up at 9:30pm and house us for a few nights so we can adjust to the altitude and celebrate Jan's (and Andy's) birthday on Tuesday. It will be so fun to reconnect with our families and especially our grandsons. And we're also looking to catch up with you long suffering blog readers, our good friends. 

THE END And so, the Great Adventure comes to an end. We have so many memories and so many pictures! As I've already stated, the magnitude of what we've just accomplished is overwhelming for us and we're so grateful to have had the opportunity. Sailing 5,000 miles over the open ocean has been mind-boggling and visiting all those exotic locations has been such a learning experience. But enough of tropical paradise for us for a while. We're looking forward to the cool, dry Colorado climate!!!

Thank all of you for following us. We've felt you keeping us company and loved having you along. We'll work on getting our pics online soon so you can see more of the beautiful places we've been. 

April 29 - Last Days Aboard Quester

Blog 5/1/13

LEAVING QUESTER AND TAHITI

Calm after the overnight storm - Jan & Joe on foredeck

LAST DAY AT SEA To reach the dock in Papeete aboard Quester involved an interesting last overnight sail with building thunderstorms and winds Sunday night. We only needed to average about 2kts so we would arrive at the entrance to the Papeete channel after dawn. But the winds built overnight, first to 12, then 16, then 20kts and at dawn just off the northern shore of Tahiti up to 30kts. During my last watch from 2200 to 2400 and Jan's from 2400 till 0200 we kept shortening sail until we just had a quarter of the mainsail out with the jib furled to maintain a 2kt average speed. By Joe's watch from 0400 to 0600 he had practically no sail out and Mike and Joe were wondering if we would have to stand off until the wind dropped a bit because it was so rough.

But then the wind died in the lee of Tahiti for the final approach to the channel and we motored in peacefully at 7am, past the large city of Papeete with its hotels, commercial areas, and TRAFFIC, to the large 400 yacht marina. It seemed most of the boats were sailboats and no doubt most of them sailed across the Pacific just like we did. So our sense of grand accomplishment was toned down a notch realizing that all these boats and crew had stories to tell and had lived through similar experiences to ours. Ho hum!?!

Oyster party with music & dances

 LEAVING QUESTER FOR MOOREA After topping off the diesel at the fuel dock we took a berth, complete with electricity and free fresh water. We had Monday and Tuesday scheduled to thoroughly scrub down and reorganize Quester before Jan and I left her for a short ferry ride 12mi over to the beautiful island of Moorea and our 3-night reservation at the InterContinental Resort on the NW tip of that island. Our cleanup of the boat was made bearable by the air conditioning which the captain allowed to be switched on with the shore power, and the Oyster party with the Blessing of the Skippers and native dances on Tuesday night. 

It was quite a chore collecting all our stuff from three months and packing it into our two large duffels plus the medium-sized sail bag which carries our wetsuits (borrowed from Jim and Freddy), self-inflating safety harnesses and snorkeling gear. In addition we have three smaller carry-on bags. A lot of kit!!

Our luggage on aft deck ready for departure