After a 45 day, 5,500 nm passage from Puerto Montt, Chile, to the Marquesas I was looking forward to a well-earned break from sailing. My week in Baie de Taiohae was certainly a break from sailing but unfortunately not the relaxing, restorative interlude I hoped it would be.
The bay is reasonably well-protected on 3 sides but is subject to a fairly continuous swell from the south that will roll the boat back and forth depending on how large the swell is. Even the catamarans I saw at anchor, which are generally much less susceptible, were rolling around a little as well. It wasn’t seriously uncomfortable, mostly just annoying.
To get to shore I needed to use the dinghy, of course. To pick the dinghy up off the foredeck, pull it back to the stern, mount the 6 hp Yamaha outboard (60+ pounds) in the dinghy, add the gas tank and oars, all takes more than an hour. Getting the outboard out of the storage locker on the stern of Phywave and getting it on the dinghy transom is a pure muscle job. When I finally leave the anchorage I have to reverse that whole process.
The swells, and wind waves that sometimes pop up, can make for a bumpy ride in the dinghy from Phywave to the place on shore where we can tie up the dinghies. I won’t call it a dinghy dock because it’s just a concrete wall with a couple of ladders and chain along the top where dinghies can be tied. There isn’t a lot of space especially since local fishermen tie their boats to the same wall with some using stern ties to buoys. It’s easy to get tangle with the stern ties coming in as I did once.
With not much space the normal process with 2 people would be to nose the dinghy to the wall and have the forward person grab the ladder or chain and tie the dingy to it. However, with one person, I’m necessarily sitting in the back running the motor so I have to swing the dinghy sideways to grab the ladder or chain, a challenge with a crowded space.
I’m explaining these details to point out that taking the dinghy to shore was a hassle. Of the 7 days I anchored in the bay, I only took the dinghy in 4 days. While I was there the bay only had about 2 dozen boats at anchored, and only about a third of those had people on board. The others were anchored long-term (it’s free) while the crew went off somewhere else, even a back home for a break. I’ve seen photos of the bay with more than 50 boats, most will crews on board. That would have made for a vastly more crowded dinghy landing than I experienced.
There is a gray sand beach near the dinghy landing which people occasionally use to land their dinghies. I tried that one day instead of the wall. It was more work and sand got everywhere. Even with small swells breaking on the beach it was still some work to push the dinghy out past them to get going back to Phywave. Later someone told me there are sometimes small hammerhead sharks in those waters. Great! But apparently they only come around early in the morning for a wild chum feeding frenzy when the local fishermen are cleaning and cutting up their catch and throwing the scraps in the water.
Taiohae is the administrative capital of the Marquesas but even so, there isn’t a lot there. Beyond the government buildings there is one really good hotel with 20 bungalows (and no vacancies) a handful on guesthouse/pensione type places, 4 or 5 restaurants, 3 or 4 small grocery stores, and variety of tourist shops and tour companies. The grocery stores were adequate to re-provision the boat. In Puerto Montt I had bought food for several months so I really just needed to replace what I had consumed en-route to the Marquesas.
The best day I had on Nuku-Hiva was Friday when I rented a car, had lunch at the upscale hotel with its amazing view, and drove around a good portion of the island to see 500 year old archeological ruins and small villages nestled at the heads of the many bays around the perimeter of the island. Driving on narrow paved roads up and over steep forested ridges provided some spectacular views.
On my first day ashore I did meet a couple from Austin at lunch that were sailing a nice 44 foot catamaran. They had arrived in the Marquesas from Panama, as I recall, and spent 2 months anchored in the Taiohae Bay. Of course, they knew every place in the town and shared than information with me, but I didn’t see nearly enough in the town, or on the island, to justify staying there that long, especially in an anchorage that was sometimes kinda rolly. Some folks just love to hang out on their boats, and have made a lifestyle of it. I guess I’m not among them, instead pursuing my sailing mission.
When the end of my week came I didn’t hesitate to up anchor and move on.
