Prepping for Richard

Barbara's brother Richard is making the trek to the southern hemisphere for a Tahitian "adventure." We hope his travels aren't adventurous but it is a long way and his arrival is at 0400 (that would be 4 am!) He is delivering about a half metric ton of stuff for us so will have to do the customs dance upon arrival. Sure glad we paid an agent!

We've been giving Astarte the thorough cleaning – and trying to reorganize space so he can fit aboard. Because we provisioned up so heavily in Panama (the last inexpensive port) we still have bins of tinned food, tissue, TP and stuff around. The cases of beer have somehow managed to go missing – but we still have lots of corn, peas and cooking oil! It's always a challenge to find homes for the stuff that fills the V-berth and forward head! But we'll manage and hopefully he'll have a good time. We're planning to sail to Moorea as part of the Pacific Puddle Jump Tahiti - Moorea Sailing Rendez Vous (for those of you who know Richard (aka Soby), he's a bit competitive so he sees this as a race.) He just hasn't gotten that we don't "race our house!"

We are excited about his visit.

We've also had the chance to see and meet some folks here. We finally met Marcel and Bruce on "Adventure Bound." These folks were on our ad hoc radio net crossing the Pacific (the POST group) and you may remember Bruce as the crazy guy who jumped overboard in the middle of the ocean to spear a mahi! They had us over last night for a great evening and dinner. We've taken the local bus into town twice and we've enjoyed seeing the city. It is a pretty large city with lots of traffic. The buses are very nice. Everything here is quite expensive though. We were so used to really cheap buses in Panama($0.25usd/person). Here they cost 130 CFP (that's the French Polynesian Franc) – so around $1.35usd per person each way. It is still way cheaper than taxis. A 5-10 run from here to the airport is $28/.00usd. The town has a beautiful waterfront park. It has gardens, a memorial for the nuclear testing that the French did in the Tuamotus, and waterfalls and ponds. Its a nice walk. Town is filled with shops – black pearl jewelry stores and high end boutiques. There is a large farmers market that has produce, fresh flowers, fish, bakeries etc. Near the marina where we have grabbed a mooring ball, there are also shops including a big grocery/department store. Laundry got done the other day – except it cost $8.50 per washing machine load – ouch!

Last minute preps today as we await Richard's arrival.