Nuka Hiva, Marquesas, French Polynesia Day 15

The perfect journey is never finished, the goal is always across the next river, round the shoulder of the next mountain. There is always one more track to follow, one more mirage to explore.
                                                                                                            -Rosita Forbes



Nuka Hiva is the largest of the Marquesas Islands, an overseas territory of France. It's a long way from Hawaii to Nuka Hiva!
 The population is primarily Polynesian with a small percent of Europeans, mostly from France. The 2007 population was 2,660. The language spoken is French. It is a very small island. The entire town is easily explored by foot with a small Catholic church, several schools, some shops, cultural sights and monuments. We spent our time seeing the sights and walking up every hill we found...trying to keep the pounds off as the eating is quite good on the ship! Although Nuka Hiva is the largest of the Marquesas, it is a very small island, with much of the island uninhabited due to the mountainous terrain.

Woman tiki (with Mary in front to show
you how big it is!)

Heading uphill to Tiki Tuhiva, the highest contemporary
sculpture in the Pacific. The warrior and woman tiki
tower over the small main town of Taiohae in the bay.

In 1813, the United States Navy Commodore, David Porter built an outpost named Fort Madison. He and fellow sailors used the outpost island as their home port for raids against the merchant ships during the War of 1812

Studies indicate that the first people to arrive
here came from Samoa around 2000 years ago,
only later colonizing Tahiti, Hawaii, The Cook
Islands and New Zealand.  
                      

Our anchorage off of Nuka Hiva. Regatta is the name of  our Oceania ship.

This muscular local canoed out to the cruise ship and
then proceeded to canoe alongside our tender back to shore.
He kept up with us, then followed our wake and lastly
beat us to the dock! If you click on the photo, you can
better see his very muscular arms and shoulders. 

    We spent several hours exploring the town and talking to some of the locals who knew a bit of English. Our ship sailed out at 3pm after arriving at 8am.  It was an enjoyable  first day off of the ship after many days of sailing! It makes up really appreciated how the ancient sailors plied these waters so very very long ago.  

Local Nuka Hiva gal came out to greet our tender and do a dance.

Side note: American writer and former sailor Herman Melville (1819-1891) deserted his ship and hid in a valley on this island. He was captured by the native people and lived in the valley for 3 weeks. This experience was the inspiration for his novel "Typee". This valley is only accessible by 4wheel drive.