December 11th 2019

MAC on arrival at Hiva Oa and the view from our terrace.
Up early and blogging to the sounds of the many roosters on the property. The Hotel Manager had thoughtfully placed earplugs in the room for those who might be disturbed by the early morning crowing of these bird who seem to call to one another. 

They day dawned perfectly as usual  with blue skies and seas and the occasional white sail of a yacht. Such mornings are routine in this part of the world.

Today was a rest day and we took that at its word. We had breakfast and then sat up in the area by the restaurant while we attended to email and such. Then it was a swim and time for lunch. We had an epiphany at lunch when we realized that I had booked the flight from LAX to JFK on the wrong day for our return home. This resulted in our trying to change the flight on-line and failing and then having to wait 20 minutes on hold on the phone before getting an agent to make the change which proved to be rather expensive, about $600 in fact. This done we could relax again.



Some of our resident bird population
After a late afternoon swim we were asked by the hotel staff if we would like to go down to the village at 6 p.m. to see the dance and song team from Hiva Oa practice for their performances at the festival which will take place next week. We agreed and quickly got ready, made our menu choices for dinner before we left and took the shuttle with two other guests down to the village and the are near the Artisanal Center where the floodlights were on. After about half an hour the team of men and women assembled and went through their paces with a ‘trainer’ who marshaled them and made sure that the movements and alignments were correct. The women sang and the drummers kept up a rhythmic beat while the men uttered some words as well as threatening sounding grunts and often advanced in a formation with knee slapping and foot stamping. The whole thing is very impressive as most of the village were at this practice either participating or watching with many children taking part or mimicking their elders. To see the old traditions maintained and the Marquesan language sang and chanted is wonderful as these things are important to preserve in this day and age. The fact that the young ones seem so involved is very encouraging. We wish the team the very best in their performance at the festival. They leave by boat  for Oa Pou this Friday and the festival will start on Monday.

The rather spectacular moon rise this evening




The Hiva Oa team for the festival convenes for their rehearsal

We returned to the hotel and had our dinner. Tomorrow we have the all day trip to see the tikis which will be very interesting. So it was early to bed.

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