The sky began to clear late Tuesday afternoon, until I could make out a faint outline of Bora-Bora as I had my evening drink.

        I was awake early Wednesday morning, but waited until 7 a.m. when there was enough light to see the color of shallower water to drop my mooring, which was itself in 85’ of dark water.

        I powered a mile south to a pass I haven’t used before.  Wide and easy, with a steadily curling wave breaking on the north side.

        Once clear I unfurled the jib, cut the engine, and with the tiller pilot steering had a fine beam reach at 6.5 to 7 knots in 14 to 17 knots of wind.

        Unlike most of these islands, Bora-Bora has only one pass through its reef, and that is halfway up the west side.  The reef extends a long way off the south end of the island.  In the past I would aim at a point I thought was far enough, invariably find that it wasn’t, and sail along the reef until I came to the corner.  With GPS I set a waypoint and that was it.

         The morning steadily brightened.

        Two of the three most beautiful islands I have ever sailed to are in the Society Islands:  Bora-Bora and Moorea.  (The third is Australia’s seldom visited Lord Howe Island in the Tasman Sea.) 

        They are very different.  Moorea is dark, mysterious, other worldly, with two deep fjord-like coves in the north.  Bora-Bora rises like a castle of light from the ocean, and has lagoon so intense that the undersides of passing clouds become turquoise by reflection.

        Until I entered the pass just before noon, I was undecided as to whether I would anchor off the islet of Toofua or take a mooring at the resurrected Bora Bora Yacht Club.  The number of boats off the Yacht Club caused me to go over there to see if I could find one empty.  I need shore access for provisioning, laundry, and dealing with officials, including getting back the almost $1400 bond I had to post upon arrival in Nuku Hiva.  This is a stupid bit of French bureaucracy that didn’t exist when I first sailed to these islands, and is required by all not EU citizens to cover the cost of airfare back to their home country.  I don’t know anywhere else in the world that has such a rule for yachts. 

        The lagoon is much too deep for me to anchor.  My mooring is in 90’.  And the only other moorings are off a restaurant called Bloody Mary’s.  I didn’t want to anchor off Toofua and then find all the moorings taken.

        The Bora-Bora Yacht Club is not a yacht club with members, but a business.  I was here in 1979 when the first owners were starting up.  In addition to moorings, there is a restaurant, showers, a place that does laundry--at what expense I will find out tomorrow when I pick up mine, which has been piling up since Panama.

        Over the years the place has changed hands at least a half dozen times and was closed due to bankruptcy when Carol and I were here five years ago.  This might be my last time at Bora-Bora, but I hope the new owners make a go of it.  The BBYC makes life for visiting yachts much easier.

        After a can of tuna for lunch, I rowed ashore.  Paid 5000 Polynesian Francs--about $62.50 US--for the mooring for a week; then walked a little over a mile to the main village of Vaitape, bought some supplies at one of the two modest supermarkets, and dragged them back on my folding cart.

        A good night’s sleep, with a cooling breeze blowing through the forward hatch, left open in the absence of rain.

        ----------

       

        2149 is the distance to my only remaining waypoint:  my mooring.  Probably that crosses a point or two of land in the Bay of Islands,  so the true distance is a few miles greater.

        It is beginning to seem likely that I will sail from here next Wednesday, Sept. 16.  I would like to anchor off Toofua and snorkel, and could do so illegally after clearing out and getting my bond back, but probably won’t.

        Bora-Bora is beautiful.  Also expensive.  And touristy, though more in the south and east.  And much, much less than Hawaii or Bali.  It is still a lovely place, despite the existence of a jet ski--surely the most evil invention of man that is not a weapon of mass destruction.  But this is the seventh time I’ve sailed to the Society Islands, and the fifth to Bora-Bora.  I’ll not linger.

        Where I really want to be is 35º 18.774’ South; 174º 07.548‘ East

        Even if its cool and rainy.