Position: 8 53S / 140 01 W  Baie de Controllier, Nuku Hiva

Manana is is on steroids in the Marquesas. We still haven’t received our mail. The mail boat came in and no luck. Not to worry, it comes back in two weeks! Airmail is delivered to Papeete and then goes via ship the rest of the way whenever one happens to be nearby. We are also awaiting a repair on a spreader that needs some welding. Supposedly there’s a guy who can do it, but he’s been busy on a school project and hasn’t been responsive. Every day the guy at the shop I know of says, “maybe I’ll find him tomorrow for you”.

The good news is that it doesn’t really matter! We decided to head up to the bay where Herman Melville jumped ship from the Acushnet and spent a couple of months. The town is Taipivei which is the setting of Melville’s first book Typee. He was injured while running away from the ship and the Taipiveis took care o him. He thought maybe they were just basting him for dinner. After he wrote the book the publishers couldn’t believe a deck had could write so well so they wouldn’t publish it until years later when he was able to corroborate the story. The rest is history.

After a couple of days here, we’re now headed to the NE side of Nuku Hiva where we look forward to visiting Anaho. After a few days there, we’ll return to pick up our mail and the repaired spreader in Taiohae.