Here in the Gambiers there are plenty of scooters, cars, trucks, construction site machines, and boats. They all need fuel; gasoline or diesel. However, there is not fuel station at all. Neither somewhere on land nor at a pier.

Thus everyone buys drums of 200 l and keeps them at home.

Thus, we sailors have the same condition: a 200 l drum is the smallest volume we can buy.

Today I bought a 200 l drum. I had to jerry can the diesel with my 4 x 20 l jerry cans to MaRe, fill the diesel in MaRe’s tank. Go back to the supply boat and repeat the same. I needed to shuttle with the tender 3 x.

The guys in charge of diesel at the supply boat are really friendly and make all very doable. At the standing drum they fit a ball valve and lay it on the ground. Then a forklift comes am puts the drum on staple of wooden pallets. The rest is easy. Connect a hose to the valve and fill the jerry cans. Every sailor has it’s own 200 l drum. At end the drum is just empty. Simple. Perfect.

I started already very early with this work today because the weather forecast said 15 – 20 KN of wind from NW. However we have all day long winds around NE of maybe 5 and in gusts 10 KN. The mountain of Mangareva is a pretty good wind protection. Winds we feel here are turbulences changing in gusts directions often. Sea remained more or less flat, which was good for today’s shuttling with jerry cans.

Only rain was but threatening. Dark clouds hung over the southern corner of the Gambiers. Fortunately that spit only a few drops on us.

This was today’s most important work. Beside this I started with a thorough cleaning of MaRe’s cockpit and the sterns.

As the supply boat arrives a bit delayed in the next days, I decided to hike again.

About in the middle of Mangareva’s NE – SW extension a trail starts leading up to the mountain ridge. This I went up. The ridge is about 200 m above sea level.

At the top there is a cross road of 2 trails. One follows the ridge on SW direction, the other one goes down on the other side to the western shore of Mangareva, or, and this is the one I followed, one follow the ridge on NW direction.

The trail towards NE goes up and down. The ridge is about 3 – 7 m wide. In the middle there are often very old Canarian firs holding on bravely to the little bit of soil on top of the volcanic rocks and on the clefts between the rocks. The hole mountain of Rikitea and the other islands are part of a caldera created very many years back when a huge volcano blew his top. Then corals started growing and the lagoon, the former caldera “crater” became a coral reef. Additionally corals grew outside the lagoon.

In the more northern part of the trail a greyish moss, looking like a thin long beard, grows on the trees. It seems it has the same function as the long needles of the Canadian firs which is condensation of water in the air especially when clouds are hanging deep.

Another very obvious plant are the “noni” trees. A noni is supposed to be a very healthy fruit. People who keeping the trail open from weeds etc., make sure that the wild growing noni trees remain well protected.

Between all the various trees there are gaps, opening a incredible view down into the coral waters on both sides of mountain. It was always a dream of looking at such waters. From my hike I had the highest view to them. The various shades of turquoise to a darker blue are really beautiful. Each shade means a different sea bottom. From white sand via multicolored coral shoals appearing kind of grey to the deep blue of water being so deep, that all other colors are absorbed. Then there is the Pacific Ocean up to the horizon and beyond. When I look at all these things I’m deeply impressed and thankful that I could see this all.

… catches the worm but also sees the sunrise.

This morning, I needed to get up a bit earlier to start the generator to charge the batteries for the bigger part with high current and let the rest be done by solar power, which provides the lower current when batteries only can take lower currents.
By this way I try to optimize charging.

Doing so, I was treated by magnificent sunrise. Sunsets are, unfortunately, behind the mountain ridge of Mangareva Island.

As I got yesterday breadfruits I felt tonight, I need to make a soup out of a breadfruit.

I peeled 1/2 breadfruit, cut it into pieces like for boiled potatoes without jackets. Chopped 1 1/2 peeled onion (2 would have been fine as well.) Into a few pieces. Peeled about 10 garlic doves. Put all in a pressure cooker and steamed it for about 5 min.

Then all was soft. Used my handheld blender and made it fine. Looked and felt like mash potatoes from our consistency. Then I added about 50 cm3 of vinegar, looooots of freshly ground pepper, 4 bullion cubes dissoluted in 1/2 l of hot water, a chunk of chorizo cut in smaller pieces and stirred all. I added step by step about 1 l of water and kept stirring until it became thick soup. Quickly back on the range to heat it up again. Don’t forget to stir while heating up!

My soup was ready and it tasted excellent. Not like a potatoe soup but like a breadfruit soup.

As I still have plenty left, I can eat more tomorrow.

Bon apétit, Reinhold!

I was looking for someone who might sell me shaddocks (pampelmouse), breadfruits, and bananas. At a corner of a garden I saw quite some shaddocks on the ground and it seemed nobody wants them. So I looked around for people to whom this tree might belong and found a father and a son doing maintenance work at their house. I asked and their next question was “How many?” “What else?”. Thus I asked carefully for 3 shaddocks and maybe 2 breadfruits. While I talked with the father, he asked the son to prepare some for me.

The conversation was about the island and life here. Jobs – 90 % are in the pearl farming industry. But they all love to live on Mangareva. I can understand.

When I asked for the French word for breadfruit, which i can’t find in my of-line dictionary, he was in trouble. Here people only use the Polynesian word – uru – even when they speak French. So from today on I also say “uru”.

At the end I got
– 5 shaddocks
– 3 uru (breadfruits)
– about 20 – 25 bananas.

I should mention that the bananas, growing here without any agro-chemicals, taste extremely good. They have the taste of bananas, and not the watered down taste of Chiquitas, Dole, etc. I wonder if I ever will eat a supermarket banana again.

As it was my lucky day I can start from tomorrow on the create new recipes. I’m curious what will come out.

Had a lunch in an eatery called Jo-Jo, which also has a shop attached. The few tables are under s roof an 2 sides are fully open.

After lunch I asked the shop lady if they have SIM cards. She said yes, but asked me to wait 30 min more until 1500. Ok, I can sit and do some messages more.

5 min later they switch off the WiFi. I asked if I can please get a bit more WiFi until the shop is open. It was then 20 min to shop opening.

“Restaurant is closed!” was the pretty unfriendly message I got.
Still I’m sitting at the same table.

There is another eatery in the village with a better menu plus lower prices and internet.

Shops – there are 2 friendly ones in the village, they will make my business from now on.

Not so much also I’m busy with boat jobs.

As 2 toilets needed maintenance I decided to maintain all 4. It takes some time because I need to remove calcium deposition on the lower part of the pipes. Fortunately vinegar helps to soften the depositions. Still it takes time.

A few other boat jobs are done others are in the pipeline.

Today I got a haircut. Here it is not that easy. Needed to go to the other side of Mangareva Island. Basically needed to go over the mountain ridge and down the other side. I just hitch hiked like in the old days – or should I say in my young days? The language is the same, French. But in my young days I hitched in France, now I’m in French Polynesia.

I was lucky, in both directions, the first car that came gave me a lift. Polynesia island helpfulness.

A friendly lady gave me a good cut, which should last again for a while. Last haircut I got in Costa Rica. Going back in time I got haircuts in Colombia, Panama, Cuba (the very best!), Mid Atlantic.

I’m also reading an interesting compendium about the Marquesas. Should someone be interested it can be downloaded here
http://svsoggypaws.com/files/#frpoly

Yesterday I made a potato soup.

As for the recipe, I looked into the late Carla Schenk’s “Bordkueche”. It is just great what this lady wrote in her book. I’m very happy that I received once a pdf-copy from her husband Bobby Schenk. Out of this copy I made the ‘Tokyo Edition” of the Carla’s famous cooking book.

Back to potatoes soup.

As a green breadfruit can be used in various ways as a substitute for a normal potato, I got the idea to make a breadfruit soup just like a potato soup. Only a bit more vinegar to remove the slightly sweet taste.

Now I’m looking forward to get breadfruits again. I simply want to do this experiment.

The day before yesterday, I was asked by Renate from SV Moana if I’m interested to join them the next day to visit a pearl farm. I agreed and this morning we met at 0830 in the tiny harbor, the commercial wharft, where a friendly lady picked us up with her pick-up car.

Pearl Farming or cultured pearls has been invented by Mr. Mikimoto in Japan. He developed the method to harvest cultured pearls instead of depending on the luck of an “ama-diver” who dived also for pearl oysters.

The farm is on the other side of Mangareva Island. It was a drive of about 20 min. There a working boat for a pearl farm was waiting already to bring us to the farm about a kilometer away. The route from the beach to the farm was not a straight one. First we needed to go through a narrow curvy channel between rocks and corals. Then through, with buoys carefully marked “roads” between “farmland”. Finally we reach the farm building placed on concrete pillars about 1.5 m above water level.

Then the explanation started with harvesting oyster larvas. They need a special environment, which is not given in the bay where there were several farms, but in another bay.

After reaching the age of 2 years, the first implementation of a pearl nucleus is done. For this one person opens the shell, and puts a plastic wedge in to keep it open. The implementation as such takes only about 2 min by person trained for it. But it’s a tough work as this person must hold up it’s arms during an the working time. The nucleus is imported from Japan.

Thereafter the oysters are placed in special nets, which then are being hung in the water at a narrow depth range. Once in a while they need to be taken out and must be cleaned to avoid dirt getting in, destroying the growth of a pearl.

Plastics garbage in the water seems to be a bigger problem, because divers clean the bottom of a farm regularly. On the others side, from what I could see, all material used for pearl farming is made out of plastic. This reminded me to the agricultural fertilizer to get a better harvest by destroying the soil.

Harvesting the pearls is done in the same way as implementation of the nucleus. One person opens the shell, puts a wedge in. The other person takes the pearl out.

We also learned about the 4 quality criteria of pearl: size, surface, shine, and shape.

About 65 % of the shells being opened for harvesting contain a pearl. From that 20 % are good quality pearls, which can be sold.

In the old days, diving for pearls was a family business. Today, pearl farming is an industry. Here in Polynesia this industry provides most jobs and it is said to be subsidized by the French government.

Today I wanted to see what I can make from mashed breadfruits.

I took a quarter of a breadfruit, peeled it just with a normal potato peeler, cut it in about 8 bigger junks and steamed them in a pressure cooker for 9 minutes.

The junks became very soft and it was easy to mash them just with a fork. I made 3 balls out of the mashed breadfruit. Over 2 balls I poured vinegar. I pressed the balls that they became kind of disc about 1 1/2 – 2 cm thick and fried therm. They got a nice color and turned outside crispy and inside soft.

The two with vinegar I put on plate and covered them in plenty with canned tuna flakes. For seasoning I used freshly ground pepper and dried parsley. It tasted pretty good. The vinegar took the slight sweet taste.

This was my main dish.

As a desert I took the one without vinegar and added apricot marmalade on top. It really was a good desert.

I would like to know local recipes. Hopefully I meet someone who cooks breadfruits at home.