It was W. Somerset Maugham's short story, "The Fall of Edward Barnard" that made me think of Tahiti as the most romantic place in the world. I was twenty years old and tremendously impressible. Maugham's Barnard, an ambitious young American goes to Tahiti to prove himself a capable business man. At first he is eagerly active and envisions sleepy, easy-going Papeete, the only town of any size on the island, as a bustling city, a busy seaport. Then he begins to wonder if it should be changed and finally succumbing to the tranquil charm of this faraway place, he goes native. Maugham's description of the lagoon, the reef, and "the unimaginable beauty of the island that is called Moorea" made me long to go there and see it all for myself.
It took a long time but in 1970 when I was fifty-six, my husband and I landed at Papeete just before dark on a July evening. I had seen pictures of it and
recognized the dramatic outline of Moorea, black against the sky, as we flew past it. I was still gasping with excitement and pleasure when I set foot on the island of Tahiti.
It was the end of an eight hour flight from Los Angeles and I was a bit groggy but the thrill was there. Two days later, when we had recovered from all the hours in the air and were totally relaxed, we went into Papeete. Barnard [or Maugham] would not have recognized it but it had a small-town, other-world atmosphere. The Maeva Beach Hotel where we were staying, was large and modern. A few miles away was a new Intercontinental. There were several boarding houses and a hostel or two. That seemed to be it. Papeete wasn't at all like Honolulu. There were shops but no large business buildings. There wasn't a hint of bustle and not the slightest sense of hurry. On the calm waters of the harbor were a couple of yachts. Some fishermen were out in canoes. Everywhere signs were in French and the French tri-color floated over government offices.
It was hot but not oppressively so. After some leisurely exploring, we were about to look for a cab when a local bus, headed in the right direction, stopped beside where we stood. It looked like an elongated station wagon, roofed but with no glass in the window frames. It was crowded, so we hesitated but the bus driver grinned a welcome, friendly Tahitian hands pulled us on board, and off we went to our hotel. It was easy to understand why Barnard enjoyed and didn't want to change Papeete. Quinn's Bar was a Must See so we made a late-afternoon visit there. Our timing was wrong--there was nothing going on. There were only half a dozen other people there. A motor bike was parked in one corner. The bartender, an elderly Tahitian woman served our drinks. We could say we had seen Quinn's but it was not the den of iniquity we has expected--and rather hoped for.
We exerted ourselves to the extent of making a tour around the island in a an open car. We were driven past peaceful villages set in coconut groves to Tahiti-iti, the tiny peninsula at its southeastern end.
As we circled Tahiti on the way back to Papeete, we saw rain forests, jungles, and huge waves smashing into the Arahoho blowhole--things so unlike the country around the seaport, that it was hard to believe they were on the same small island.
I wanted very much to go to Moorea but we were told that it was an extremely rough trip across the reef so we contented ourselves by just looking at that fantastic island--a view we never tired of. If we couldn't get to Moorea, we could and did go to Bora Bora by plane. As I looked down on it from the air, I thought its two volcanic peaks were like the towers of an enchanted castle.
From the minute airstrip where we landed, we went by boat across the lagoon to the Bora Bora Hotel, a collection of about twenty unpretentious but comfortable cottages surrounding a main dining room and deck on the coral pink sands of the beach. This was forty years ago and the island, if not pristine, was close to it. There were a relatively new Club Med and a small hotel a mile or so away and that was all. We spent two blissful days in this Polynesian Eden.
We walked under tall palms along its encircling trail where land crabs, some as large as dinner plates, scuttled our from under piles of coconut shells. We swam in the lagoon, and we sailed over it in a glass-bottomed boat. On this excursion we saw hundreds of the the most amazing small fish imaginable, in geometric shapes and rainbow colors.
We returned to Papeete, less Edenic than Bora Bora, but with its own magnetic charm It was Sunday and we went to Mass. The sermon was in Tahitian and therefore incomprehensible. Then the choir, composed mostly of young men, sang and their voices were heavenly. They were led by a severe, unsmiling French nun. She knew her business and the music we heard that morning is something I've never forgotten. It was July fourteenth, Bastille Day, a festival for the French and the Tahitians apparently enjoyed all the excitement with them. Bands played and there was a grand parade. We went that night to Belvedere, a restaurant on the hill above town. Eight young French people rode up on the bus with us and we sat together at a single table on a sort of deck. It was dark so we missed seeing the fabled view but our dinner was delicious. In each of two black iron pots on the table was boiling sauce into which we dipped skewered pieces of meat, that being the main course. The wines were good, the French warm and friendly. All the way back to the hotel, they sang songs about the Champs Elysees.
That was our farewell night in Papeete. Forty years have passed since then. Quinn's is gone and there are condos on Bora Bora. I am fortunate in having seen these places before they changed so much. In my mind and in my memory, those faraway islands have never lost, and never will lose, their magic.
Note: The pictures are not mine. Photobucket and Imageshack get the credit.