Surprises of the New Aranui III
The next day we had our first view of the ship that was to be our home for the next 16 days. I’d been more than a little concerned about taking this cargo ship. Aranui means “The Great Highway” in the Tahitian language. Its essential job is to deliver vital cargo to the remote Marquesas Islands and its 8,000 inhabitants. Passengers come along as an added financial benefit.
We’d be traveling almost a thousand miles northeast of Tahiti and making at least 15 stops on all the inhabited islands. However, most of the passenger landings would be via whaleboat trips to shore since only three ports had appropriate docks for the Aranui to anchor, and wet landings” were the order of the day.
These “wet landings” by wooden whaleboat were a secret worry of mine since I had just spent several months recovering from knee surgery for torn cartilage. I had read in the guidebooks that due to these whaleboat landings, passengers must be in good shape and should not undertake this trip unless they were fit. This shook me up more than I would admit. Getting in and out of bobbing, unstable whaleboats in a turbulent sea, hoisting myself up and down steps on slippery concrete docks, and maneuvering back onto the ship from a precarious position was the stuff of several nightmares on the nights before my trip began. These apprehensions only mounted as we approached the Aranui that first morning.
But arriving at the dock, I discovered a sleek white freighter anchored in the harbor. Newly built in Rumania and commencing just a fifth trip since its inaugural voyage in February, 2003, the Aranui III was all the literature said it would be. At 386 feet long, 58 feet wide, and with cruising at a speed of 15 knots and a 52-member crew, the ship is all air-conditioned and, for a cargo ship, designed with passenger comfort in mind.
I was reassured when a muscular Polynesian crewman stepped up on the dock, grabbed my heavy suitcase, and hoisted it up the gangway without effort. It appeared in my stateroom immediately. The room was the best surprise of all!
Our stateroom #47A provided a porthole, ample storage, space for all our belongings, comfortable twin beds, and a well-designed compact bathroom---with a shower to die for. In fact, when we described the Aranui from then on, we raved about the unbelievable shower that produced steaming water available day and night! A freshly made bed, clean room each day, fresh towels every other day, and best of all---free laundry service were part of the Aranui plan. Some news articles had described the new vessel as a passenger/cargo ship—and that wasn’t far off the mark.
Our first move was to check out the dormitories. Just two, each featured 12 bunks. There were two communal bathrooms. Why were Jean and I so interested? Early on, against my better judgment, we had decided to stay in a dorm because this was a great buy, and we had booked bunk space! I had stubbornly resisted this decision, mostly because of lack of a private bathroom. Ultimately, I had won Jean over and we had upgraded to a stateroom. One look at the dorm and Jean agreed with this decision. Though the dorms were almost empty on this trip, the noise of the engine and lack of private bathrooms would have made the trip much less enjoyable.
A comfortable dining room, small conference room for nightly lectures, large lounge with afternoon tea, little boutique, fine swimming pool and spacious deck space for lounging and watching brilliant sunsets and night skies, and a top deck bar where the Aranui crew band entertained passengers combined to make this freighter the dream ship I had hoped for but truly hadn’t dared to expect.
Best of all—for us but not for the future well-being of the company — was the fact that on this trip there were just 67 passengers--though the ship had space for 208. Forty were French and 20, American, with a few from Australia, New Zealand, Italy and Germany. We soon formed into two informal groups, the French and the English speaking. The English-speaking passengers quickly formed a gang and became buddies. We passed many pleasant hours together on shipboard and on land, hiking, exploring archaeological sites, swimming, and snorkeling on land excursions and beach picnics. Of course, I didn’t ignore the French, and my limited French improved considerably during the course of the trip.
Most importantly, we discovered that a world-renowned Marquesan specialist, Robert Suggs, was to be our guide and lecturer. Two bilingual guides, Sophie and Didier, were guides, along with Bob. This combination resulted in a voyage far beyond my greatest educational expectations.
An archaeologist with a Ph.D. from Columbia University, Suggs originally had been sent to the Marquesas in 1957 by the Museum of Natural History in New York to begin the first of his many digs on island sites. An expert with several books on the Marquesas to his credit, Suggs speaks Marquesan, French, German, and Russian and has many friends on the islands. We learned he leads Aranui expeditions only two or three times a year. Unknowingly, we had chosen one of these times for our trip. (Originally, we had planned to go in August but chose to go earlier than intended when the company offered us a 25% discount for signing on for a June voyage.) Bob turned out to be an incredibly knowledgeable guide and a valued friend as the trip progressed.
The Polynesian crew was another of the ship’s strengths. Big, burly,
powerful men with traditional tattoos displayed prominently on their bodies and faces, they possessed patience, good humor, and incredible skills with the cargo--both inanimate and human. The whaleboat crew, especially, took enormous pride in their jobs; they put their formidable flexibility, quick thinking and strength to use constantly to help passengers move on and off on the whaleboats. Sometimes that wasn’t an easy task! But more of that later.
The dining staff in their colorful pareos, flower leis, and complementing fresh flower headdresses were smiling and efficient—though some of the French passengers were sometimes more than a little cranky about the kitchen. One waiter, Joelle, was a handsome young Polynesian who was especially cheerful and willing to please even the most demanding of diners. Each day he wore a different pareo, perfectly chosen matching shirt, and a flower lei and headdress that complemented his colorful pareo skirt and meticulously applied makeup. He reflected the relaxed culture of Polynesia, I learned, where many kinds of lifestyles and cultures are accepted as routine.
Quickly, we fell into the leisurely pattern of life aboard the ship. We relaxed with three ample meals each day, served family style and with free-flowing red, rose, or white French wine. We had freedom of seating in the dining room and choices about speaking either French or English throughout the day.
We started off the day with a breakfast buffet from 6:30 a.m. to 8:30 a.m.—dining on fresh fruit—mango, papaya, bananas, pineapple, honeydo, cantaloupe—and cereals, freshly baked baguettes and croissants, eggs if requested, and plenty of hot coffee. Lunch and dinner family style, was served with wine, and included frequent fresh fish, often in a special sauce, salad, vegetables, interesting soups, and excellent desserts. At 4 p.m. tea and cookies in the lounge soon became our standard meeting place.
Landings on each of the inhabited islands were scheduled along with cargo stops, once or twice a day, mostly by whaleboat. Each day we also found time to swim, sit in a deck chair and read or be hypnotized by an ever-changing sea or endless horizon. In our search for life out there, we never saw another ship at sea.
Most interesting of all, were the many hours I lingered on a top deck to watch, fascinated, the meticulous work of the two men who managed the two huge orange cranes. In a veritable ballet of movement, they lowered and lifted a fascinating array of assorted cargo. Huge containers, massive nets, and open steel boxes were raised and lowered by means of four heavy chain cables with grappling hooks hanging loosely from the ends to be attached to move cargo.
I never ceased being amazed at the strength and dexterity of the crew. Working in tandem, seemingly without effort, several men down on the deck, on the barge or in a whaleboat grasped each chain as it was lowered and hooked it to the enormous boxes, containers, or other items. They communicated with each other during these dangerous operations with casual nods or an easy wave of the hand. With ease they handled pallets of cement, crates of beer, children’s bicycles, new and old cars in need of repair, pickup trucks and vans, copra, citrus and noni fruit, refrigerators and air conditioners, and huge nets filled with 500 gallon barrels of fuel. These were some of the day-to-day essentials making it onto the barge, whale boat and dock. And I never saw a misstep.
We arose each morning anticipating full days of land expeditions to a new island site. On land, we’d climb over the tailgate and into the back of pickup trucks to bump over dirt roads or hike along the road to a village. Or we’d swim, snorkel, picnic on a beach or mountain, ride a horse on a wooden saddle over the mountain, wander over archaeological sites, or enjoy demonstrations of tapa cloth making and other traditional artisans’ work. By nightfall, we’d be sunburnt and tired, and all too ready for relaxation.
Each evening we had a pre-dinner lecture by Bob or another of the guides on expeditions planned for the next day. After dinner, we’d meet with friends in the lounge or get comfortable in a deckchair to chat, read, or sit out on the back deck to watch stars in a inky black sky. Sometimes, we’d stop off at the top deck bar and order a Hinano, Polynesian beer, and sit back to enjoy the Aranui crew band in action.
That’s where I had my best surprise of the trip. The first night the six-piece band settled down with guitar, drums, banjo, ukulele and other unknown native instruments. The sound was great. Within seconds, I got caught up in the great Polynesian rhythms. Anybody who knows me knows I was dying to dance—a la my experience on the Ocean Explorer trip where I had first learned ballroom dancing. To my total surprise--and delight--Yoyo, the famed bartender of the Aranui (according to the guidebooks known throughout the South Pacific for his special rum cocktails), must have appreciated my enthusiasm for the music. I hadn’t danced for over a year, but when this bare-chested pareo garbed Polynesian guy approached me and
asked me to begin dancing on an empty dance floor, despite my embarrassment I couldn’t refuse.
Over the course of the trip, each of the several times I appeared at the bar, Yoyo danced with me. This was an unexpected bonus of my adventure in the South Seas.
But the REAL highlight of this journey to paradise was a more uncertain experience-- getting to shore and back in a whaleboat! At first, I thought of my trip as Paradise Lost—because I was worried I’d never get to shore if I had to go in a whaleboat.
[Go to South Seas Part Four]
