An Afternoon on Nuka Hiva

Maggie Grant, C Watch Deckhand

Today is Sunday December 11th and it is currently midday and we have just arrived at Ua Huka which is roughly 30 nautical miles away from Nuka Hiva.
We set sail this morning and it took about five hours to reach our destination.

Yesterday we were at anchor beside Nuka Hiva and everyone got a chance to go ashore to explore the town. I spent the morning on the ship with a few other people, which was lovely. I had an egg salad sandwich for lunch and I played guitar with a few of the other folks on board. At 1300 those of us who were on the ship in the morning went to shore to spend the afternoon on land.

While ashore, I wandered around with a few of my ship mates and we found a craft market that was selling wood carvings, baskets, jewelry and many other things almost all of which were created from natural things found on the island such as shells, bones, rocks, leaves, and seeds. We walked through the town and revisited the Catholic Church that we had visited the previous day on the wonderful tour of the island, and after that we visited a small grocery store where we got some ice cream bars.

From there we visited the Tiki which is a traditional statue that sits on a hill overlooking the bay. A sign beside the Tiki explaining when it was built invited each visitor to write a note for eternity and put it in the Tiki's bellybutton so that it would fall into the stomach of the Tiki where it would presumably stay forever. So we each wrote notes of our own and stepped up on to a platform (which looked like a traditional drum) to slip our pieces of paper inside of the statue.
The rest of the day was spent walking beside the beach and enjoying the warmth and the beautiful surroundings. We were ferried back to the ship by the small boat and had a yummy dinner of corn, rice and pesto pasta. Then, C watch (the watch that I am a member of) got together for a meeting to check i9n and partake in some activities.

We played a game called "bunny bunny" and then our assistant scientist read from a book called "Pagoo" which is a children's book all about the life cycle of hermit crabs. Then I sat with my watch mates on the lab top and we all read our separate books together as we listened to the sounds of the island at night. It was a lovely day.

Until next time,
-Maggie Grant, C Watch Deckhand,