Anchorage here was a little better than being at sea. Rolling and hobby horsing were the familiar motions of our boat as if at sea. Bay of the Virgins was spectacular. Its green peaks resembled the shrouded Virgin Mary on the right side and buttressing pillars on the opposite side. Many cruisers sheepishly say that they stopped here mainly for the photo op. For us it was the southern most island in the Marquesas we were willing to embark.

As soon as Jeff set his hefty anchor weighing over 100 lbs with a snubber, the kayaks were unleashed and floated along the boat. The girls immediately paddled over to sv Banyan for a chance play on the water before the sunset.

I was really curious about the island so I paddled onto shore. It looked like the locals had just finished a soccer game. It was a bit of a surprise to find a very nice official size soccer field on Fatu Hiva. Since I was eager to procure some fruits, I was on a look out for friendly locals who were willing to engage. Soon, I met a group of young guys who finished playing soccer. One of them spoke pretty good English and asked where I was from. Understandably they were curious of my ethnic origin. The guys seemed unsatified when I told them I had come from Washington State from US. So then, I quickly announced that I am Korean. They quickly exclaimed with satisfaction and started to spout off everything they know about South Korea. Our exchange involved the recent winter Olympic there and how one of the guys is a professional boxer and is Olympic level. With stunted English, very broken French and sign language, I somehow understood that they recently caught a pig and that I should come to a feast tomorrow afternoon. This may have been a gross misunderstanding on my part but there was no get together that involved myself nor my family.

The next day, we decided to head to shore for mass. Once we were able to pull our towing dinghy off of the slippery cement ramp, a woman who approached us to exchange things we have on board for fruits. We were surprised to find such forwardness as soon as we got on shore. Another woman mentioned a tableau, which we understood as a cooked meal for a price.

After mass we showed up to the house where the meal was being prepared. As I was examining how the hostess was frying breadfruit chips, I was asked to look after the last few chips while our hostess moved into other dishes she had to finish.

For lunch, we had barbecued pork, chicken, and beef, bread fruit chips, something that resembles poi, poisson cru, and rice. It was a lot of food. We had heard about polynsian portions being large and indeed it was. We were stuffed.

Sv Banyan and we wanted to check out the famed waterfall. But getting there was a harrowing journey. Along the way we got directions from a French cruiser who mixed a bit too much French with his sprinkling of English and we quickly got confused by his directions. At the end we made it to the waterfall and had a refreshing swim at the bottom of the fall.

As we hiked throughout Marquesas, we foraged constantly for mangos.