Hanamoenoa Bay and Snorkel

On October 16 we moved further down Tahuata to Hanamoenoa Bay. This is said to be one of the most beautiful anchorages in all of French Polyneasia. With that white sand beach, I think we agree!

Someone has a house in those palm trees.

The beach is wide when the tide is out. That is Stephen down there, coming to meet us.  He inherited a large section of the land here from his grandfather.  He is the only one that lives here full time.  He asked us not to take his photo, but I had already taken this one and he is so small you can't really see him.  He lives off the land and sea.  Quite an interesting and deep person.  He spoke excellent English and we had many great conversations.

Where the beach ends and turns rocky, the waves crash.

Stephen found 2 baby piglets which he was trying to save, because their mom was gone. They are hungry little babies.

Avatar is the only boat in the anchorage.

As the sun is heading west, Avatar is glistening in the sparkling water.

There must be a lot of life in this bay, because I kept getting little bitty crabs crawling up into my sink.

This guy is heading for my shell collection after struggling to get up the side of the sink.

Then I went to sit on the head (toilet for you land lubbers) and I see something red scurrying about! No way am I sitting down until I get this guy to go away! Creepy! Yikes!!

So we figured we should get in the water and see what other critters are down there. This is the rocky point on the South side of the bay.

But we decided to snorkel the North side by this blow hole.

Hanamoenoa bay beach from the dingy tour.

In the water we can see the waves making white water on the top of the rocks.

The rocks drop away quickly.

This stripped fish was cruising the sandy part.

As we swim closer to the point the rocks fall away even more.

But at the point, these rocks protrude underwater beyond it. (why you never pass close to a point with the big boat!)

On the left are some corals that look like mini discs as another stripped fish swims by.

Mike dives down to take a closer look.

Back at the surface 3 large predator fish are on the hunt.

Fish hide under any rocks they can find, so not to be eaten by larger ones.

At the tip of the point we saw these other flying saucer corals, but these were about 3 feet across!

Then out of the deep comes what we have been hoping to see, a ray.

Mike dives down to see him better.

But he is cruising down at the deeper rocks. He is not the type we had hoped to see. He is an Eagle ray and this place is known for having Manta Rays, but no luck with them.

This was the stranges piece of plankton or what ever it is. The Go Pro camera has no zoom, so he is not in very good focus. It is almost like a jelly fish but he has arms like a squid and is only about as big as my thumb nail!!

The rays of the sun show me this hole in the rocks.

So I dive down for a different view.

From here it looks like a rock bridge.

Looking down into the deep.

A school of fish swim on the surface by the breaking waves.

This school of little blue fish were even smaller that the other ones.

Looking back at the drop off as a wave hits the rocks.

Mike is still looking for the elusive lobster, none seen yet.

A rock overhang.

Where is that lobster anyway?!?

This was a cool purple fish on the left side which I never did find in the book to identify. But I loved his colors!

Looking out over the shallow area of thin flat corals.

These fish swam out from under the rock to show themselves to me.

One of the few starfish we have seen, but looks more like an oversized green blob.

Don't touch this sea urchin with his sharp spikes, growing near some orange and green blobs. When the sun is out, the colors really show up.

We spent a week in this bay and it seemed the sun loved to shine on the white sand and palm trees.

Another perfect sunset.

Later in the week the clouds moved in, but still the sun shines on the palms on the beach.

The sun was turning the sea and clouds pink and orange as it poked through a hole in the clouds before setting this night.  Hanamoenoa bay is a very special place!