Relaxing and Exploring tahiti

Left the hotel on Monday morning and walked to the nearby grocery store. Prices for meals and drinks at the hotels are outrageous. Picked up an interesting combination breakfast of banana smoothie, baguette, swiss cheese and seaweed salad. Then took a lengthy walk down the beach just outside the hotel and stopped at a park to enjoy our food along the shore under a tree. Ended up walking down to the nicest white sand beach on the island. Crystal clear water and mid-eighty degree temperature! Swam around for a bit, then walked back along the street towards the hotel. Stopped back at the market to grab some lunch, but they had sold out of the poisson cru (aka ceviche), so we had a panini and a some seafood spring rolls instead. Got back to the hotel and hung out at the pool with a Hinano six pack.

Met a nice couple from washington, we had seen them on our plane from NZ, they had been doing a tramping trip for a couple weeks in abel tasman and milford sound tracks. Talked with them for a few hours til the rain started, so we headed back to shower up for dinner. Decided to try the pizza place next door, which was a good choice. The same couple ended up there too, so we had dinner together.

Woke up tuesday and decided to rent a car for some island exploration. We never did see anything outside of Papeete the last time. Picked up the ultra-compact Kia around 11 and started on our way around the island. Had a map of spots to check out. First stop we enjoyed our ceviche lunch, which might have been the best ever and definitely reminded me of our last visit. Saw some cool stuff: waterfalls, gardens with amazing flowers, gnarly shore pound waves, Teahuapoo (famous surf break), blowholes and an island traffic jam.