Final blog post: Last night at Le Taha'a

My final blog post for this blog:

Today is the last day at Le Taha'a! i got up, and went to work right away. I snuck away for a bit to go get something to eat and then went back to work. For lunch I had a good cheeseburger, fries, and what they call Taha'a cup for dessert. Its a big cup of ice cream, chocolate, whipped cream, and sliced bananas, aka amazing.

I got to see the kitchen today and the chefs. It was cool to see them do their work. I snapped a few photos and got to see some of the desserts the pastry chef was working on for tonight. I watched him use a blow torch to heat up some sugar ring so it would stick to the plate better. it was impressive to watch.

After that we did some snorkeling at the coral gardens. It was really cool to see the fish one last time. Too bad we didn't have better sun today because those fish are so dang friendly.

We also went into the pool for a while after that to cool down and snap some pics. I tried to do my bubble smoke rings but i wasn't doing too well. I need to practice that more to get better.

We went to the buffet and dance show tonight. It was really cool to see the traditional tahitian dancers preform and to listen to the traditional live music. I snapped a lot of photos of them, some of the shots came out pretty nice I think. It is always a challenge when you shoot something new that you haven't shot before, but mid way through I figured out a good configuration for the type of shooting. They also had a fire dancing show which was really cool to watch.

For dinner I had a whole bunch of tuna sashimi, taro, chicken, beef, pork, seared tuna steak…. sushi… I ate a lot. I tried each of the desserts.. all of them were awesome. Once we get back to mat's house I am going to train so hard haha. I might even run again lol.

This is the end of my first month here. Writing this blog has been fun but wow it takes a lot of my time at night! I'm yawning as I write this.. and I have to be up in 5 hrs to work! I wish I could keep writing this blog during my whole three month stay but I don't think it's possible. I need sleep so I don't miss my 6am local time meetings.

If you want to know what I am up to just send me a message:)

Thanks for reading,
Chris

Working Monday

This AM I worked from home from the bungalow again. I got quite a bit of work done which felt good. The internet connection was pretty smooth today.. Even in the rain. I had a long call this morning over VoIP with my team, luckily they were able to hear me clearly. The internet connection on this small motu is connected over a wireless link. When it rains the connection goes to crab since water is interfering. 

I shot quite a few more pics today around the resort. For lunch mat and I ordered room service so we didn't have to walk to the restaurant. We are so spoiled now haha. I'm ready to go back to the simple life of bread and pasta at le presek'ile (peninsula). I've been having so many desserts lately, I can't wait to start training again ha. I tried to take a nap today but failed. Mat went out on his own to do air pics and also to shoot some videos too. He worked on editing some kind of video most of the evening and night. I heard the same song played 100 times today while he was editing the video.

After lunch we hung out for a while while the weather was bad and then once it cleared up we went to the garden corals to check out the fish. Mat grabbed me some fins that he thought were my size, but once getting in the water and smashing my feet into them i realized they were not. I stuck out the pain as long as I could and then i went in to get a different pair hah. I was really stoked about this snorkel because I actually saw an octopus. He was changing colors and had himself held down into a hole in the ground. I really wanted him to come out so i could get  better pic, but anytime i got close to him he would cram himself deeper into the hole. As I would swim away (or up current rather) he would slowly poke his head up. He would actually poke his head up faster if he saw that I wasn't looking at him. Those creatures are so smart. I snapped  a few pics of the guy and then left him alone. 

I swam over to more corals and started to take some pics of the fish. The fish greet you like a long lost relative at this spot. I let some bread out and it was like sharks swarming a school of fish. I had to be careful that the big parrot fish didn't bite me! they were swimming all around me, coming so close and even swimming between my legs and under my fins lol. Those fish actually bite on coral reef and chew it.. so you can imagine if one bit you, it would be a bad thing. The funny thing about these fish and taking photos of them is that they actually get too close to your lens to get decent shots of them. This is a problem I've never had before when shooting fish.

I shot them for a while and then headed back to the resort. I saw the fenced off shark that some local squatter has there. He charges tourists to see the shark. I wanted to go into the water at night and bust the shark out of the cage.. Mat doesn't want to deal with the locals though, I don't blame him.. but i really do want to bust that shark out of the cage. 

Once I got to the resort I jumped in the pool and swam up to the swim up bar. I ordered a virgin pina colada (of course) and took some photos of the bar. The pineapple here tastes so amazing so as you can imagine the drinks are great too. 

I went for another sunset paddle. This time mat was the photographer. It was so beautiful out there again. the white sand around the point is insane. I even tried to catch some of the current swell that came though the lagoon sine it was so shallow. didn't really catch any though as they were too small.

For dinner we went over to the restaurant, we both had duck. It was pretty good. I think the lamb chops I had yesterday were a lot better though. For dessert I had the molluex (spelt wrong), it was amazing as usual. So much chocolate and ice-cream flavor in such a small amount of food. 

After dinner we came back to the room and hung out. i fed the fish some cockroaches from the deck (4 to be exact). It is quite entertaining for me to watch the fish eat the bugs for some reason. I also tried to chum some sharks with beef leftovers from lunch but failed :). There were hundreds of the spike nosed fish all around the bungalow again tonight. I slammed the paddle down next to some and they all jumped at the same time all around the water. They get scared so easily. It rained pretty hard for a bit and now its clear again. Rain is very fickle here compared to cali. It will rain here for a minute and then its gone 10 minutes later with the sun being out. Back in cali we usually have cold weather and rain all day or for days, but not nearly as hard as the rain is here in French Polynesia. 

One more full day to go before we fly back to Tahiti!

Sunday in paradise.

Like usual we had another awesome day in paradise. We woke up a bit later, I think at 7:30am. We had breakfast which was so good again. I had a ton of fruit today, so good. I wish I could get the same fresh fruit and juices back home in cali.

After we ate we went back to the room and messed around on the computer. Editing pics and stuff like that. We sent in our laundry today, which was much needed. As I had expected they used a drier for my tshirts, and now they look faded lol. I never dry my shirts, and its crazy how one time can make them fray and fade so quick.

I asked a good friend of mine back home to pick up some surfboards i left at the repair shop, he was nice enough to do that for me. It would suck to have them get sold or something since I lef them there for so long. I also started to think about what the heck to do with all of my mail and the gardening work my house is going to need from the crazy storms back home.

We had lunch with Rani again today. I had the mahi mahi burger, so good! The tropical presentation of the food here is really cool here. The flowers and leafs are a nice touch.

I edited the title of my blog since I am now going to be staying here in French Polynesia for another two months.. I could register a new blog domain... but I don't think i'll be blogging as often. this is a lot of work!

For dinner we decided to have room service, such a good idea. I had rack of lamb, and it was to die for. I've never really ate that before but wow it was good.

Time to goto sleep... I have to be up early for another fun meeting. woooo.

Pics & SUP in front of Bora Bora

I got up at 6:30am today. I wanted to get down to the breakfast. I was really hungry, which isnt a surprise to anyone who knows me. after breakfast I went back to the room and got ready. we went over to the royal villa, the nicest room on the island (3k per night) to check it out. that room was insane! This is the kind of place a movie star would stay in. The flowers they had all over the room and on the beds really adds a nice touch. The place has two bathrooms, a outdoor bath tub under palm trees, a backyard, with private pool, and access to a white sand beach right behind it. Such amazing views. its like looking at a painting or picture on a wall somewhere. A friend of mine saw pics of where I was and said wow, it looks like paradise, and mat corrected him. He said "this is paradise" and wow, he is right.

After the villa I went over to the pool area where a guy with a ton of tahitian tattoos was doing demonstrations. I took a few pics of him, the band, and of a girl who was there doing some demonstrations as well. The guy with the tats has a pretty crazy looking face. He has tattoos all over his face and body. tongue piercings, and a big bone that goes through his ear. He used a machette to cut open some coconuts, and even gave me one as I was shooting, but I couldn't hold it so I gave it to Rani.  After that we had lunch with Rani and then after that I went back to the room to take a nap. I've been so exhausted that I think I am getting sick. I'm living in both time zones (for my work) and i think it is catching up with me. If I had been doing this blog I would be feeling even worse since typing takes a while!

After the nap Rani paddled over on a SUP so we could do some sunset shots with her paddling in front of bora bora. The sunset wasn't too great because there was too many clouds so we just hung out there by the white sand for a while. Rani gave me the SUP and I paddled out for a while. I saw some really cool sting rays that looked like small manta rays. they were covered in spots, almost like a wildcat, but with black spots. Mat took pics of me as I paddled, hopefully one turned out, but I haven't seen them yet. I'm really far behind on editing pics. I have so much to do! I paddeled out all the way until the reef was too shallow to continue. Sure enough right as I turn around the wind picks up so I got to paddle upwind! It was so glassy to on my trip across the lagoon. The white sand in this area, or on the whole island for that matter is unreal. it seems os perfect that it almost makes you think that they brought the sand here, but actually it is natural.

After SUP we got ready and then went to dinner. I had some kind of tuna thing called tartar, tahitian chicken, which had a nice sauce, and then for dessert I had a sundae.

I'm back in the room now, and about to crash!