How Do You Solve a Problem Like Moorea?

Austria this is not! Lol.  There are no problems with Moorea! From the time we woke up on our second day, the sky was beautiful, the water like clear glass and we were ready for our island tour. 

We were picked up in a very small 4x4 pick-up with the back bed refurbished as two benches with seat belts and an iron roll bar. Not really what were thinking, but going with it. Made a nice stop at one of the bays for a picture stop and then on to Magic Mountain. 

This is where it got iffy. The little truck huffed and puffed and we held on up a very little, very steep mountain road all the way to the top. Huge sigh of relief and we tried not to think about having to go back down. A short hike to the lookout (no, I didn't know there would be a hike and had on very cute leopard print flip flops) but it was worth it. A 360 view of the island! We could even see our bungalow from there! 

Pictures, pictures , pictures and it was time to head down. I had thought about this all the way up and just closed my eyes for the trip down. Next stop, pineapple fields! Very interested. It's amazing how hard the local people have to work for so little return. Unemployment is outrageously high and it doesn't go unrecognized that for a place so remote that cost a fortune to visit, very little seems to go to the local people. You would not know that many even live without electricity by their attitude. They have a joy about living, work, and relaxing that is wonderful and refreshing. No one is on cell phones here! Kids are playing outside and adults gather together mid day, businesses close for 2-3 hours and they enjoy lunch and each other. Island time! I've seen it on other islands, but they have such a welcoming nature, it's refreshing!

Next we went to a mountain lookout, beautiful.... Then to a jam factory (yum), a black pearl store (I'm not really a fan) and ended the tour tasting local fruit drinks at the Juice Distillery (even yummier)! Quite a nice time, it was a four hour tour.

Then we had Cheeseburgers for lunch at the hotel and it truly was a "cheeseburger in paradise"! 

We spent the afternoon lazily snorkeling off of our overwater bungalow. 

It was so cool. Water was crystal clear and David had so much fun with the underwater camera.

For dinner we decided to go to the Crepe Bar. They feed black tip sharks there at night and it was so neat to sit and watch them. Kinda scary that they had to swim under our bungalow to get there!! But they don't have a taste for people. All the same, it still freaked us out! We had a seafood crepe and a pineapple, coconut, chocolate for dessert. Scrumptious! Love how the French love to prepare their food, it was an event, with the chef personally delivering our crepes!

We had a long day and were in bed by 9!

Today we went to The Dolphin Experience that neither of us knew anything about. I just knew I had missed two opportunities in the past of having this activity scheduled at other places we went to and I was determined to do it. Long story short...Fantastic! But here is the long story...otherwise you probably wouldn't want to read this! 

I thought we would go in waist deep water, rub a dolphin, photo op and we were done. I was very wrong! It was an in depth, literally, life jackets for a portion on the education of these wonderful animals. You may have seen a pic ob Fb, that was a 19 year old guy that I would have compared to a dog, wanting his tummy rubbed and all. Then for he deep water portion, a 35 yr old female that was blind. She knew exactly what she was supposed to do. There is a lot of controversy over these centers and I can honestly say they are well taken care of, love the interaction, feel safe and are well fed!(we fed them) these animals are born into captivity and serve such a useful purpose to educate students as well as ...well us! We had a wonderful time!

We ended this evening with a Catamaran Sunset Cruise. The weather was not rolling in but barreling, so when we reached the activity pier, our guide, William, pronounced, Gilliam was waiting for us and immediately told us that he came because we had already had to cancel due to weather. He said you may get wet! We were in swimsuits and a cover up how bad could it be? Turned out wonderful! He bypassed the rain, we had a beautiful sunset and loved getting o know William. It was our best thing so far. So many times people travel looking for the most magnificent place to see but never really see it because they don't get to know the soul of the people. We did that tonight and it felt amazing and you know, I never even thought about my phone!

We ended the night at the Crepe Bar, another Seafood crepe and dessert crepe, banana, chocolate, coconut ice cream... It was a very good night indeed!

Relaxing tomorrow… sun, sea, sand!!!