Woke up in Daniel's Bay to sunshine--I could get used to this! Ben made an awesome breakfast of rice pudding, then we set off with Osprey to find this hike.
The guidebook was a little vague about how long the hike was; it said 2 hours but we had no idea if that was one way or round trip, so we planned for 2 hours one way. The actual location of the trailhead was also a little vague, so we wandered around for a little while trying to cross the river because we didn't want to traipse through anyone's yard (We had no idea there would be so many houses since there isn't really a road connecting this part of the island to anywhere else). It was also a little vague about the quality of the tail and the direction. It merely said "follow the river to the waterfall".
What looked like a driveway did turn out to be the road, which turned into the trail to Vaipo Waterfall--so we ended up traipsing around people's yards anyways. There were so many crabs living in tunnels that it seemed like gopher holes in some places near the river.
The hike to the waterfall probably took us more than 2 hours, since we stopped for pictures so often. It's amazing to walk down a road past house after house and suddenly see a rock wall built pre-European contact with a tiki sitting on it staring at you. The whole hike was littered with remnants of the past civilization--we found what was probably a sacrificial temple of some sort and possibly a bbq pit for their pigs and goats.
The trail gradually narrowed from the initial rutted dirt road to a pretty wide, still maintained trail, to a little bit narrower, rockier, rootier trail, to a footpath. Every so often instead of "following the river" we had to cross it. About 2/3 of the way to the waterfall it starting pouring buckets and buckets of rain; between that and crossing the river we were pretty soaked.
Once we got to the end of the trail you couldn't quite see all of the waterfall, just a little bit near the bottom. It was still impressive though. After turning around we found a little rock overhang that sheltered us from the rain to eat some snacks before heading back to the boat.
On the way back the rain let up, but that meant the mosquitos came out. I hope Tahitian mosquitos like me less than the Marquesian ones, because I got eaten alive and am pretty itchy.
During the downpour, we were a little worried about the boat staying dry since I had hung some laundry and we couldn't remember if we closed all the hatches before leaving. Even though it rained cats and dogs while hiking, the bay was dry! Jory made some pretty tasty pasta for us then headed over to the beach to scope it out for a fire in the evening. While he gathered wood he managed to kill to crabs for us to cook and eat over the fire.
The beach fire was pretty rad--Brian and Richard joined us once the fire was going and later in the evening some folks from Wizard's Eye kayaked over. They have so many toys on their boat--kayaks, mini paraglider things, surfboards etc. They're actually sponsored by Kavu and some other companies so they're pretty motivated to have some awesome adventures to write home about.
The plan for the next couple of days--head back to Taiohae Bay so Jory can catch his flight on Thursday. We'll stock up on food there then head to the Tuamotus! It's about a 4-5 day passage depending on the wind, and while the Tuamotus are really awesome atolls, there's not much else there. Don't know if I'll have internet, but stay tuned!
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