The Marquesas Islands Nuku Hiva: Taiohae, Hatiheu and Taipivai
At first light we sail into Taiohae’s spectacular bay, a giant volcanic crater surrounded by towering cliffs. As the Aranui 5 unloads at the dock, there is a chance to explore Taiohae, the small administrative capital of the Marquesas. After a tour of the Cathedral Notre Dame, famed for its stonework and wood sculptures, we get into 4WDs and head for the hills. Taiohae Bay is where the young sailor Herman Melville jumped ship in up the same winding mountain tracks and through jungle-like valleys, we arrive at the archaeological site of Kamuihei where a troupe of dancers perform in a magical setting on an ancient stone platform beneath a giant 400-year-old Banyan tree. In the village of Hatiheu we have lunch at Chez Yvonne, one of the best restaurants in the Marquesas, where the specialty is pork baked in an underground oven as well as traditional Marquesan delicacies including breadfruit, poisson cru, taro and sweet red bananas. In the afternoon we travel to the valley of Taipivai, where Melville wrote his famous book Typee. The area is dotted with stone tiki gods, sacred ritual sites (marae) and stone platforms (paepae) where the Taipi people built their houses, as well as petroglyphs of birds, turtles and fish. Meanwhile hikers can follow a steep trail to a ridge for breathtaking views of the beautiful Anaho Bay, where the Scottish writer Robert Louis Stevenson spent three weeks during a South Seas voyage in 1888.