Au Revoir French Polynesia

Originally posted on July 20, 2014 by cruisingrunner

Mopelia is about 4 days behind us now, and we have just under a day left to go in our ocean passage. French Polynesia was amazing in the diversity of experiences offered and in the intense beauty of some of the more remote places that sometimes you had to pinch yourself to make sure it was real. I will always have a soft spot for the island of Huahine, because it is there that I rekindled my love for running. Our next destination is the island of Suwarrow, which is in the northern island group of The Cook Islands. According to our chart, we have already crossed the international boundary, so we are no longer in French waters.

According to our guidebook, The Cook Islands are a self-governing democratic commonwealth “affiliated” with New Zealand. Apparently New Zealand handles foreign affairs, defense, and subsidizes finances. Cook Islanders are New Zealand citizens and can move freely back and forth between The Cooks and New Zealand.

New Zealand. That means they speak English. I must stop and prepare myself for this. For the first time in almost a year and half we will be in a country where we speak the language. Before we bungled French in French Polynesia, we spent a year in Mexico butchering Spanish. Yes, my Spanish is far better than my French, but that didn’t mean it still wasn’t a constant intentional effort to communicate. I’m so used to preparing for every interaction with a little studying of the phrase books and so used to dealing with the ad hoc interactions by feeling like a 3-year-old and usually resorting to asking, “Please do you speak a little English?” in the appropriate language. It seems so strange that we’ll be able to clear into the country tomorrow speaking the language we speak in our own heads.

Suwarrow is an atoll and it is also a national park, and my understanding is that our opportunities to go to the various motus will be limited, so I’m a little worried about running opportunities. I will make the best of it though, as we are supposed to have spectacular weather while we are there, good for much paddle boarding and snorkeling.

-D.