Larson's Bay

Cyndi is here! She arrived last week and we have been exploring this beautiful, strange and interesting island. She is running Wyndmere from here, thanks to the internet, a variety of connections, and of course the wonderful people at Wyndmere who keep the place going. We ride to work together; she is established in our office library. Every day we go to lunch out by Pago Pago Harbor – well, almost; it's the rainy season and it rains a lot, so sometimes we get wet. Here's a couple photos of the views from where we hang out:

Pago Pago Harbor

Sailing past The Rainmaker (Mt. Pioa)

The ship was a Princess Cruise liner, in town for the day. The next week was the turn of the Queen Elizabeth III, on its first cruise ever, all around the world. I don't have photos of it as it was tied up to the dock all day, here's one from the net:

QE3 (stock photo)

It is considerably larger than the Princess; huge, in fact. Said to be 3 times larger than the Titanic and opulent throughout. Again, passengers from the QE roamed all over the island for a day while it was in port. We were then visited by a small French Navy vessel, La Railleuse:

La Railleuse

About 170 years ago 37 French sailors were killed and the French were driven off by Samoans. The French send a ship every year to memorialize at a place across island fittingly called Massacre Bay. The Samoans call it, I think, Tuesday. The ship comes over from Tahiti, spends about a week, then returns. Tahiti is about a thousand miles east of here, its an overseas territory of France. We plan a hike to Massacre Bay the next weekend day where the weather cooperates.

Last weekend we went out to Larson's Bay, or Fogama'a as the Samoans call it. We started from an area of blowholes and crashing waves called Turtle and Shark, named for an old Samoan legend. Here's a few photos and a couple videos from Turtle and Shark:

Guess who?

Wave action

Shoreline at Turtle & Shark

Across the coral

Cyndi's flower and beach panorama

More waves on the coral

Cyndi getting a good view

 

We then hiked up a hill, around, and then down to Larson's Bay. About a half hour hike.  The trail took us through a banana plantation, a wrong turn, and back downhill to a medium sized cove. There was no one there but us, and it was far enough off the beaten path for there to be no garbage. Here are some photos:

The beach at Larson's cove

Larson's Bay - looking out

Rocky cliff - note small arch opening

Looking back toward the west end

Cliff with palm tree - west side of cove

This cove was great – sandy beach, moderate waves, sun, palms, and complete isolation. No one was there. We had this tropical beach all to ourselves, for the price of a half-hour hike. Pretty darn nice!

Afterward we headed over to Airport Beach, passing more blowholes (I've shown a few photos in a past posting; will save this area for a full post later on). Some storm clouds were rolling in so our snorkeling was cut short here. Even so, we saw fishes only seen before in an aquarium. All in all, a nice day.

Sunday it was mass in the local church, where the choir was absolutely great, then a trip up-island all the way to Tisa's for a genuine pina colada at the beach. Cyndi got a pretty extensive tour of the island this weekend. I don't think she ever wants to return!

Next: Massacre Bay, or perhaps some other exotic adventure. Stay tuned, gentle readers.

Wait, that's Rick's flipflop, where did he go?  Will he ever return?