Neverneverland VI

Neverneverland part VI – Moorea   AKA   A wee temper tantrum followed by bliss.

View (up) from 3-coconut-tree-pass...
some peaks you just admire from below. 

No.  -  I don’t want to be here, on my last island.

NO.  -  I don’t want to have to go home afterwards.

NO!!!  -  I don’t want to grow up.

This photo may be a bit grainy but even a perfectly clear shot would likely not capture the rapture!

My hostel here has the feel of a cottage. I am sharing a huge ocean view room with two other women who are also travelling on their own and though we often go our own ways during the day we start together sitting on the dock side by side to watch the sunrise and finish together with a snorkel, a lazy beer or two, and a late meal.

I freely acknowledge that I am not going to summit any of the mountains here and so instead hike happily up to 3-coconut-tree-pass from where I can see both sides of the island and the horizon stretching off to infinity.

On my last day I swim with the whales. They are humpback whales, each the size of six elephants. They come up for a breath every 20 minutes or so and then sink back down into the water to relax; they are here for 6 months and will not eat at all during that time so spend much of it being still. They are huge and silent and oh so majestic. And we float up above them suspended, mesmerized, entranced, in awe…

I will pack up my stuff, start the slow trip back home, and hope I can remember.

And, perhaps, I will end my blog for this year here, with the blue sky above and the behemoths below. Humpbacks are like me, they only sing when they are alone, but, despite the silence, my soul is full of song and I am infused with a peace that words cannot describe.

With the possible exception of having brought my middle son along with me for part or all of the time, I would not, even if I could, change one single day of the past five months. I have not, I fear, learnt anything about myself. But I am thrilled to have been. And that, for now, is good enough.