Experiments in Tourism

Moorea, Society Islands, French Polynesia

Like we said, we’re moonlighting as “normal tourists” in the Society islands.  So what do normal tourists do?  No, that isn’t rhetorical or a clever way to intro this blog entry.  Really, what do they do?

While we are, at this point, arguably at least relatively well traveled, we really haven’t done a lot of “tourist-ing.” (is that a word?)  Packaged tours aren’t really our forte and why pay for a walking tour of Venice when you can wander around it all by your dang self to find the local’s dance club?  Our method of exploring a place is best compared, in Greg’s twisted gamer mind at least, to a random encounter roll.  A hold over from his Dungeons and Dragons days…

Tiffany: “Oh, look Greg, there went half the freaking audience in three words or less!”

Greg: “No, no wait, it’s cool!”

Sigh…anyway, the idea is that you find places with a propensity to be interesting and you wander around them until you have a random encounter with someone or something noteworthy.  Hopefully you don’t end up eaten by an ice dragon or beholder or something.

Tiffany:  “If you didn’t understand that last sentence, don’t worry.  You aren’t alone.”

Greg: “You’re the one who married me dude.”
(dude is a gender neutral term to Californians, just FYI)

While not exactly suited to speed touring through Europe, it does have its benefits.  However it is not the environment we currently find ourselves in right now. So…um…tours!  Yes, tourists go on tours!  Brilliant!

The first thing we discover – you know all those mountains in the previous entry or two?  Kind of odd right?  If the island was formed by a volcano, then there should be just the one mountain right?

There is only one mountain.

Which, at least explains why there are so many pretty flowers and tropical fruit all over the place.  Volcanic soil is good that way.

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(Oooooohhh new feature: Slide Shows!!  You should be enthralled with our new technological mastery 😉

Next we went to a heritage sight where we found how the Polynesians made war paint…and lipstick.  Because really, when you get right down to it how much of a difference is there between the two?

(to be cont’d)