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Marquesas, Tuamotus & Society Islands

brandibak

By brandibak,
in Paul Gauguin Cruises

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brandibak

brandibak

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Hello~ We are on the Jan. 4, 2014 14 day cruise of Marquesas, Tuamotus & Society Islands.

I have excursions planned w/ Ato in Fakarava & Patrick in Bora Bora. Taking the advice of members here and renting a car in Moorea as well. This board has been a wonderful source of info...thank you!

 

I am looking at the Jet Ski Tour in Huahine w/ Marc, has anyone done this? Is there a better Jet Ski Tour to take on another island?

 

Does anyone have recommendations for the Marquesas Islands for excursions or even things to do on our own?

 

I have a Roll Call going but not much action there yet with the exception of Gatorboy & his group who are also booked on the Ato & Patrick tours.

 

One more thing...Is this cruise during "Holiday" for school children? Not that I would mind just wondering. We went to Fiji last year in mid-January & it seemed that we had just missed it.

 

Thanks in advance for your time & advice!

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Wendy The Wanderer

Wendy The Wanderer

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Well, if you're going to all four of the islands I went to in the Marquesas, each is a different situation. I think there was only two where you could do much on your own.

 

On the big island, Nuku Hiva, you could just wander around town, shop and see the cathedral. But we took a jeep tour over the mountains, and I'd definitely recommend that.

 

On Hiva Oa I think there was a shuttle that took you into town to see the museum and the cemetery (Gauguin, Jacques Brel.) Again, we took a 4x4 tour out to the other end of the island, pretty.

 

In fact, we took 4x4 trips on three islands, the third on Ua Huka, but not on Fatu Hiva. We just wandered up the road ogling the amazing rock formations, rubbernecking and shopping, then came back for the performance that the locals put on for us.

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DesertSkies120

DesertSkies120

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Brandibak, you do not seem to have gotten a really specific answer to your jetski question, so I am going to take a stab at it.

 

First, a couple of questions for you: Why are you considering a jetski tour? Is it because you just particularly like jetskis? Or because you think it would be a good way to tour the island from offshore? Do you have much experience with jetskis?

 

I did the jetski of Bora Bora offered through PG. I had no real previous experience on a jetski, though I have ridden motorcycles for 20 years. NOT the same, it turns out! I found that I spent so much time concentrating on actually steering the jetski that I saw little of the island itself. As I said in my review of my cruise, I saw mostly the water in front of me, not the island. And though the guys who guided the tour spoke good English, there was no "guiding" to be done since there was no talking between jetskis while in motion. Any noteworthy sights that we flew past went unremarked upon, so we knew nothing about what we were (or were not) seeing.

 

I saw several jetski tours on the lagoon in Moorea. The lagoon there was somewhat smoother (always weather dependent). We also saw at least one jetski tour that went outside the lagoon into the open ocean to chase whales (Dr Poole went ballistic, and rightly so).

 

In Huahine, we did an independent all-day version of Marc's Motu Picnic tour. I highly recommend this, far more than any jetski tour in Huahine. The second half of the Motu Picnic tour was by motorized outrigger, so we got a really good view of the island from the water. And we made several stops, including at a shark feeding. The first half of the tour, a land portion, was also great fun. For the price, you will get far more bang for your buck in Huahine doing the Motu Picnic Tour.

 

Having done the jetski tour in Bora Bora, I would not do a jetski tour again, period. Too costly on a dollars per minute basis, too little "seeing" and too much "driving", and I have been persuaded that it is environmentally too disruptive.

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brandibak

brandibak

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Thank you for more great info on excursions...so many choices!

 

Desertskies120...thank you for putting so much time & detail into the review of your 10 day cruise! Excellent information for those of us who have never been on PG.

 

As far as The Jetski Tour in Huahine - we have a full day tour with Patrick in Bora Bora & have rented a car in Moorea so Huahine was the only other option that we seen for this type of tour. We have driven Jetskis many times, we live in Alaska & find it comparable to driving a snow machine.

We were torn between the Motu Picnic & the Jetski tour with Marc but we don't want to do similar excursions....same thing, different island.

 

It is spendy but with 2 of us on 1 Ski it works out to about the same as any other excursion, Marc's tour is a little longer than the PG tour. It is a plus to ride double so that way we can switch off driving & sightseeing. I did get the impression from Marc that it's a "relaxed" tour.

 

I personally don't feel that it is environmentally disruptive as it is a jet vs having a prop. I agree that it was a bad choice to chase whales in the open water. Or really to harass wildlife of any kind!

 

Thanks again for your advice & information!

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ALB0711

ALB0711

Posted
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We did jet ski tours in both Bora Bora and Moorea, sounds like neither is an option for you - but for what it's worth Bora Bora was by far the better tour for us. In Bora Bora you go all the way around the island, the views along the way are incredible and you could see sting rays and other sea life under you as your went around the lagoon. My wife and I were both beginners, she ended up doing most of the driving because she was having so much fun catching air when going over the wakes of the other riders. In Moorea we went about half way around and then we had to turn around and go back becaue at some point you have to exit the lagoon and enter open water if you want to circumnavigate Moorea. We were told by others that the swells and currents were strong outside of the lagoon.

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CIRCUSGIRL

CIRCUSGIRL

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Brandibak, you do not seem to have gotten a really specific answer to your jetski question, so I am going to take a stab at it.

 

First, a couple of questions for you: Why are you considering a jetski tour? Is it because you just particularly like jetskis? Or because you think it would be a good way to tour the island from offshore? Do you have much experience with jetskis?

 

I did the jetski of Bora Bora offered through PG. I had no real previous experience on a jetski, though I have ridden motorcycles for 20 years. NOT the same, it turns out! I found that I spent so much time concentrating on actually steering the jetski that I saw little of the island itself. As I said in my review of my cruise, I saw mostly the water in front of me, not the island. And though the guys who guided the tour spoke good English, there was no "guiding" to be done since there was no talking between jetskis while in motion. Any noteworthy sights that we flew past went unremarked upon, so we knew nothing about what we were (or were not) seeing.

 

I saw several jetski tours on the lagoon in Moorea. The lagoon there was somewhat smoother (always weather dependent). We also saw at least one jetski tour that went outside the lagoon into the open ocean to chase whales (Dr Poole went ballistic, and rightly so).

 

In Huahine, we did an independent all-day version of Marc's Motu Picnic tour. I highly recommend this, far more than any jetski tour in Huahine. The second half of the Motu Picnic tour was by motorized outrigger, so we got a really good view of the island from the water. And we made several stops, including at a shark feeding. The first half of the tour, a land portion, was also great fun. For the price, you will get far more bang for your buck in Huahine doing the Motu Picnic Tour.

 

Having done the jetski tour in Bora Bora, I would not do a jetski tour again, period. Too costly on a dollars per minute basis, too little "seeing" and too much "driving", and I have been persuaded that it is environmentally too disruptive.

 

I agree 100% with Desert Skies. We were told by both Jean Michel Cousteau and Dr Poole's collaborator, who took us on an excursion, that the jet skis were unregulated and could go as fast as they wanted and were devastatingly disruptive to marine life.

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J-D

J-D

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... As far as The Jetski Tour ... I personally don't feel that it is environmentally disruptive as it is a jet vs having a prop. I agree that it was a bad choice to chase whales in the open water. Or really to harass wildlife of any kind!

 

I agree 100% with Desert Skies. We were told by both Jean Michel Cousteau and Dr Poole's collaborator, who took us on an excursion, that the jet skis were unregulated and could go as fast as they wanted and were devastatingly disruptive to marine life.

 

Despite the risk of inciting flaming, as someone with some knowledge about noise effects on wildlife, I feel compelled to comment. There have been several substantive papers in the scientific literature documenting how highly disturbing jet-skis are to various marine mammals. For summaries of a few of those papers, see the following:

 

http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0025315408000908

 

http://gsm-ev.de/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/koschinski-ascobans2008.pdf

 

http://dx.doi.org/10.1578/AM.31.1.2005.133

 

Although jet-skis are small and emit noise near and above the water surface, some of their sound does propagate down into the water and to a considerable distance. Most if not all marine mammals are sensitive to underwater noise. Also, the erratic movements and rapidly varying sound (underwater and in-air) are probably equally or more problematic than the average sound level. Other things being equal, marine mammals tend to respond more strongly to fluctuating stimuli (acoustic or otherwise) than to steady stimuli, and jet-skis produce strongly fluctuating sound and visual stimuli. Disturbance of marine mammals by jet-skis can extend to quite a long distance (hundreds of metres, and probably farther), and thus can occur even if animals are far enough way to be unnoticed by the jet-ski riders.

 

Also, disturbance by jet-skis is not limited to marine mammals. For example, it has also been shown to be a problem for some waterbirds:

 

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/07438140309353986

 

I will not get into the issue of annoyance to other humans (aside from the jet ski riders).

 

John

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brandibak

brandibak

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J-D - thank you for the links, we will look into this more now that we are informed! I assumed a Jetski would be ok as it is smaller than a boat & had no prop to worry about! I actually never thought about the noise being a disturbance but it totally makes sense now that you have brought it up.

In Alaska & on the North Slope where I work we are trained to respect wildlife & strive to reduce our impact on them!

Very enlightening...thanks again.

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DesertSkies120

DesertSkies120

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I am glad that JD posted all those links. Another issue with jetskis is "carbon footprint", something that many people are more conscious of these days. Dr Poole made this comparison: His boat carries about 15 to 20 people using a single engine (an engine that runs steadily or idles slowly, minimizing noise disturbance). Jetskis carry just two people per engine. To carry 15 people would require 8 jetskis and thus 8 engines. A significantly greater carbon footprint. I'd even bet that the fuel consumption (gallons per hour) is less with Dr Poole's one boat than it is for 8 jetskis.

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J-D

J-D

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Posted (edited)
... noise being a disturbance but it totally makes sense now that you have brought it up. In Alaska & on the North Slope where I work we are trained to respect wildlife & strive to reduce our impact on them! Very enlightening...thanks again.

 

I should also have given, in my earlier post, the link to a recently-published paper by C. Erbe on measurements of underwater noise from jet-skis:

http://dx.doi.org/10.1121/1.4795220

This paper is open-access so anyone can download the full paper via the "Download PDF" link. As in most acoustics papers, there is a lot of technical terminology. However, the final conclusion is clear: "Even though [jet-skis] are quieter underwater than boats, the sound pressure level might not be a good indicator of the bioacoustic impact....[jet-skis] have unique operational characteristics (e.g., continually leaving and re-entering the water, persistent changes in speed hence noise level and pitch, repetitive smacking of ... hulls against the water, tendency to circle in one spot for long times) that make their noise more annoying than that of other motorized vessels."

 

Regarding Alaska generally and the North Slope in particular, that is one of the first areas of the world where noise disturbance to marine mammals became a major conservation issue, over 30 years ago. It remains so to this day, e.g., with regard to humpback whales in Southeast Alaska, bowhead whales off the North Slope, and beluga whales in Cook Inlet. The underwater noise issues in Alaska mainly concern noise from shipping (including cruise ships in Southeast Alaska) and from oil industry activities.

 

My apologies for leading this thread off topic. It must be time to revert to the original subject -- Marquesas, Tuamotus & Society Islands.

 

John

Edited by J-D
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