SIX

There IS a reason for this photo being posted

(besides the non-obvious, which will be explained in a minute). 

My good friend Sam, at Compound Eye of a Dragonfly (though she is sooooo much more than a blog) TAGGED me (my first tag!) (I think!) to post the 'sixth' picture on my computer, or something like that. Which was a problem initially, because I have soooo many photo files/folders on my laptop, which to choose?

Finally I just did the easiest and went into iPhoto... and this gem turned up in slot #6.

And now, the caption:

Wife #2, Leigh, Wife #1

InterContinental Resort, Papeete, Tahiti, French Polynesia

And NOW, the explanation:

Went to Tahiti/Moorea and New Zealand with Eva and Sari in May of 2005 (Best trip EVER!). I had spent 7 weeks in French Polynesia and the Cook Islands the previous summer (working for Princess), and kinda knew my way around. What I did NOT know my way around were the island hotels, however; I knew good ones were not cheap, and I'd been lucky to have had my lodging taken care of in 2004 (either onboard or at the Le Meridien resort en route), but we were on a budget this time around so I pre-booked minor pension lodgings before we got there...

and we sure didn't want to pay for a hotel the morning we got there (2:45 am arrival), so had planned to just chill at the airport until daybreak (islanders get up early). LUCKILY, though, Eva and I were apparently looking foxy enough at 2:45 am for a young man to chat us up in the customs/passport line... which resulted in us staying at his schnazzy digs at the Intercontinental Resort, instead. Ohhhh, yeahhhh.

Now, STOP JUDGING. This young man was Leigh, and I'd actually talked to him in line to board our plane in Los Angeles (well, he'd talked to me... I just said "uh huh" and nervously walked off, I'm not used to handsome strangers making conversation). In the passport line, we found out he was from New Zealand (score!), was leaving on the same flight to Auckland in two days' hence (double score!), could take us around Auckland before we flew on to Christchurch later that same day (triple score!), AND, offered to share his hotel with us that morning (score, score, score!). (Not that kind of score, get your mind out of the gutter).  We hesitated for a minute... and then the fatigue won out, so we followed Leigh. 

Now, I do have a filter, and I am also not stupid. Pretty street-smart on the whole. I know that it looks idiotic that we went off with a strange guy, but 1) if you MET Leigh, you'd understand how he's really just an affable older brother, and 2) Eva and I would be a pretty strong duo in a tussle. Oh, and 3) this was well before the movie "Taken" had come out, which has ruined me for traveling forever even though I'm not a cute young leggy blond.

And... turned out to be a very, very good decision. In all honesty, we ran into a few sketchy situations in our 27 hours on Tahiti, and Leigh was like a guardian angel that had been sent to keep us safe. And plus we got to stay at the Intercontinental Resort!

Leigh got a good exchange out of it, too-- got to meet some classy young Mormon gals (his previous encounters were with a couple girls on a plane he'd chatted up... which Eva and I, after some questioning, eventually concluded to have been sister missionaries. It tipped us off when he said "How come you two aren't wearing skirts, too?" Ohhh, Leigh.)

And, he got numerous photos with his first two wives, the above photo being one of the first -- As we were all getting to know each other hanging out on the balcony of the hotel room, Leigh shared with us his deep-down desire to someday have seven wives and travel around in a Zeppelin with them. (Ohhh, Leigh.) So for the rest of our stay, he referred to us as his wives. I was the First Wife, of course. 

The view from our hotel balcony (below) -- how gorgeous is that??

The story of our Papeete lodgings doesn't end here, though.

Leigh went on ahead to Moorea, and we stayed behind in Papeete to pick up Sari from the airport at dawn the following morning, planning to meet him in Moorea (we were going there anyway) at noon or so (just a ferry ride over).

And once again-- THANK THE HEAVENS FOR LEIGH.

I am no princess, and I knew cheap lodging wouldn't be at all fancy on Tahiti, but there is NO WAY I was prepared for the conditions of the Hotel Josephine, across the 'street' from the airport, DON'T EVER STAY THERE.

Our private room had a futon bed with dirty sheets, no lock on the door, a flickering light and another fixture with a burned-out bulb, and a 'closet' with one shelf in it, some bugs, and a black plastic bag on the floor that we figured must contain a severed head or the like. The community bathroom was so disgusting I couldn't even go in it (and I'm the stronger stomach of the two of us), but Eva told me the bathtub was coated with black gunk. All that for SIXTY-FIVE DOLLARS PER NIGHT.

Here I am barfing at the disgustingness of it all. (photo on the right)

And here I am, below, pointing at the blood stain-- yes, BLOOD STAIN-- on my "pillow".

Grody grody gross. 

We quickly determined that we would NOT stay there for two nights (Josephine was pretty pissed that I demanded a refund for the second night, but her stink-eye and French mutterings didn't phase me)-- we'd rather be up all night on the streets of Papeete waiting for our 3am flight to NZ, than to stay in that hell-hole. We had to get some sleep before getting Sari, though, so we went into town to get crepes, stayed out as long as we could, then came back and muscled up for the four hours we had to kill before dawn. For Eva, this involved bundling up so that her skin was as well-protected as possible. It was in the high 80's and humid, by the way. She didn't care. 

I didn't really sleep at all that night, because I'd given Eva my ear plugs (so no bugs would crawl in hers) and my earphones/music didn't quite do the job of drowning out the barking dogs outside and reveling youth hostelers inside (just on the other side of our slat-shutter door and interior "window".  I think I slept with all my valuables, too.

The second 4:45 am came, we ran out of there (literally-- RAN ... luckily the dogs were asleep so we didn't get nipped at the ankle) in our pajamas, down the alley and across the street to the airport, where we brushed our teeth and changed clothes in the public restroom.  And told Sari, when she arrived, that we were catching the 6am ferry to Moorea, where...

THIS was waiting!!

I don't quite remember how we had masterminded this kind of reunion, because we certainly didn't have cell phone access/contact there, but we found our way to the Moorea Intercontinental and to Leigh's 'private' beach bungalow, where there was a note under a rock on the railing that said he'd gone surfing and how to find the key he'd hidden.

SCORE, again!!

Another view of the resort on this picturesque island (Moorea is maybe my favorite of the Society Island group, with Bora Bora a close second)

How grateful we were to Leigh. And how grateful he was that we surprised him with Sari, so he could now have THREE wives. 

EPILOGUE

The four of us went back to Papeete that night to catch our 2am flight to Auckland, did NOT stay at the Hotel Josephine, also didn't pay for a room at the IC Resort, but the good people of the ICR (swayed by Leigh's charm) let us hang out on their grounds (on lounge chairs by the sandy-bottom pool) and kept our luggage for us. Then we got to the airport and found out it had long padded benches to lay on and was much warmer. Oh, well.

Leigh's brother picked us up at the airport in Auckland (boy, was HE surprised to find out he was picking up four, not one) and we spent the day there with Leigh as a tour guide before finding our way to the airport once again.

Sari, Eva, Leigh, Jennie.... Takapuna beach, North Island New Zealand

HOTEL EPILOGUE:

In Hamner Springs (central South Island) we stayed in a "Homestay" (pretty cool NZ tradition). Nice German couple, great (warm!) room, comfy beds (esp. for Sari, who hadn't slept in 48 hours or so), delicious breakfast at their kitchen table the next morning. I recommend the experience.

Westport, on the west coast of the South Island-- the private room of the hostel wasn't fancy, but provided shelter from the hail storm and we made do, exhausted after the terror of driving on the opposite side of the car on the opposite side of the road on a snowy mountain pass across the southern alps to cross to the other side of the island. Skeery!

(we're just so pretty)

Best of all... our hotel 'suite' in Christchurch, the final night of our whirlwind five-day trip. Astounding how much luggage we had for five days (but we were dealing with two different seasons, come on... as it was, we wore the same thing every day)

AND NOW, AFTER ALL THAT... I'm going to make my first tag effort. Tagging SIX people to do the same (post their sixth photo on their computer on their blog), novel-length explanations not necessary.

I tag...

A Little Sass

The Moh you Know

Selene's Things

Carot-Tops are Green

Stacy Smack

88 Miles per Hour

and really, anyone else who wants to.