My Home Town

[maheanuu]

Uturoa, the Leeward Islands principal government seat and the location of the largest hospital outside of Papeete. If you look closely, you can see the 3 streets that run through the ville. The upper one at the bottom of the photo is the business bypass, the middle one is Main street and the one next to the lagoon is what we call Front de Mer. The large building next to the quay is the Tourist information Center and has a small post office plus tourist and local shops with everything from resturants to clothing, computers, cameras and supplies, sporting goods, audio, curios and of course the Black Pearl shops and other jewelry. The little thatched roof cottages to the right of gthe large building in the park are the "Fare Mamas' for the local artisans who make everything from ukuleles to carved coral and bone jewelry... Oh, and bargaining is not done, What may seem expensive to you, actually is rather reasonable considering the time and effort along with all the taxes that are added on by our local government...

I hope that you enjoy my home town..

[Celebration]

1. Where do the cruise ships sail from?

Wow that must be interesting, having all those tourists descend into that tiny town..........well, it looks tiny, and very colorful. Are you taking this picture from a hill, a building, or what?

Thanks.

[maheanuu]

2. The first photo was taken from here

This shot was taken from the Post Office and Court House parking lot. I was standing just to the right of the front tv/radio antenna on the top of the cliff between the two small bushes you see on the right side shooting back at almost a reciprocal bearing from this shot. I will try to get into town today and see about shooting some of buildings and people. Uturoa has a population of around 3500 people and the population of Island of Raiatea is approximately 12000. The Cruise Ship in the photo is the Pacific Princess and at present she is homeported (for the season) in Papeete. At present she departs from Papeete to Moorea then to Huahine and then here to Raiatea and on to Bora Bora and then returning to Papeete. Todays tourists are for the most part quite wealthy and I find them to be rather snobbish and loutish. Most feel that we are here to cater to them, and being a person that has is not of the catering type, usually time my visits to the town when they are not there... I used to talk to them, or try to, but found that 99% of them are of the Reich Wing persuasion, which means they and I have nothing in common other than each others mutual destruction.


Mt. Tapioi