This view of paradise greets travelers who arrive at Bora Bora’s Motu Mute Airport.  Photo by Gene Korte

Ia ora na!

Greetings from Bora Bora — a tiny piece of heaven in the South Pacific.

The water is impossibly blue, except for those improbable shades of green, and everywhere you turn, it is — snap, snap, snap — picture postcard perfect. James Michener, author of “Tales of the South Pacific,” thought Bora Bora was the most beautiful island of all. No wonder.

Bora Bora, which lies about 150 miles northwest of Tahiti (http://www.tahiti-tourisme.com), is about five miles long and a couple of miles wide and surrounded by a barrier reef and a lagoon. Palm-covered motus, or tiny islands, form a necklace around the main island, while native hibiscus flowers spread their lush scent on the hillsides. Some visitors come to sail and swim, snorkel and dive these amazingly clear waters. While others come to sink in the perfect sand, experience the tropical beauty and channel their inner Paul Gauguin.

Here are a few reasons why this romantic island is so magical.

TI’A MOANA

Ships that sail the South Pacific stop here. Boats that travel within the borders of French Polynesia, an area bigger than Europe, stop here. And then there’s the yacht the Ti’a Moana (http://www.bora-bora-cruises.com ) that  sails in and around Bora Bora and its Society Island neighbors — Taha’a, Raiatea and Huahine.

The Ti’a Moana is a honeymooner’s dream. In fact, most of the 38 passengers on our trip were newlyweds from France and Spain. The ship offers all outside cabins, large windows and exquisite furnishing and passengers are pampered by a well traveled and trained international staff who seemed to read our minds and catered to our every want and need, providing privacy, though there were others onboard. The food on this stylish, Tahitian-owned yacht was the best French food we’d had in years. And because the yacht is so small, it was able to maneuver into many a remote beach.

OVERWATER BUNGALOWS

The first luxury resort bungalow on stilts over the Bora Bora Lagoon appeared years ago and now there are about a dozen upmarket resorts here with this feature.  These overwater bungalows can be found in other parts of the South Pacific, but if you’ve seen photos of these unusual places, chances are they were taken in Bora Bora. Although couples show up at these resorts, they offer special family packages as well.

We stayed in an overwater bungalow at the Bora Bora Lagoon Resort  & Spa located on Motu Toopua. It’s 10 minutes from the Bora Bora airport by skiff and a few minutes across the water from Vaitape, Bora Bora’s main town.

Although there were people around at the reception desk and in the restaurant, once you’re in your bungalow, it’s only you and the tropics. We had our own private steps into the warm water of the lagoon and when daylight faded, we could see into the water through our Tahitian television, that is, our glass-top coffee table that provided illuminated views of the fish. This resort is a place where you can enjoy views of Bora Bora’s classic mountain peak, Otemanu, and treetop massages, along with a full range of spa and aquatic offerings.

HAWAIKI NUI VA’A

For centuries, Polynesian warriors have raced across the open waters of the South Pacific in their outriggers. In today’s version of the race, six-person teams compete over three days in October in the Hawaiki Nui Va’a, the Super Bowl of outrigger canoe races, http://www.hawaikinuivaa.pf/.

Contestants wear matching T-shirts and baseball hats and their outriggers are covered with advertising like Indy 500 cars. Despite the presence of sailing ships and powered support boats throttling in the open waters just a few feet away, the racers still move their oars in perfect harmony at about one stroke per second and switch sides simultaneously in practiced choreography. We watched the finish of one of the 72-mile races on the deck of the Ti’a Moana while it was moored in the harbor on the island of Raiatea.

HOW TO GET THERE:

Travelers come mostly by air, but also by sea. Bora Bora’s busy Motu Mute Airport — about 45 minutes by air from Tahiti — was built in 1942 by the United States during World War II and was French Polynesia’s first international airport. Tahiti is five hours by air from Easter Island and eight hours from Los Angeles.

Air Tahiti Nui (http://www.airtahitinui-usa.com) is the leading carrier to French Polynesia and has a half-dozen daily inter-island flights to Bora Bora from Fa’a’ā International Airport on the island of Tahiti. Check their website for special travel packages, including family rates, from the United States and other parts of the world.

LAN Airlines (http://www.lan.com) is the dominant airline in South America. It’s also the only airline, and has been since 1968, that flies from Easter Island to Tahiti with two round-trip flights per week. Fly this way from North America and you’ll be stopping at two of the world’s most exotic destinations.

LESS EXPENSIVE HOTEL OPTIONS:

Luxury yachts and resorts in Bora Bora are pricey, but French Polynesia has more than 100 islands. If you’re looking to travel here more economically, there are about 250 pensions or family hotels throughout the five island groups in Tahiti, https://tahititourisme.com/en-us/vacation-packages/

AVERAGE TEMPERATURE: In Bora Bora it’s 82 to 85 degrees year-round with water temperature in the low 80s.

Distributed by Tribune Media Services, INC. for World’s Fare Syndicate

© 2018  Diana and Gene Korte

The Bay of Islands is in New Zealand’s sub-tropical far north. This is the view there from the front porch of the luxurious Kimberley Lodge that overlooks the town of  Russell.    Photo by Gene Korte

New Zealand, a green and lush neighbor to the southeast of Australia in the Pacific Ocean, is long and narrow like California, though it’s divided into two main islands and is overall smaller than the Golden State. To illustrate, at least in part, why New Zealand with its moderate climate and thousands of miles of uncrowded coastline attracts so many visitors and wannabe immigrants, its population is 2 million versus California’s 35 million.

We  traveled from the top of the North Island in the Bay of Islands, near where the British and the native Maori signed the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840 down to Queenstown in the South Island. We visited four distinctive areas of the country in eight days. We flew over New Zealand’s interior on our way down south, sometimes crisscrossing from east to west and back again. We saw miles and miles of empty coastline and vast verdant forests with the wispy clouds that looked like the Middle-earth in the “Lord of the Rings” movies. And that’s one of the reasons we came to New Zealand — to see this new South Pacific Hollywood.

MOVIE-MAKING KIWI STYLE

While “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy is perhaps the best known of the recent movies made in New Zealand, recent additions are Tom Cruise’s “The Last Samurai” and “Whale Rider,” both filmed on the North Island and released in 2003.

Greeted in New Plymouth in the Taranaki region by a traditional Maori welcome, Cruise is a big hero here. He and his movie crew who did the filming in early 2003 brought in millions of dollars to the area and were good neighbors as well.

New Zealand was chosen as the site for the story that takes place in Japan in the 1870s, because Mount Taranaki looks like Japan’s Mount Fuji, the weather is pleasant, and it’s not crowded. Many Kiwis, as the New Zealanders call themselves, benefited from the Hollywood influx — homeowners who rented their houses to crew members, the car dealer who leased 262 Toyota RAV4s for the crew and hotels that were totally booked for months. The extra business even trickled down to Frances Rogers in nearby Waitara who raises dozens of varieties of peppers from the cool to the very hot. She said she provided a number of boxes of peppers for the movie crew.

We were in New Plymouth toward the end of the filming, while some sets were still intact. By cutting through someone’s yard (the person we were with said it was okay) and standing on the railroad tracks, we could see the Japanese village by the harbor. And in a valley outside of town, we viewed another Japanese village that was covered in “snow” on a warm early fall day. In addition to closeness to mountains, this area is on the coast and attracts surfers as well.

RIDING IN XENA’S CHARIOT AND TOURING THE `LORD OF THE RINGS’ FILM SITES IN QUEENSTOWN

Even before the number of movies increased, two long-running American TV programs — “Xena, Warrior Princess” and “Hercules” — were filmed on Bethell’s Beach near Auckland. Now you can go there and perhaps ride in a horse-drawn chariot with Xena’s stunt double. As the number of movies increase, so does the tourist interest. Ian Brodie’s “The Lord of the Rings Location Guidebook” is New Zealand’s fastest-selling book. With the guidebook in hand, visitors can explore the locations by car, jetboat, kayak, four-wheel drive, helicopter and on foot.

Queenstown in the South Island is the adventure capital of New Zealand. The first commercial bungee jump was here. We suspect locals climb the Remarkables — the local mountain range most often seen in the “Lord of the Rings” movies –for lunch. And people pay good money to skim over shallow creeks with only inches to spare at 50 miles per hour in a 12-passenger boat powered by a 350 Chevy V-8 engine. We did that. It’s called jetboating, the kind of boat ride where you hang on to your hat and clutch the heated bar with your other hand. Our ride on the Dart River took us into regions near the filming of “Amon Hen.” For those of you who have seen the movies, that’s where Merry and Pippin were captured by the Orcs near the end of the first movie, “The Fellowship of the Ring.” On a Nomad Safaris trip, we went through Arrowtown, near Queenstown, to see yet another scene from this movie. Our driver put the Land Rover into low and drove us well into the creek-like Arrow River to the spot where, according to Brodie, “The Nazgul charged as Arwen ferried Frodo across the river on Asfaloth, her Elven steed.” Looking at both scenes takes a little imagination, as special effects makes movie scenes much grander than the real thing.

NEW ZEALAND’S LUXURIOUS LODGES

High-end boutique resorts are called lodges in New Zealand. Our travels took us to four of them in addition to Auckland’s Hilton Hotel, which is shaped like a ship, on Prince’s Wharf. The surroundings, service and dining at all of these great lodges was superb, and they each offered a variety of wines predominantly from New Zealand. The capacity for each lodge is about 10 guests, and every location was a stunning one-of-a-kind place.

The Boatshed is a lodge on Waiheke Island that overlooks the bay, a weekend-in-the-country ferry ride away from Auckland. Among its suites is the out-of-the-way Lighthouse, a favorite with honeymooners. Waiheke Island is home to a number of vineyards including Stonyridge, whose LaRose Cabernet is the most expensive wine in New Zealand.

The Bay of Islands is in New Zealand’s sub-tropical far north and home to a lodge with history and another that’s reached only by ferry. The Orongo Bay Homestead on 17 acres is the home of the first U.S. consulate in New Zealand and dates back to the 1860s. Fully restored with period furniture, it’s the only certified organic lodge in New Zealand. The nearby luxurious Kimberly Lodge overlooks the town of Russell with astounding views of the Bay of Islands. Chef Virginia Holloway offers a popular cooking class that takes guests out of the kitchen to the seashore to gather mussels from the rocks, for starters.

Outside of Queenstown is a lodge called Punatapu or Sacred Waters, as it’s known in Maori. The most unusual feature of any lodge that we saw is Punutapu’s Artist in Residence program. The well-known Kiwi artist John Bevan Ford is there currently. The artist lives in a house up the hill from the lodge quarters and invites guests to his sunny studio where he demonstrates and discusses how he does his work. He also joins in at some of the meals in the lodge and adds an interesting perspective for travelers lucky enough to stay there.

INCIDENTAL INTELLIGENCE

GETTING THERE

Air New Zealand, Web page: http://www.airnewzealand.com, or (800) 369-6867. Rated among the world’s finest international airlines by travel magazine readers, ANZ offers more direct flights to the South Pacific than any other carrier, including 17 non-stop flights a week from Los Angeles to Auckland. ANZ’s South Pacific Airpass, when combined with an international ticket, allows two to 10 stopovers to destinations in New Zealand, Australia, Fiji, the Cook Islands, Tahiti, Samoa and Tonga.

Special to The Denver Post  http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_0002569878

© 2005-2014  Diana and Gene Korte

Aitutaki locals, some say the best dancers in this part of the world, perform in Rarotonga.         Photo by Gene Korte

This Polynesian paradise of more than a dozen islands was settled about 1,500 years ago, according to local oral history. In pre-missionary days, like most of their
neighbors in this part of the world, the islanders practiced cannibalism. Today most of the inhabitants are practicing Methodists.

The British Captain Cook, the namesake for the Cooks, traveled in the South Pacific several times in the 18th century, though he didn’t see as much of this island group as the mutineers on the Bounty did. Their last stop before taking off for Pitcairn Island was in the Cooks.

Aitutaki (pronounced eye-too-tock-ee), one of the main islands, is an atoll surrounded by a 27-mile, movie quality turquoise lagoon. While there, we attended the annual dance contest held at Prince Edward Hall. It was a family affair with what seemed like most of the population crowded in for an exciting night of pounding drums and shouted encouragement from the audience for the young dancers on stage. Each contestant had to perform certain prescribed movements, much like the exacting steps in an ice-skating competition.

Cook Islanders, Aitutakians in particular, usually win South Pacific dance contests. We can guess why. In the same way that families in alpine areas around the world produce fine skiers, these islanders teach their children from toddlers on up how to dance. They move their bodies with skill and speed, isolating and wiggling this group of muscles and then that group, in amazing ways.

While watching dancers at the Rarotongan Beach Resort one night, a man sitting at the next table turned to his wife and asked, ‘‘Is that possible? Can the human body do that?’’ In this part of the world, indeed, it can.

…

Distributed by Tribune Media Services, INC. for World’s Fare Syndicate

© 2011  Diana and Gene Korte

For more information, go to http://www.cookislands.travel/USA.

These screeching Tasmanian devils, once a scourge to farmers but now an endangered species, live at the private Trowunna Wildlife Park in Tasmania.         Photo by Gene Korte

Tassie, as the locals call it, is Australia’s smallest state. Blessed with four seasons, unlike the mainland, it also has hundreds of miles of dramatic coastline. This island is home to wombats and koalas, among other unusual creatures. Perhaps the most unusual of all is the small-dog-sized Tasmanian devils, because of the screaming meemies shriek they make.

Tasmania is also the last bit of land, if you’re heading south, before you reach Antarctica, 1,500 miles away.

Cradle Mountain is one of the most popular tourist destinations here, especially for what the Tasmanians call bushwalking and Northern Hemisphere residents might label hiking or a walk in the woods. As fully one-third of the island is protected temperate rainforest, there’s lots of bushwalking to go around. Perhaps Tassie’s most famous trail is the 50-mile Overland Track near Cradle Mountain.

To read the rest of the article, go to: http://www.denverpost.com/ci_0002569883?source=ARK_spot