It almost felt like a scene out of the movie musical South Pacific. Our landing craft — a WWII vintage front-loader — alighted onto the sugar-sand beach with a soft thump, and we stepped off into the crowd of musicians and women with armfuls of flower leis.
“Bienvenue a Raivavae,” said one as I stooped to accept one of the fragrant leis, made with tiaré gardenia blossoms, basil shoots and local flora.
Raivavae (pronounced rye-vah-vah-eh), is the third stop of our tour through French Polynesia’s Austral Islands onboard the combination cargo/passenger cruise ship Aranui 5, and the arrival scene has by now become familiar: troupes of musicians with ukulele and drums, children and dogs darting between everyone’s legs, ice-cold coconuts hacked open with machetes for refreshing drinks, stalls with local handicrafts staffed by smiling women in woven palm frond hats accented with intricate flower crowns.
