The End of the Cruise

May 15, 2022, the final day of the cruise, brought us to Moorea. We were really glad that we had spent some time there at the beginning of this vacation because visiting the island for only a few hours would be kind of a shame.

We took a swim in the morning, in Cook’s Bay, where the ship was docked. Whenever you see a promotional piece on the Wind Spirit, or of Windstar in general in fact, you’ll see her moored in Cook’s Bay.

Mary kept on hanging out in the water off the back of the boat, for a total of five hours. I wanted to sort of say farewell to this island I became so fond of, so I booked the photo excursion that took us to the highlights. We stopped at the Belvedere, of course, and at one of the marae that Mary and I had visited before, but the light that had made it look so enchanting before had left.

Ink and wash of Cook's Bay, Moorea — View of Cook’s Bay from a plantation high in the hills of Moorea

Debarkation, Tahiti

Overnight the ship made the quick hop to its berth in the harbor at Pape’ete. We woke up at 6:15, left our packed luggage outside our stateroom door, and went for a COVID test so we could re-enter the US.

We now had a long wait for our flight back home. We had some onboard credit, so we put it toward a tour of Tahiti. Here is where we saw a waterfall, a grotto, and a quite impressive marae with two large stone tikis, the geldings I told you about before. After all those wonderful places we had just been, it was kind of a yawn. The tour guide was interesting: a fashionable young woman who I had a feeling would rather have been working in a nice office booking vacations and making deals. Her tattoos were of the tastefully placed variety, but in the Polynesian style.

view of Moorea at sunset — Moorea at sunset

We were dropped off at the Hotel Intercontinental where we stayed overnight. The next day we were able to hang out at the hotel and enjoy the pool. At around 6 pm we caught a taxi to the airport, and then began the grueling trip back: first to San Francisco, stopping off in Chicago (!), finally to Raleigh. We arrived in Raleigh too late to drive back home, so we stayed overnight at the hotel where we’d parked the car.