We take a early morning flight from Papeete on a 'Air Tahiti' prop plane, to the Island of 'Hiva Oa' then one hour further on to the largest Island in the Marquesas, 'Nuka Hiva'. The Marquesas are a group of mountainous Islands approximately 700 kilometers from Papeete. We learned they were the first Islands in Polynesia to be discovered by Spanish Europeans in 1595. Even though Captain James Cook visited the Islands in the late 1700's, the French claimed them...

We left Melbourne on an Emirates flight to Auckland NZ at 8 am. We did not realise how exhausted we were from stress and strain from family and business issues that we have needed to finalise in the last two weeks before we left. New Zealand to Papeete is a 5 and a half hour flight on Air Tahiti. We arrived about 10 pm the day before we left, and stayed at the Intercontinental hotel near the airport. We left very early the next morning for the Marquesas Islands....