One day in 1966, phosphate mining operations ceased on the island of Makatea in the Tuamotu archipelago of French Polynesia. Within a few weeks, the island’s population dwindled from over 3,000 to less than 100. In the preceding 60 years, miners hand-dug over 11.5 million tons of phosphate sand from between the coral pillars atop the island. And left it that way.
The tradesmen and laborers moved on. Some went to work in the French nuclear testing program on nearby Mororua atoll, some went to mine manganese in Vanuatu, and a few went to work in the growing tourism industry in Tahiti.
We spent a day touring Makatea with Heitapu Mai, a guide and son of the island’s mayor, Julien Mai. “Tapu” was delightful. He was easygoing, knowledgeable, had a great sense of humor, and had an infectious laugh. We rode around the island in his Mitsubishi diesel pickup. He took us to see the mining ruins, a clear-water cave, and a hike up the cliffside on a trail locals use for coconut crab hunts.
Tapu is helping to lead the charge in Makatea’s emerging eco-tourism industry. He heads the Makatea Escalade, a rock climbing association, and hosts the Vertical Adventure Festival each September.
After our island tour, Tapu arranged lunch with the island’s mayor, Julien Mai. We sat at a table on the porch of his guest house and talked about his past (he was a Polynesia dance troupe promoter), his five terms as the island’s mayor, its history, and its hopeful future.
Makatea is singularly unique as an island in the Tuamotus. The island’s vertical cliffs rise 260 feet out of the ocean. Two million years ago, the weight of nearby Tahiti and the society islands depressed the seafloor and popped Makatea up and out of the sea. You can see the pillars of what was once a massive coral garden everywhere on top of the island, 200 feet in the air.
It stands in contrast to the other atolls in the Tuamotus, which are flat, low-lying coral rings around a lagoon. Makatea is the opposite. When you make landfall, it looks like it is floating on top of the ocean.
It’s too deep to anchor there. The island provides four moorings for visiting yachts. They hope to add six more this year.
Over a million holes remain from the mining. Most are 50 to 75 feet deep, with some as deep as 250 feet. Fall in, and you are likely not coming home. And that is the challenge Makatea has now. Millions of holes all over the island.
The mayor invited us to attend an evening dance performance by the school children—all nine of them, ages 6 to 14—and one teacher from Huahine on a five-year contract. It was a treat for us. Pam baked chocolate chip cookies as a thank-you gift to the kids for having us.
The parents were quite involved in the performance. The island moms had several dance numbers, and even the dads joined the boys for one dance.
Good mayors solve problems for their constituents. Maybe you are trying to get your kid into the boarding school in neighboring Rangiroa, but the bureaucrat in Tahiti won’t call you back. The mayor will get things moving for you. He deals with a lot of this kind of thing. But not much crime. The population of 136 doesn’t even have a gendarme.
The mayor also has to offer a vision for the future. For Mayor Mai, that’s where things are changing. For many years, a proposal to restart mining operations has been under consideration.
A New Zealand company proposed to spend the next thirty years grinding off the top of the coral pillars, extracting the phosphate rock, and filling the holes left by the previous mining operations with the rock tailings. The island would get rehabilitated. The value of the extracted phosphate rock would cover the cost. It would probably work. It’s not a popular proposal with the land owners and residents (and there aren’t many of them). You can understand why.
The mayor supported the proposal at first. It would create jobs and solve the problem of a million holes. It would create new roads and an airport. But his mind is changing. He is seeing firsthand the popularity of eco-tourism, particularly rock climbing. He thinks this may be the path forward for Makatea. I admire any politician (or anyone, really) willing to change their mind in the face of new information.
Makatea is tough to get to. It doesn’t have an airport. You get to it by boat from Tahiti, 135 miles away, or Rangirora, 60 miles away. It took us an entire day to sail there from Tikehau. It would take A LOT of eco-tourists to make an impact.
It’s a nice idea, and it promises a hopeful future. I’m skeptical, but hey, you’ve got to have dreams.
Updates from our PredictWind log:
Makatea
Tue Jul 02 2024 18:20:00 GMT-1000 (Tahiti Time)
15 49.449s 148 16.750w
All is well. We are presently tied to a mooring just outside the harbor on the Makatea atoll, Tuamotus, French Polynesia.
We had a wet and rough 50 mile close reach from Tikehau in 18-25 knots of wind and 8’ seas with a double reefed main and a reefed Solent. The boat did great and we did ok. We haven’t been offshore in big seas in awhile so we are both less than 100%.
We reached the mooring field just after sunset in the fading light. Pam snagged the mooring on the first try. This is a very deep anchorage (90’) thus the moorings. We are unnervingly close to the rocks. We are here with two other boats.
Tomorrow we will spend the morning touring the island with the mayor, Julian. And have lunch.
For now, dinner, a hot shower, bed.
—Jim
Let me know when you get to Taratupa!
Ha! It’s a little hard to find on the charts, but I think I know where it is. I’ll keep you posted.
Wooow it’s so beautiful keep enjoying this place and also we love to see more of your adventure trip and photos love you 👍🫶🙏
Evers, my friend. The people here are lovely but they do NOT know how to make proper tuna tartar. They are very into “poisson cru” which is essentially ceviche marinated in coconut milk. It’s good. But it’s not La Cata Del Mar. Miss you guys.
World’s best tuna tartar by the world’s best restauranteurs
Wondering if you had to reserve the mooring ball and if yes, how you managed that?
Great question. It’s first come, first served. You can message Tapu or Julien via WhatsApp, and they will let you know the status of the moorings. But you can’t reserve them, as boats sometimes show up unannounced and take one that’s available. AIS and NoForeignLand don’t show all the boats en route, so you can’t be entirely sure if boats will arrive before you.
We sailed there knowing we might not get a mooring. If that happened, we could hang out and wait to see if anyone left, tie off to the back of a moored boat (sketch in some conditions), or sail on to Mo’orea.
Mayor Julien says they will add six more moorings sometime in July or August of this year. If that happens, a visit should be easier to plan.
Tapu Mai: +689 87 71 52 05
Mayor Julien Mai: +689 87 74 45 22
If you go, be aware that a fifth mooring is what Tapu describes as a “fake” mooring — not strong enough to hold a yacht. The two northern most moorings are fine. Of the three southern moorings the one closest to the harbor entrance is the fake mooring. I posted this annotated photo on Noforeignland.
What a fabulous write up. I can feel what you wrote. Glad you are seeing a lot of the Tuamotus that most don’t go to. Great experiences.
Thanks so much for sharing.
Thank you. You guys were good role models. I remember you talking about the Gambier and how amazing that experience was. We’re trying to get off the beaten track a little. Other than sailing, the part I enjoy the most is meeting the people who live in these places. It’s fascinating to see what they value, what they care about, what they struggle with, and is it the same or different it is from our life in the US.
One big decision looming for us is whether to spend a second season in French Polynesia, or keep moving west. I don’t know what the right answer is. Staying for a second season would give us time to visit the Gambier and the Australs. That is appealing. But so is Fiji!
Such a human and personal write-up of your time in Makatea. Thanks for all the time and effort to engage the people there and to share the experience with facts and feelings.
Thank you, James! It was a treat having you all with us in Rangiroa and Tikehau.
Talking with the Mayor, he talks about the island’s history, where it is today, and where he thinks it will go. When he talks about the history, he says that “…Makatea saved French Polynesia and the world.” By that, he means the phosphate mined out of the island played a critical role in feeding French Polynesia’s people during World War II. And, to a degree, in allied munitions production. The island gave of itself to help everyone.
People do come back to Makatea. We met a recently retired couple who recently built a small house there—painted pink. She was an operating room nurse in Tahiti. She had ancestors who originally came from Makatea. For them, the island is a quiet, inexpensive, and simple place to live in retirement.
All of these atolls are tough for the residents. These once-subsistence people lived on fish, crabs, coconuts, and taro. One consequence of the shift in subsistence living to a wage-based economy was a shift in diet. People living on these atolls started eating food from the supply ships. That is usually highly processed carbohydrates. They are cheap, easy to ship, and shelf-stable.
The shift in diet has had a predictable result over the past two generations. There has been a massive increase in obesity rates and the related health problems that come with them. Adult obesity in French Polynesia is about 40% now. Very close to the that of the US. Some neighboring Pacific Island populations have obesity rates as high as 60%—75% (Samoa).
While on Makatea, we met Frederic and Marine. Frederic sailed from Panama in 2016. He’s a French nurse. For the last seven years, he’s been doing home health work on the island of Nuku Hiva in the Marquesas. He sees things we don’t see as tourists. He sees firsthand the effect of this economic shift and the resulting shift in diet: obesity, diabetes, alcohol use disorder, and high cannabis consumption. It was fascinating hearing him talk about his work. He’s taking a break from work now and sailing around the South Pacific.
Frederic and Marine.
What a beautiful place, welcoming people, and one-of-a-kind experience! I’m sure they just love showing off their beautiful island…thank you so much for sharing!
Thank you, Stephanie. It’s a place you would love. Amazing hiking here. You would have been proud of Pam tackling the cliff hike!
Jim…continued great stuff for those of us on a vicarious cruise with you!!! Favorite pic in the latest is Pam’s body language as she tentatively looks down the chasm!! Al
Thank you for sailing virtually with us, Alfredo! Yes! These mining holes are unique. Miners were lowered into them, filling buckets with phosphate sand, which they dug by hand. At the end of their shift, they were hauled back out. There are no official records of industrial accidents or deaths in the mining operations, but the locals have stories. It was a risky endeavor.
Today, it reminds me of the stories you read of former war zones that are still littered with anti-personnel minefields. The population eventually comes to grips with the situation and figures out how to live with the constant reality of getting blown up. People here are used to the fact that you could fall into a deep hole and not come out.
Tapu plans to rappel into a deep hole in the next few weeks. He has the right gear to do it safely. It is a deep hole that descends below the water table and used to be the source of well water for the island’s freshwater system. When the mining company built the town, it generated electricity and supplied fresh water to the entire town. When they left, they shut it all down. The islanders want to see about restarting the water system. Tapu will check it out and see what’s down there. Not me, man.