Mt. Rotui

Last Wednesday I finally made it to the top of Mt. Rotui (899 m), the enormous mountain behind the Gump Station that lends its name to French Polynesia's ubiquitous brand of fruit juice. The climb up Rotui is along the long, narrow ridge on the north side of the mountain. The trail is long, narrow, exposed, and towards the summit, rather precarious (with several-hundred-meter cliffs on either side, and ropes in places). Both times I had tried it earlier, I had been forced to turn around partway because it started raining. Going down Rotui in the rain resembles a scene out of Lord of the Rings, in a bad way.

Up above 500 m you get into pretty nice native vegetation, with lots of the endemic tree Glochidion nadeaudii (which is what I was looking for), as well as all kinds of other cool things like Macaranga attenuata (a member of a genus of Southeast Asian plants famous for their mutualisms with ants, although this species has no ants). We heard seabirds calling in the vegetation and saw burrows but didn't see any birds. After 4 hours, you are at the top. There are amazing views of the rest of Mo'orea and Tahiti, as well as two other Windward Islands: the atoll Tetiaroa to the north (which at that point I did not realize I would be visiting the following day) and Maiao to the southwest. I was accompanied by 5 very enthusiastic undergrads. You can see some pictures here.