Radio Bora Bora Calling

Bora Bora has now faded into the sunset and dropped off the horizon after leaving a lasting impression of the absolute best snorkeling and underwater experiences I've ever had. It didn't really matter that it poured rain most of the second day we were there, our plans were to get wet anyway. So, at about 8:30, we left the ship, took a tender to shore, and hooked up with a local gal named Nora. Now, Nora is in her 60s, a rather rotund retired school teacher, born and raised on Bora Bora. But unlike Jay Tuday (remember, the off road four wheel driver who never left the island in his 28 years except to go to the hospital), Nora is proud to say she has been to LA and Paris. But she admits, she'd much rather be here ... and shortly we discovered why.

With one of her pals serenading us by ukulele, Nora had the flat bottom boat maneuver first to a shallow sandbar near the reef that protects Bora Bora, about a mile from land. As we approached, first one, then two, then three, then dozens of stingrays began surrounding the boat. Ladder lowered, we entered the cool water (yeah, it's not as warm as we thought it would be) to begin swimming with the stingrays. You don't really swim with them, but they come up to you, nuzzle you with their slippery bodies, looking for a handout. Give them a fish and they're happy, pull on their barbs and they aren't (remember Steve Irwin). After a half hour of so there, no one stung, Nora tells us to get back n board, she's got another place for us to go.

The next stop was the shallow coral reef that stretched for miles around Bora Bora. I wish I had an underwater camera to share what we saw because it was pretty damn indescribable. Even if you’ve seen videos in HD on the underwater experience here, it really can’t adequately capture it.

Thousands and thousands of the most brilliantly colored fish and sea life living among towering underwater monuments of coral. It was like swimming in your own huge well stocked underwater aquarium, but better. The only downfall is it was cold and rainy. Without the sunshine, a lot of us got chilled and the hour excursion was cut down to 45 minutes. All the way back to the pier where we caught the tender back to the ship, it poured rain. Fortunately, the ship did not run out of hot water from the inevitable flood of showers that everyone rushed to take.

Vacations aren't only about relaxing, exploring, meeting new people, seeing the natural wonders of the world. They are about reconnecting with yourself. So, for those of you who know me well, it should come as no surprise that when I returned to Bora Bora that afternoon after the rain stopped to hike around, and I spotted a wooden sign hanging over a dilapidated building that said "Radio Bora Bora," I was intrigued. Though I did TV most of my life, radio was really my true vocational love ... not the corporate crap that has taken over the American airwaves, but the "true local serve your community" type stations that we used to have. If there was any true raw radio left on this planet, I figured I might find it at Radio Bora Bora.

As I entered the building, a young woman wearing flowing Tahitian garb who spoke no English greeted me and gestured for me to come in and follow her (I think she thought I was bringing a new supply of CDs or something). She took me to a small room at the end of a long hallway where a very large Tahitian man was sitting behind a mixing board, the type I used when I first started at KPCO in Quincy in 1976. He spoke English and when I told him I used to work in radio and TV in the U.S. I was suddenly his new best friend for the afternoon. He told me he was the owner and he was very proud of the little FM station that he put on the air six years ago. He told me Radio Bora Bora is the only radio station on the island, in fact the only radio station they receive, and before he put it on the air, there was no radio here at all. It is all local, with five employees who play Tahitian music from 6:30 AM when they sign on to 11:30 PM when they sign off (sometimes he said bowing to pressure from the young Tahitians, he will play Lady Gaga's Poker Face).

His station is computerized, CDs recorded onto a hard drive and like stations in the US, programmed by touch screen. Attached to a pole at the side of the building was a miniature microwave dish that sends the program to a transmitter on a nearby hillside. Two other islands also now receive Radio Bora Bora.

I didn't get his name, but he wanted me to take a picture of him and me so I would remember Radio Bora Bora. Along with the stingrays, and coral, and fish, the little radio station with the big Tahitian man will be part of the great memories of Bora Bora. Alas, radio the way used to be does exist ... though you have to go to the South Pacific to find it.