The next day, we rushed out of our dormitory to go on a four hour hike known as the Three Pines trail. A word on the dormitories- they don't feel institutionalized. Instead, they are an interesting combination of hostel and house. The building is in the polynesian style, although msuch larger than most of the familial houses on the island. It has two stories, with an additional “classroom”, which is more of a large, highly windowed room with tables and benches that we've been using as a dining room. The rooms have either two or three beds, each with a desk that is more like a table with a colorful floral print cloth on top. I'm on the first floor, my bed up against the windows. It's a great spot- the ground floor makes it cool, I'm just far away enough from the common areas to not hear talking at night, and (most importantly) I fall asleep to the water and the wind.

But any ways, the hike. The first part was mostly stop and go. We were officially looking at these archaeological sites called Marae, the remains of ceremonial alters and temples of the polynesians. Structurally, they are were more like raised courtyards bu

ilt of layers of coral (dragged up from the shore) or basalt rock. We would stop at a few of them, our arcaheology specialist would speak for a little, followed by our botanist expert on the importance of the plants around us. Mostly, I zoned out. I tried to pay attention, I really did, but I'm super inattentive when it comes to plants (bad for an entomologist, I know) or people. I had my new three foot long net with heavy duty sweep attachm

ent, and I just wanted to whack the hell out of everything around me. But that would have been loud. And dissruptive. So I only did it while we were walking and I could accidentally smack people off the path with it.

The second part of the hike was the actual uphill ascent. When we reached the top, the view was spectacular. Three Pine Point looks out onto both bays of Moorea. It's literally in the middle between the two, giving spectacular views of the surrounding valleys ahead of us and the mountainous ranges behind. We sat down there for a half hour or so, enjoying the view and eating our lunch. Huge dragonflies were darting around us, forming mating swarms on the top of the hill.

After the hike, we walked down the road to the Agriculture School of Moorea. School in French Polynesia is only mandatory through what we would consider 9^th grade. After that, a few academically minded students go on to high school, though for Mooreans this usually means taking the ferry to Tahiti or living with family elsewhere or (for a few, wealthy ones) going to boarding school in France. The only alternative to this usual path on Moorea is the Agriculture school. The school has several programs educating students of different levels from 15-22. We were escorted around the entire learning farm by the older students, who were practicing their English with us. This took the form of kind of awkward, but strangely informative, five minute presentations on various crops in English while their teacher corrected and graded them. I sympathized with the students- if I had to do what they did in French back home, I would have about laid down and died.

The talks were a little stilted, but dotted with samples of fresh fruit. A young man borrowed my sweep net (for insects), climbed on his friend's back, and knocked down a couple of ripe papayas. After the tour/lectures, both the agr. Students and us sat waiting for “le truck” (the rentable bus/actual bus system of Moorea) to pick us up. The truck was running late and we all sat around doing nothing until a couple of students broke out their musical isntruments. For 45 mintues, we sat playing music and singing, the instruments passed back and forth between each group. It was pretty amazing.

The next day we went on a hike that focused on looking at various locations along a single stream. The first stop was an estuary that drained into the ocean that had been recently cleared. It was hot, sticky, and looked somewhat carcinogenic with all the runoff that it contained. Farther up was a forested spot where I slipped on some rocks while trying to catch a bug in the middle of a GSI's lecture (hah). And then it ended at this spot:

That's a one hundred foot rock wall with a waterfall trickling down it, the head of the stream. We had lunch there, swam around the stream looking for snails and freshwater eels, and ended our hike there. Apparently there's a species of gobi that climbs that wall, with a special sucker thing on its belly.

So that's part two of the crazy week of doing things. This ends on Saturday with our final hike to the 3 Coconuts trail, which will take us into the higher elevations of the mountain. And that's where I'll find the cool bugs, I bet.