Moʼorea

Moorea, also spelled Moorea, is a volcanic island in French Polynesia lying northwest of Tahiti. Moorea and Tahiti are the largest members of the Windward Islands, a group that is part of the larger Society Islands archipelago.
Mo means 'yellow lizard' in Tahitian: Mo = lizard; Re = yellow. An older name for the island is , sometimes spelled or . Early Western colonists and voyagers also referred to Moorea as York Island or Santo Domingo.

History

Prehistory

According to recent archaeological evidence, the Society Islands were probably settled from Samoa and Tonga around 200 CE.
Nine tribal principalities emerged in the enclosed valleys, which in turn were subdivided into individual clans. The stratified society was characterized by a hierarchical leadership whose elite combined both political and religious power. The leading families of Moorea remained linked by marriage and kinship for centuries with those of the neighboring island of Tahiti. These connections led to important alliances, but at other times were also the source of bloody conflicts.
Intensive research on the Opunohu Valley, which continues to this day, initiated by Kenneth P. Emory in the 1920s and continued in the 1960s by archaeologist Roger C. Green of the University of Auckland, provides an exemplary picture of the evolution of Moorean society. The interaction between increasing population density and human modification of the environment resulted in major changes in the form of society.
The so-called Pre-Atiroo phase, before 1000 CE, is characterized by extensive clearing and cultivation of the valley slopes, which by the end of the period had led to erosion and the formation of alluvial soils. Society was not yet stratified, but was relatively homogeneous.
In the Atiroo period, artificial cultivation terraces were built on the slopes and simple stone buildings, such as the Marae Tapauruuru. The remains of rectangular houses and those with elongated oval floor plans, reserved for the power elite, indicate a strictly stratified and hierarchical form of society.
The later Marama period is marked by the conquest of the Opunohu Valley by the chiefs of the Marama tribe, originally settled on the coast, who succeeded in uniting all the other clans in the valley under their rule. In addition to a further increase in population, this phase also saw a lively construction activity of representative religious structures - large marae in the style of a step pyramid. Towards the end of this period, the Opunohu valley became a refuge for the Ariki who resisted European influence.

Early European influence

The first European to sight the island was Pedro Fernandes de Queirós, in 1606. The first European settlers arrived during the 18th century. The first Europeans to arrive on the island were the Englishmen Samuel Wallis and James Cook. Captain James Cook first landed on Tahiti, where he planned the 1769 Transit of Venus observed from Tahiti and Moorea. Cook arrived in October 1777 and obtained supplies on the island. This was the first contact the islanders had with Europeans, and on 6 October, one of Cook's goats was stolen while grazing ashore. After negotiations failed to return the goat, two large armed parties were sent ashore to set fire to houses and boats on the island. Eventually, the goat was returned, and Cook departed Mo'orea.
At Moorea, where Taaroa was chief, Cook first landed in Ōpūnohu Bay, Cook's Bay was later named in his honor. Spanish sailor Domingo de Bonechea visited it in 1774 and named it Santo Domingo.
It is likely that Teraura, a Polynesian woman who accompanied the Bounty mutineers to Pitcairn Island, was from Moorea.
The island was among those visited by the United States Exploring Expedition on its tour of the South Pacific in 1839.
Charles Darwin found inspiration for his theory regarding the formation of coral atolls when looking down upon Moorea while standing on a peak on Tahiti. He described it as a "picture in a frame", referring to the barrier reef encircling the island.
Don the Beachcomber lived here briefly in the late 1920s. His houseboat was destroyed by tropical cyclones after he moved it from Waikiki after 1947.
On October 7, 1967, construction was completed on the Moorea Airport, which opened the following month.

Geography

Moorea is about 16 km across. There are two small, nearly symmetrical bays on the north shore. The one to the west is called Ōpūnohu Bay. The main surrounding communes of the bay are Pihaena in the east and Papetōai to the west. The one to the east is Cook's Bay, also called Pao Pao Bay since the largest commune of Moorea is at the head of the bay. The other communes are Pihaena to the west and busy Maharepa to the east. The highest point is Mount Tohivea, near the center of Moorea. It dominates the vista from the two bays and can be seen from Tahiti. Vaiare Bay is another small inlet, smaller than the two main bays, on the east shore where there is a ferry terminal with services to and from Tahiti.

Geology

Moorea formed as a shield volcano 1.5 to 2.5 million years ago, the action of the hotspot in the Earth's mantle which is responsible for all the Society Islands. Today, Moorea is an atoll where a coral reef surrounds the entire island forming a lagoon along the shoreline. The reef is relatively close, making the lagoon narrow with several navigable passages from the Pacific Ocean.
It is theorized that Moorea's bays were formerly river basins that filled during the Holocene sea rise.

Climate

Moorea is located in the Earth's tropical belt. The climate is tropical-warm and very humid, which favors the lush vegetation of the island. The average temperature ranges between 28 and 30 °C, with little difference between months. The rainiest months are from December to February, the months from July to September are drier. There is a constant wind that moderates temperatures. However, an occasional cyclone cannot be ruled out. In the 1982–83 season, a series of cyclones in the Society Islands also caused considerable property damage in Moorea.

Demographics

The island had a population of 14,226 inhabitants in the 2002 census, which increased to 17,718 in 2017, distributed in the associated communes of Afareaitu, Haapiti, Paopao, Papetōai, and Teavaro. Together with Maiao it forms the commune of Moorea-Maiao, which had 14,550 inhabitants by 2002.
The evolution of the number of inhabitants is known through population censuses conducted in the municipality since 1977. Since 2006, the INSEE has published annually the legal populations of the municipalities, but the law on local democracy of February 27, 2002, in its articles dedicated to the population census, introduced population censuses every five years in New Caledonia, French Polynesia, Mayotte, and the Wallis and Futuna islands, which was not the case before. For the municipality, the first comprehensive census under the new system was conducted in 2002; previous censuses took place in 1996, 1988, 1983, 1977, and 1971.

Bays

The most famous sight of Moorea is Cook's Bay, where cruise ships regularly anchor. It is a deep blue bay that often has white sailing yachts, and in the background, the 830 metre high Mount Mouaputa, this being probably the most photographed South Seas image. Next door is Opunohu Bay, where many exterior shots of the 1984 movie The Bounty were filmed.
The two bays are connected by a steep, winding scenic road. In the once densely populated Opunohu Valley, the indigenous Polynesians built numerous worship platforms. The remains of these religious sites can be found everywhere off the road; some of them are signposted. Marae Titiroa is surrounded by banyan trees and was reconstructed in the late 1960s. A few hundred meters away is the multi-level Marae Ahu-o-Mahine, also well preserved. The trail continues to the Belvédère lookout overlooking Mount Rotui, Cook Bay, and Opunohu Bay.

Flora and fauna

Due to the short distance to Tahiti and similarities in climate and soil structure, the flora of Moorea is comparable to that of Tahiti. The narrow coastal strip is dominated by anthropic plants, due to dense settlement and centuries of human use. However, significant remnants of the original plant communities have survived in the uninhabited and partially inaccessible interior of the island. The University of California at Berkeley maintains a permanent research institute on Moorea, Richard B. Gump Station, to study tropical biodiversity and interactions between cultural processes and the ecosystem. From 2008 to 2010, Moorea was the site of the Moorea Biocode project, the first comprehensive inventory of all macroscopic life in an ecosystem. They collected specimens, photographs, and genetic barcodes for over 5,700 species of plants, animals, and fungi.
Terrestrial mammals did not originally exist on the Society Islands; they were introduced exclusively by humans. Early Polynesian settlers brought dogs, pigs, chickens and the Polynesian rat as food animals, while Europeans introduced goats, cows, sheep and horses. The indigenous land animals are only insects, land crabs, snails, and lizards.
Many Moorean endemic species have gone extinct or been extirpated. The Polynesian tree snails of the genus Partula were largely wiped out after the rosy wolf snail was introduced in 1977, although captive and small refuge populations on Tahiti still exist. In 2019 both Partula rosea and Partula varia were reintroduced to the island. Until the 1980s, the Moorea reed warbler, an endemic species, was recorded on the island. This songbird was closely related to the Tahiti reed warbler and may have been displaced by the common myna. Another bird species extinct on Moorea is the Moorea sandpiper, of which only two specimens are known from 1777. The tree Glochidion nadeaudii is endemic to the island, growing in montane rain forests above 400 meters elevation.
There are no animals on Moorea that are dangerous to humans. Sand fleas on the beach and mosquitoes, which are everywhere in the interior of the island, can be unpleasant. The marine fauna of the lagoon and coral reef is very rich in species. In addition to more than 500 species of coral fish, divers and snorkelers can observe numerous molluscs, echinoderms, and crustaceans of the tropical sea. Behind the fringing reef are sharks, rays, swordfish, and sea turtles. From July to October, humpback whales pass by the island. Whale and dolphin watching is offered to tourists.