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Tikehau,
which was discovered by Kotzebue in 1816, is the second last
atoll at the north-western extremity of the Tuamotu archipelago.
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Tikehau
is situated 14°52' south and 148°15'15" west, 300km
to the north of Tahiti, between Rangiroa and Mataiva (to the
west and east, respectively); the sea between Tikehau de
Mataiva, which are 37km apart, is less than 1000m deep.
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This
atoll is almost circular in shape and its emergent land has
an area of 2000 hectares. It has a maximum diameter of 28 km
from its south-western to north-eastern extremities. Its
coral ring is about 78 km in length, and the width of this
ring from the algal crest to the edge of the lagoon ranges
between 300m in the north-east to 1300m in the south-east.
The "motus", which are covered with vegetation,
are mostly between 150 and 500m wide, apart from the large
"motu" in the south-west of the island, which is
900m wide, and which is the site of this atoll's only
permanent village, Tuherahera.
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On
the western leeward coast, the coral reef is breached by a
300-m wide channel with a depth of 3.7m in its shallowest part, so that Tikehau is open
to the sea. A winding passage has been roughly marked out in
the lagoon over a distance of
7 sea-miles between this natural channel and the
village of Tuherahera.
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This
island has 400 inhabitants (according to the 1996 census),
most of whom live in the village of Tuherahera. Part of this
population leads a nomadic way of life: the village of
Tuheiava serves as a base for the fisherman who work the
fish ponds which have been set up on both sides of the
Tuherahera channel; whereas the village of Maiai, which is
set on the large "motu" in the north-east of the
island, is mainly involved in copra farming.
It
is worth noting that 4 religions co-exist here: the majority of
the inhabitants are Sanitos, but there are also Protestants,
Catholics and Last Day Adventists living on this island.
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The
Legend of Princess Ina
Once
there was a princess, who used to bathe in a natural
pool which
had formed behind the Tikehau reef. To make the pool
fill up with water, she used to tap on a hollow "feo"
with a large slab of weathered limestone. Whenever she
did this, an extra-large wave would arrive, which filled
the pool.
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From :
Ministère
des Archipels (1998), Les Tuamotu Gambier : recueil de données
essentielles, décembre 1998, Service de l'administration
et du développement des archipels, PAPEETE.
Norman&Ngaire,
Douglas (1994), Pacific Islands Yearbook,
17° édition, Fiji Times Ltd, 767p. |
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