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8/7/2010 2:03 AM 

My God I’d almost forgotten how much I love to drive.  Lauren and I along with Tony and Stephen, the crew of s/v Endymion, rented a tiny little Fiat Panda to tour the island of Huahine.  I slid into the little drivers seat and scooted it back as far as its design would allow.  Fortunately for me, Lauren doesn’t take up much space and was sitting right behind me.  Backing onto the main road in the town of Fare we set out in search of the perfect scoop of homemade island fruit ice cream, ancient fish traps, restored marae temples, and a highly recommended botanical garden.  We didn’t make it very far.

The tarmac ribbon that surrounds Huahine has so many twists and turns I never made it out of 3rd gear.  Pulling off every 10 minutes or so we walked around the marae temples and eventually found what could only be the old fish traps.  The stones were stacked high in a shallow bay and formed a large W shape in the water.  This let the locals herd the fish towards the traps and drive them into the holding pens for collection and eventually dinner.  The spot was serene and Lauren took a moment to show us her yoga moves on a flat rock under the shade of some palms.  My photog duties completed, Stephen asked for one more photo sitting in a tree.  The last thing I remember is looking through his view finder and taking one step closer to get a better angle.  Lights out.

Just as I raised the camera to my eye a 40+ foot palm tree let go of a six pound coconut.  It landed perfectly on the top of my head and turned me off like a light switch.  According to those who where there I fell over like a sack of potatoes.  My companions, shocked, ran to my side to ensure I was still breathing and that my grey matter was still in my skull.  I lay motionless for around 90 seconds before coming too.  When I did my body instinctively curled into the fetal position and my hands went to my head.

Not wanting to be touched or moved I laid still, moaning for a few minutes more.  Eventually, Tony and Stephen helped me to my feet and held my arms as I stumbled over to lean against the hood of the little Panda.  Lauren says I was confused, but very giddy.  I didn’t know where we were or what we were doing and insisted I be given a few minutes to, “try and put these puzzle pieces back together”.  By now everyone agreed I needed medical attention and I was ushered into the backseat of the car and driven the half hour back to Fare.

For 30 minutes my friends listened to me repeat myself incessantly.  My only words were, “A coconut fell out of a tree. Which tree was it?  Did anyone get the coconut?”.  I was assured a dozen times over the the offending nut was in the back of the car, but I’d lost my ability to form short term memory.  There isn’t one thing I can remember from the time the nut knocked me out to the time we walked into the doctors office.  My recollection kicks in as I stumbled like a drunk man through the office door and onto the examination table.

The doctors questions revealed that I knew I was sailing, but had no grasp of where I was, what we’d been doing that day, or even the name of Stephen at that time.  The doc felt my memory would return, but that procedure was to get me to Papeete asap for a full CAT Scan.  The doc even called the airline, reserved me a seat on the next flight, and told us to get moving.  Back in town I paid the ticket price and booked one more seat for Lauren just in case I might really be in trouble.

We made our way to the Huahine airport in the Panda and as chance would have it Hanine, a friend I’d met in Papeete was there as well.  She was kind enough to call my friends back in Tahiti and we were set up with a ride to the hospital and a place to crash with a friend in Papara.  It’s good to make friends with the locals.

By the time we reached the hospital my senses were completely about me and the humor of the event was not lost on anyone.  Explaining to the triage nurse why I was standing before her we both cracked smiled and a laugh.  Once in the examination room the same smiled and chuckles passed between us and the nurse and doctor.  It isn’t every day a coconut knocks someone out in paradise.

We eventually wound our way up to radiology where I was strapped to a big machine and fed into the mouth of the big scanner.  A few short minutes later I was standing back in the exam room waiting on the diagnoses from the doctor.  To our great relief there was no internal damage proving once again I have an incredibly hard head.

The next day Lauren and I flew back to Huahine and prepped the boat to go sailing.  We are now anchored 30 miles away just off the island of Taha’a, by far the prettiest of all the Society Islands I’ve explored thus far.  Lauren flies out tomorrow and I’ll make the short jump to Bora Bora sometime this week.  My time in French Polynesia is coming to an end and I haven’t yet decided where I’ll go next.  I suppose, like always, one day soon I’ll wake up, check the weather, and pick a destination that the winds favor.  Until then, the sky may not be falling, but don't forget to look up once in a while.

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