Alternative angles: Regatta roundup/News covering regatta highlights, participants, crews, yachts, who die what and when,  in this exotic location, sprinkled with some colourful quotes from sailors and non-sailors alike.

Naturally stunning pics of regatta participants against dramatic seascapes will be available.

The Tahiti Pearl Regatta is an annual event held in May 2011: Fiona Harper will be attending.

With a full program of sailing by day and entertainment Tahitian style by night, it's a fun filled five days in a glorious South Pacific setting. Fiona Harper  will be out on the water, as well as digging out stories on shore at the regatta events http://www.tahitipearlregatta.org.pf/index.php

Contact Fiona Harper to register your 'in principal interest' in exclusive editorial www.fionaharper.com.au 

Cruising around the palm-fringed motus or islands of Rangiroa atoll in the Tuamoto Archipelago of French Polynesia takes a lot of beating -- particularly with an idyllic climate, constant sunshine and peaceful vignettes of a slow-paced island life – all played out around an impossibly blue lagoon.

Diu Island in Gujarat, India has a history going back even further. It is said that in the era of Satyuga (between two and three million years ago, a time when “the gods walked the earth”), a certain King Jalandhar ruled over the island. According to legend, he was a real bad dude, and accordingly was disposed of by the aforesaid gods.

In Estonia, the ancient culture of Hiiumaa Island was home to the “Mad Baron” von Ungern-Sternberg.  He is said to have led troops in Mongolia, treating the Mongols with “unparalleled savagery”. Eventually, in 1921, Ungern-Sternberg was handed over to the Bolsheviks for execution. Even today teachers at Suuremõisa College (the baron's former manor) and electricians working on the manor house claim to have seen or heard his ghost.

What, if anything, do these three widely separated islands have in common?                                                           

This article runs to approximately 1200 words but can be tailored to individual editorial requirements. Images available.

There he has a work-in-progress. An inky trail of tribal tattoos circle his kneecap and march up his strong thigh. The swirls and whorls he traces are his family tree, he announces proudly.

Alain, our guide, is from yet another island across the water from where we are talking in the main town, Taiohae, on Nuku Hiva, the largest island. He points it out from a lookout high above the bay that cradles the settlement. His homeland is just a smudge on the horizon, a couple of hours by boat away.

The Marquesas, subtitled appropriately 'the land of men' is said to be the most remote island group in the world, and are composed of twelve islands. Six are inhabited but the remainder are rocky dots in this forgotten corner of the Pacific Ocean.

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This article continues outlining the history – yes, these people once did eat human flesh – and today’s relaxed pace of life, as well as information on accommodation provided, local food and cuisine, things to do and see.

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(finishes…)

Although the Marquesas are part of French Polynesia, they are far removed. The small Air Tahiti plane takes over three hours to reach them from Papeete, Tahiti, and we put our watches forward half an hour as well. On arrival we board a helicopter for a swooping flight across the island to our hotel – a ten minute extravagance (the tortuous mountain road trip takes several hours) where we skim the mountain tops then gasp as the earth falls away into a massive green basin a couple of thousand feet below. Far off the frilled edge of the ocean beats on the rocks, for these are not the peaceful turquoise coral atolls you see in Tahiti's brochures. Here the sand is black, the sea green.

The climate is milder in the Marquesas too, because of tradewinds and the sea is cooled by an upwelling of cold water rising to the surface. Yet the tropics are all around - in the frangipani that scents the air, fruit such as custard apples and breadfruit growing in profusion, and the flowers the local girls tuck into their hair, and yours, as a sign of welcome.

Right ear shows your taken, left ear means you're looking. Or is it the other way round? In the Marquesas it hardly matters. As Alain says, 'we just like to have fun'.