One thing I've been disappointed with on the Society Islands is the quality of the tourist maps. When you pull up to an island, you see large mountains, waterfalls, and hiking opportunities. A visit to the tourism office gives you a cartoony map of spas, restaurants, and boat tours. Other points of interest are indeed labeled, but not necessarily in their right location, nor with instructions on how to access them.
Our Bora Bora map had an asterisk next to the road, halfway between our mooring and the main town. Next to this * was the word 'Canons.' We learned that during World War II, after the Japanese had abandoned Bora Bora, the Americans seized the island and built a series of canons to protect it. The largest two were situated on a bluff overlooking the pass.
Besides being marked on the map, there was no obvious way to access them. We attempted to follow one road up the hill, but that ended prematurely. We eventually decided to ask a local family.
We stopped into the yard of a home and asked the mother of the house for directions to the canons. She promptly dispatched five elementary school-aged kids, and one older teenager to take us there. The kids darted up the hill behind the house, and we in-turn, followed. They all took their shoes off at the bottom, and we (thinking that this was obviously the proper procedure for finding the canons) did the same.
Our journey took us straight up a hillside, onto the crest of the hill, and through the woods until we saw them - two massive WWII era cannons. These were never fired in combat, and the Americans abandoned them at the end of the war, but it was a very cool site to see. The hillside provided excellent views of the island, pass, and town as well.
It was fun climbing up the hill with the kids. We answered their many questions about the United States, and they answered our questions about Bora Bora. The next day, the family invited us back to the home to feed us lunch - another example of the overwhelming Polynesian hospitality that we keep running into.
If our tourist map was any better, we wouldn't have had such a great time.