Temaiatea and his wife once lived on the island of Tupuai-Manu, now called Maiao. The young woman became pregnant and gave birth to an egg. The husband took the egg to a small cave near the shore called Vaionini, where he laid it.
One night, Temaiatea vahine had a vision in her sleep. She saw that she had given birth to a boy with yellowish skin. She awoke and recounted the dream to her husband. When day broke, the man went to observe the egg he had left in the cave. He found that the egg had hatched: it was a baby lizard of the same hue as in his wife's dream.

Temaiatea named this lizard Moo-rea, the yellow lizard. He and his wife nurtured Moo-rea in this little cave until he was big enough. When he became enormous, the wife became frightened and said to her husband: “We must give up Moo-rea, or he will soon eat us.” The husband refused, telling her: “He's still our beloved child, to whom we gave the name Moo-rea” But as the wife insisted, the man gave in to her pleas.
He built a pirogue to escape from the island. When it was finished, the couple left Maiao and headed towards the rising sun. They approached Tahiti via the taapuna pass and found refuge on a mountain peak.

Moo-rea goes in search of his parents
The little yellow lizard, Moo-rea, couldn't stop thinking about his parents, who had raised and nurtured him with such affection. But it had been a long time since anyone had brought him food, and he realized that his parents had abandoned him. In despair, he threw himself into the sea and swam towards the east.
When Moo-rea had lost sight of land, he confronted the Teara-Veri (scolopendre) current, then emerged from it. This current is not bristling with ripples, but its course is like that of the scolopendre. Moo-rea then faced a second current called Tefara (Pandanus), because it's a “thorny” current like the Pandanus. Moo-rea managed to extricate himself from this current, but he was exhausted. He faced a third current called Tepua (Soap), for it is a powerful current. The foam of the sea is like soap foam.
Exhausted by his struggle against these three natural phenomena, he drowned. His body drifted ashore at Vai Anae in Aimeho (the former name of the island of Moorea).
Early in the morning, two men went fishing. When they reached Vai Anae beach, they saw this huge thing lying on the sand and ran to warn the islanders, shouting: “It's a yellow lizard! E moo re'a!”
From that day on, Aimeho was known as Moo-rea, meaning Moorea.

SOURCE: TAHITI HERITAGE