Summary
Spent an epic 16 day adventure in French Polynesia. 2 days in Tahiti, 4 days in Moorea, and 10 days in Bora Bora. Total out of pocket: $9,638.01.
Travel Notes (All prices below are USD unless otherwise noted)
Covid Notes
- We spent $200 per person for a 72 hours guaranteed turnaround test at trucheckoc. We made an appointment a couple weeks in advance and they came and tested us in our car.
- We opted to buy trip insurance for $206.96. This would have covered us if somehow we had tested positive and had to cancel the trip and it provided medical insurance if we got sick during the trip.
- Locals adhered to mask wearing well, although ~10% did not cover their noses. :P
- The self administered test after 4 days was easy to take and dropped off at hotel reception.
Travel
- Tahiti
- The InterContinental Resort Tahiti is a 5 min taxi ride from the airport. It was 2000 xpf.
- We rented a car from Ecocar. This is what all the locals had advised when we asked. They are located right across the street from the airport. I called them from the hotel and they came and picked me up. We agreed that they would drop us off at the ferry after returning the car.
- I recommend calling ahead of time to book a car. Locals rent cars from here so they are pretty busy.
- It was a bit stressful trying to relearn driving stick shift in a foreign country, but once I got the hang of it again it was enjoyable!
- We took the Aremiti ferry from Papeete to Moorea.
- Moorea
- We pre-booked a car over the phone from Albert Rentals. They picked me up from the airport and took my larger luggage to drop off at the Hilton Moorea. Once I picked up the car I drove back to pick up my family from the airport and the remaining luggage. This process took about 45 min since Albert is halfway to the Hilton Moorea.
- Highly recommend renting a car here, there was a lot to see in Moorea and made it easy to visit the local Super U market.
- They dropped me back at the hotel once I returned the car.
- We booked a shuttle to the airport through the hotel since it was early in the morning.
- Bora Bora
- Once we landed in BOB, I let the Conrad attendant know that we had landed but that we'd be taking the boat to Vaitape. He gave us some leis and Conrad bag tags.
- From Vaitape we needed to walk about 1/4 mile to Robert Wan docks. This was a bit difficult with our luggage. The store was closed but there is a path to the right of the business to the docks. The boat was waiting there and took us promptly to the Conrad.
- We visited Vaitape once again during our stay at the Conrad. You'll need to make a reservation with the front desk and let them know your departure and return time.
- Once on Vaitape we rented a Minimoke from Avis which we had prebooked through Expedia. It was an automatic and easy to drive. You could circle the whole island in about 40 min.
- We decided to pay the $150 for the direct boat back to BOB for departure since that allowed us to stay at the resort until 2:30pm. Else we would have had to take all our luggage to Vaitape at 11am and wait for the free boat to BOB at around 2pm.
Accommodations
- InterContinental Resort Tahiti
- We had Platinum Ambassador status for the stay.
- We used 100,000 points for 2 nights.
- Point redemption value was about .08 cpp.
- Booked 1 King Bed Garden View, was upgraded to 1 King Bed Superior Lagoon View Room and had a rollaway bed added.
- It was pretty cramped for 4 people. 3 of us slept on the bed and 1 slept on the rollaway.
- We got a ~$19 food credit for our status which we used on a acai bowl.
- Hilton Moorea Lagoon Resort & Spa
- We had Diamond status for the stay.
- We used 4 free night certificates.
- Booked King Garden Guestroom and was upgraded to King Deluxe Garden Bungalow with Private Pool. We inquired about
- This was far more roomy with a large bathroom setup. The girls slept on the couch which we configured into an L shape with the sitting chair. They slept with their legs facing each other.
- We received a box of macaroons for our welcome amenity.
- The kids had a blast with the private plunge pool.
- Conrad Bora Bora Nui
- We had Diamond status for the stay.
- We used 445,000 points and 4 free night certificates for 10 night stay (you get one free night for booking 4 nights on points).
- Point redemption value was about 1.2 cpp for the Pool Villa and 1.3 cpp for Overwater Villa.
- Booked King Garden View Suite and was upgraded to Garden View Pool Villa. We inquired about the Horizon Villa but it was unavailable for the middle of our stay period. We upgraded to King Deluxe Overwater Villa for the last 4 nights through an email offer for ~$248 a night (It was actually a standard King Overwater Villa but they gave us a complementary upgrade to Deluxe).
- Both rooms were very spacious. One daughter slept on a rollaway and the other the couch.
- The welcome gifts here were very generous. We received multiple food/drink gifts through the stay and a birthday cake for our older daughter.
- Apparently they implemented a supervised Kids Club recently, we had read that it was unsupervised in previous reports. Our daughters loved it and it was available from 10am-noon and then 1-4pm each day. The hours weren't precise but we chalked that up to island time. There was crafting, a ping pong table, and movies.
- There is also free coral friendly sun screen and aloe lotion by the pool! We made good use of both during our long stay.
Entertainment
- Tahiti
- We stopped by the Mara'a Grotto but it was roped off. There was a gentleman who had flowers on his bike and tried to have us take pictures with him. We avoided doing so and left (we've learned to avoid anyone offering picture taking opportunities at tourist places).
- We then visited the Water Gardens Vaipahi which was fantastic. There was a waterfall that you could walk under. There were eels in the stream that flowed from it, and baby ducks walking around.
- Moorea
- The lagoonarium was a terrific experience. I believe it was ~$39 per adult and $22? per child. They only took cash. A gentleman named "Yo" picked us up and took us to a small motu (island). We were assigned a small hut to store our stuff. The girls were able to see sharks, a stingway, and tons of fish.
- We enjoyed driving up to Belvedere Point and taking a small hike to a lookout point and stream. It was a nice easy ~30 min hike each way.
- Bora Bora
- The deeper water snorkeling at Conrad Bora Bora was fascinating for me. It ran 80-100 ft deep pretty close to shore, and it felt like flying over an alien landscape. Really enjoyed this. I got to see a blacktip shark, eagle rays, stingrays, and numerous types of interesting fish.
Mobile/Internet
- We opted to use hotel internet and our phones which generally had 3g coverage. All the hotels had good connections with the exception of Moorea on the first day (I think they had some transient tech issues).
Laundry
- We did our own laundry by washing and hanging (our clothes dried fast in the heat of the sun). However, I discovered that the InterContinental Resort Tahiti had what appeared to be free washer/dryers in the Ice Room as we were leaving!
Food
- Tahiti
- We went several times to the local Carrefour to get groceries. The hotel did provide 2 water bottles each day.
- We tried the food trucks at Place Vaiete. While their portions were plenty the food was so-so. The chicken was probably the best. I have heard that their fish is great but we did not try that.
- Moorea
- We had free buffet breakfast every day at the hotel thanks to Diamond status.
- The other great thing here was that the fridge minibar contents were free and refilled each day. The pineapple juice was fantastic. There were a couple beers that we had replaced with water and soda.
- Kids eat free with paid adults at this resort. We ate at the Crepe restaurant and found it to be really good value since the kids got good portion meals for free.
- We went for groceries at the Super U which is really close to the hotel, and also the much larger Champion store near the ferry.
- Bora Bora
- We had free buffet breakfast every day at the hotel thanks to Diamond status. I was quoted in the welcome email that the kids would need to pay, but that didn't turn out to be the case once we got to breakfast.
- We had stocked up on groceries at Chin Lee in Vaitape before coming to the Conrad (and also halfway through we did another grocery run), but got a little tired of baguette sandwiches about halfway through. We started eating a late lunch at the Tamure grill to supplement our meals about halfway through our stay. We also ordered room service from the Chinese restaurant Banyan one evening for a $14 delivery fee. We had tried to get a table, but reserved it too late. We generally enjoyed our meals at the Conrad.
- We ate at Bloody Marys when we visited Vaitape. The fish tacos were great.
- Extra water bottles were provided with turn down service every day. They ended up giving us more water than we could drink. :P
Things that went well
- Stopping at the Intercontinental Tahiti before going to Moorea. I think we would have been too tired for the longer journey.
- Bringing ponchos. It did not rain long at any location but it was pretty heavy when there were downpours.
- Going to the Overwater Bungalows in Bora Bora, wish we moved to them earlier.
Lessons for next time
- We should have brought better bug spray and our citronella candles. Our time outside was limited due to mosquito bites and would have preferred to spend more time on our beautiful backyards.
- We could have spent less time on Vaitape (perhaps taken the 11am boat instead of 8:30am). It was not as interesting as Moorea, although maybe if we swam at Matira Beach it would've been more fun.
- Bring more fish food.
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