French Polynesia - Sept 2022

Toasting to our first night at the Hilton Moorea

We finally made it to Shawna's bucket list wish place - hut over the water in French Polynesia.  We were supposed to go in 2021 for her 50th bday celebration but Covid was still a little crazy then so we punted it another year.  John and JoAnna joined us and we spent three nights on Moorea and four nights on Bora Bora.  It was absolutely everything Shawna wished for and more - truly stunning scenery and the color of water was nothing like we had ever seen!

Accommodations:

Renaissance LAX Airport - We stayed here one night.  Nice hotel. Close to the airport. 

Hilton Moorea - We stayed here three nights in a hut over the water.  The resort is small with three restaurants, a small beach and a pool with a beautiful view of a mountain.  Our room (104) was very nice and we enjoyed swimming in the water from our room.  We had seen in the reviews that the food was not the best so while we had breakfast and lunches at the hotel, we ate all of our dinners off property.

Hilton Moorea

St Regis Bora Bora - We stayed here four nights in a hut over the water, also in room 104.  The resort is stunning with four restaurants, a small beach, two pools, a spa and a lagunarium where you can snorkel with fish.  We splurged and got a nicer room that had views of the main mountain on the island and had a large separate living room and deck.  We spent quite a bit of time relaxing our deck and swimming in the ocean from our room.

St Regis Bora Bora

Activity:

We flew to LA on Thursday evening and worked from the hotel on Friday - mainly because we did not want to miss our connecting flight that flew out on Friday night to Tahiti.  John and JoAnna also did the same.  Shawna worked a half day on Friday and so she and JoAnna went to Santa Monica Pier to walk around a bit and have lunch.  With traffic, it took a while to get there so we did not have as much time as we would have liked to explore.  We returned to the hotel, showered and packed up and then the four of us went out to dinner in Venice Beach before heading to the airport to catch our flight at midnight.

Santa Monica Pier

Venice Beach

We arrived in Tahiti on Saturday morning early.  John and JoAnna had booked a tour package so we were able to go on their transports by paying some extra cash.  So we hopped on a bus which took us to a ferry (the ferry was about a 30 min ride to Moorea) which then took us to another bus and then another bus before we finally arrived at our hotel!!  Since we got to our hotel well before check-in time, we changed into our swimsuits and relaxed by the pool.

Pool time

While in Moorea, we did a tour of the island for about three hours - on the tour, we drove in a 4x4 truck and went to a distillery where we tasted some local liquor, a vanilla farm where we had some vanilla ice cream and homemade jam and explored multiple viewpoints on the island.  The tour was great and our guide was interesting and funny.

Photos from the tour

The rest of the time on Moorea was spent relaxing at our hotel - sitting at the pool and drinking sparkling apple juice (aka beer - our waiter called it this).  We also swam off of our deck and snorkeled around that area, spending one afternoon entirely doing this.  We took kayaks out one morning to look for sea turtles and we saw one but it swam away quickly.  

Hanging out in the ocean off of our deck

Kayaking

On Tuesday, we checked out of our hotel on Moorea and took a bus to the airport to fly to Bora Bora.  The flight was short - about 40 minutes and once there, we took a large boat that is operated by the hotel from the airport to the hotel.  We were so excited to see the views and the water and of course to get to our hotel! Our rooms were not quite ready so we grabbed a late lunch and then got settled in.  That evening, we drank the complimentary Champagne that we each got in our rooms on our deck.

We had a primary concierge assigned to us who took care of our restaurant reservations and ordered us beer to be delivered to our hut so we could hang out on our deck on afternoon.  We struggled to come up with things to ask her to do since we were all so low maintenance!!  She was super nice and probably appreciated that we were not too demanding!

View from the beach

While on Bora Bora, we did one excursion - a snorkeling tour for about three hours.  The tour picked us up at our hotel and we went to three different spots to snorkel with reef sharks, manta rays, eel rays and lots of other colorful fish.  The cool part of this tour (aside from the really amazing snorkeling) was that we also went around the whole island so got to see it from all angles.  We definitely would recommend this tour and the company we went with.

Snorkel tour

The rest of the time, we enjoyed the resort - mainly relaxing at the beach or on one of our decks.  The water from our decks was deeper (no real snorkeling there) but we were able to jump in and use the floats that John had brought to relax in the water.  We only spent a couple of hours one day at one of the pools as it was really much nicer to spend time at the beach or on our decks.  One morning, we attended the fish feeding at the lagunarium and then also snorkeling in the lagoon for about an hour - some really cool fish here as well.  Keith and Shawna also treated themselves to a 90 min couples massage on the last day which was amazing!

Lagunarium

Swimming off our deck

Chilling at the beach

Our flight back on Sat was at the end of the day so we were able to get a late checkout for John and JoAnna's room which allowed us to enjoy more time at the resort and shower up before heading to the airport.  We flew out of Bora Bora around 6:30pm to Tahiti and then had a few hours at the Tahiti airport before our midnight flight back to LA.  We landed in LA shortly after 11am so we each ran to our connecting flights and got home around 8:30pm on Sunday.  What a long day getting back!!

Overall, truly an amazing trip - we were so sad to leave but definitely had to return to make more money to pay for the trip!!

Restaurants:

Gjelina (Venice Beach) - We had dinner here on Friday night before going to the airport to catch our flight.  It is one of Keith's favorites in the area.  We shared a bunch of yummy dishes.  All of the food was fantastic! 

Arri Vahine (Hilton Moorea) - We had breakfast here each morning - great buffet of fruit, pastries, and the usual hot items.

Rotui Bar & Grill (Hilton Moorea) - We had lunch here each day, eating at the pool.  We usually shared the tuna trio and a salad.  Food was pretty good.

Rudy's (Moorea) - We had dinner here twice - food was very good.  They offer pick up and drop off for free (most of the restaurants do this).  The first night we shared some yummy fish dishes and the second night we had some even yummier meat dishes.  Shawna was not a fan of their creme brûlée which she went on and on about!!  But everything else was really tasty.  A must go place on the island.

Le No Stress (Moorea) - We had dinner here one night at the recommendation of our concierge at the hotel.  While the food was good, the service was slow which caused some stress ironically given the name of the restaurant!  We also got free pick up and drop off to/from our hotel.  We shared some tasty seafood dishes.  Overall, we preferred Rudy's.

Te Pahu (St Regis Bora Bora) - We had all of our breakfasts and lunches here.  The breakfast was a really nice buffet with the usual items but then also fresh sushi and you can order hot items made to order from the table.  For lunch, we mostly shared the tuna poke and salad but one day splurged on getting the burger which was really good.

Bamboo (St Regis Bora Bora) - We had dinner here two nights at their Asian restaurant.  Food was really good.  We shared the stir-fried beef both nights.

Far Niente (St Regis Bora Bora) - We had dinner here one night at their Italian restaurant.  Food was also really good - we really like the truffle pasta but also shared a few other items for the table.

727 Bar (St Regis Bora Bora) - We had drinks here two nights - once at sunset to watch the sabering of the champagne and another time later in the evening before dinner.  Great location to watch the sunset. 

Lagoon Restaurant (St Regis Bora Bora) - We had dinner here one night - this is their nicer (and most expensive) restaurant on property.  We shared an appetizer, pasta, main dish and dessert - everything was very tasty!