French Polynesia: Tahiti and Taha’a

 

It was a last minute decision to add eight nights in French Polynesia to break up our travel from Hawaii to New Zealand and we are very happy we did.  We arrived around 8 pm to live music and dancing in the airport.  The Intercontinental Hotel was about five minutes from the airport.  The welcome drink (mango juice) and view of the pool were a preview of morning. 

Although we did not take advantage of all of the hotel offerings, we woke up early, explored and grounds and enjoyed the spectacular views.

Breakfast was a large buffet and “fashion show” that started at 8:30 am.  The show was an hour of music and dance performances.  

After breakfasts we had time for a quick swim before heading to the airport for our flight to Raiatea. 

La Taha’a hotel is on a private island about an hour boat ride from the Raiatea airport. We were greeted with a crown of flowers and vanilla tea. 

Our room was on the property’s edge and had a private plunge pool, outdoor deck, hammock, outdoor shower, and resident cat (never allowed in the room). We named the cat Brackets because her stripes. The upside was the cat loved the food we brought each morning.  The downside was she had fleas and there were fleas were in the room!  We mentioned this to the hotel at breakfast and they immediately addressed the issue—our room was fumigated, we were given lunch while waiting to return to our room, and the hotel laundered all of our clothing free of charge.  We stopped getting flea bites and did not see any fleas on us or our belongings since (it’s been over a month).

Kaley suggested we try jet skiing—She was the only one who had been on a jet ski before-the rental also included a guided tour of Taha’a.  There were three jet skis so it was 1-Kaley, 2-Ian and Sunshine and 3-the guides. The first ten minutes were terrifying!! Luckily we stopped at the largest Pearl manufacturer in Taha’a. The tour provided a detailed explanation of how pearls are farmed. After the initial ride, it was a lot of fun.

We then rode to an area where we swam with blacktip reef sharks.  We were told this type of shark is not aggressive (unless provoked).  The water was amazing and our guides made us feel safe. When another group arrived in a boat, we hopped back on our jet skis and rode to the “Vanilla Island.”

The tour was short and the talk about vanilla was interesting. The shop served pineapple juice, fresh coconut and locally grown bananas.We bought a local oil known as a cure all for bug bites, sun burns and reef scrapes.  We already had bug bites but would soon need it for the other two ailments.  

Our final stop was a coral garden.  It was beautiful. The camera did not capture the unbelievable feeling of the experience. Our guides prepared a snack of fresh fruit and water before our final ride back to the hotel.  A word about this last ride-it was starting to rain and the waves were much larger.  We were happy to return to land without flipping one of the jet skis. 

The following day we signed up to swim with the rays.  We rode a boat rather than jetski.  The water was clear and the most glorious colors of blue. The longer we swam the more the rays approached us.

The tour continued to another spot to swim with sharks (a surprise to us).  This time it was a little scarier—the guide fed the sharks before we got into the water.  One of the other passengers got really freaked out becuase there had been a shark biting the previous week.  Once in the water, we never felt unsafe but we kept our distance. We later learned that the shark bite occurred because one of the guides poked a shark in the eye by mistake.

The final stop of our boat tour was the coral reef we visited the prior day.  It was great to return and enjoy the area in the sun. For us, this was one of the most beautiful coral reefs we had ever seen.  However, the other guests told us that most of the coral had died since their previous visit a few years ago.  

The weather was a little rainy each day so we enjoyed days swimming and snorkeling near our room.  We were always the only ones in the water so it felt like our own private lagoon. 

There was a dance show after dinner our final night. The dancers were a lot of fun and Kaley joined in when invited to the stage. The performances moved to the beach for a fire show as the finale.