Lonely Planet™ · Thorn Tree Forum · 2020

Midnight flight to Fidi from Samoa/ hotel and transfer service

Country forums / Pacific Islands & Papua New Guinea / Samoa

Hello<All

We (2 girls) will take a flight to Fiji at midnight on Nov 30th.
We have 4nights and 5 days in Apia and we probably stay at the same accomodation.
Can you please recommend or suggest any good hostel/hotel that can arrange the transfer service
to the airport at night and we can use their facilites(pool, internet, cafe...) till 10pm?

How much it would be if we take a taxi at night? And the taxi at night is safe?

Thank you very much for your reply in advance. Have a nice day!

Why on earth are you staying in Apia for 5 days?
A half day is more than enough there, then head to the south coast where it's much nicer.

The airport is basically closed during daytime and comes to life at night when all of the big flights come and go, so a midnight transfer is normal. Hotels can easily arrange it. Can't recall the exact taxi fare, but I think it was around 50 or 60 tala ($25ish) from the airport to Apia. It's a long drive.

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Thanks tch7.
We actually stay in Samoa for the connected flight reason...
I know it is like you come to Provence(south of france where I live and stay in Marseille for
all your holiday time... I know... it sounds fool... I should suggest to go Aix-en-Provence and
go to some nice beaches...

Because the big Tunami destroyed many nice beaches and resorts etc...
Are you kind enough to recommend any nice beaches and hotels on the south coast?

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Faofao Beach Fales and Taufua Beach Fales are both good. Basic, but good, and on the best beach in Samoa. If you need a bit more "luxury," there's Virgin Cove, but Samoa is a third world country so don't expect much. Spend 4 days down there and then your last day in Apia.

The damage from the tsunami is nice in a way, because it makes you really feel disconnected from the world since there's nothing around. No phones, no internet, nothing. All the debris has long since been cleaned up, but very little has been rebuilt.

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I disagree with tch7, depending on what time of year you are traveling, it can be rainy on the south coast when the weather on the north coast is beautiful. Apia can be a good base if you rent a car.

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Yes I agree with tilos. It's great fun driving round Upolu and you can easily visit many places from Apia. It is nice to sleep in a fale on the beach though, so I'd recommend this for at least one night.

We stayed at Taufua beach fales pre-tsunami and really enjoyed it.

We had a very early morning flight if I remember correctly (approx 4am?) and our taxi driver kept drifting off on the way to the airport, so I think that's the only thing to look out for! Lively conversation seemed to do the trick!

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