Lonely Planet™ · Thorn Tree Forum · 2020

Weather in December

Country forums / Pacific Islands & Papua New Guinea / Tahiti & French Polynesia

We are thinking about going to Tahiti this December. I know that it is rainy season, but does anyone have any input on how rainy? Would it be just miserable to go during rainy season or does it rain hard and then stop or it it rainy and cloudy and awful most of the time in December?

In was in Tahiti in Dec 2003 and then again in Sept-Oct 2005.
I didn't find the rain much of an issue. As you said, it's a case of it pissing down for a few hours in the late afternoon and then it would clear up. We did have one full afternoon of rain, but still went swimming / enjoyed ourselves. The main issue was the heat. it was so hot and muggy!
Sept / Oct is a lot nicer, a little less hot and no rain - at least for me.
Hoep this helps.
B

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Let me piggyback for a similar question. My wife and I want to visit Bora Bora next Jan. This is supposed to be the peak of the rainy season. Would going at this time be ill advised? I wouldn't have a problem if it was a shower a day in the afternoon. Thanks.

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I didn't go to Bora Bora when I was there in Dec 2003. Although I did visit in 2005.

As I said above, the clouds tended to gather from lunchtime and then there would be an almighty downpour late in the afternoon. One day we had non stop rain.

The mountain on Moorea was often obstructed with cloud, so I imagine that would be the case on Bora Bora also. That would kind of ruin the experience as that mountain is absolutely incredible.

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Husband and I did our honeymoon in December of last year. We visited Tahiti, Tikehau, Moorea, and Bora Bora. It did rain, but sometimes on and off. It never really kept us from doing anything on our trip. Though it was rather painful riding jet skis back to the hotel in the rain - hits you pretty hard in the face.

Otherwise, we were able to do everything we wanted to as the rain seemed to come and go. Only exceptions were that it would rain all night in Tikehau, but by that time, people weren't really out anymore, and it rained our last day in Bora Bora. But we had booked a boat trip that morning and the weather was beautiful up until the time we got back to the hotel. It never really seemed to rain in the morning as well, only later into the day.

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I think you'll find that December, as their summer, is the rainy season, and is likely to be quite wet.

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