French Polynesia

HI All,
I'm thinking about heading over to French Polynesia for some diving? Has anyone been there on a RTW trip and is it possible to find cheaper accommodation on Rangiora and Fakarava ? also would it be a really borring place to be for a week or two for a single guy as I know it's frequented by honymooners in general ?
Thanks in advance,

Hi,

I spent 3 weeks in French Polynesia last April, and visited Moorea, Bora Bora, Rangiroa, Tikehau, Fakarava, and of course Tahiti, and it was one of my favourite places of my whole trip, and I'm a single, 21 year old guy, so it definitely won't be boring!

It's definitely possible to find cheaper accommodation in both Rangiroa and Fakarava - go on a website called www.thetahititraveler.com, and they've got a pretty good list of places to stay, most with emails or phone numbers. I stayed in my own little bungalows in both Rangiroa and Fakarava for about £30-£50 a night, including breakfast and dinner.

I spent most of my time scuba diving - Rangiroa, Fakarava and Tikehau had some absolutely amazing diving, the best in all the places I went to in the South Pacific, I'd definitely recommend those islands! Loads and loads of sharks, pretty much guaranteed dolphin sightings in Rangiroa, plus amazing visibility, tons of fish and other marine life. There are a few other things to do as well, like lagoon tours, or taking a bike around the island, but otherwise it's pretty laid back. I found these islands a lot less honeymoon-y, than Bora Bora or Moorea, and I met some really cool people, although basically nobody spoke English where I was staying, so if you don't know any French, it could be a bit tricky.

If you want to know any thing else, just let me know!

Thanks so much for taking the time to write all that.
So it's the best diving in the South Pacific ? did you dive the Solomon Islands? How many dives per day did you do? Is it a must to book accommodation or are there plenty of places not listed on the net when you get on the ground ? Have you dove anywhere better than Rangiora / Fakarava ? thanks so much for your assistance and sorry for so many questions.
Thanks in advance again,

No problem, I remember how difficult it was to find information about FP from a more budget/backpacker point of view rather than just all honeymoons or family holidays, so I'm happy to help!

I'd say it was, but I only went diving in Fiji, Tonga, Samoa and FP - Tonga, Fiji and FP were all great, Samoa not so much. But out of those 4, FP was by far the best - I'd also rate it higher than my experiences on the Great Barrier Reef, and it was a lot better than the diving I've done on Utila, Honduras, in the Caribbean. I've heard the Solomons and Palau are both pretty amazing for diving, but I'll have to save them for another trip!

I did 2 dives per day - usually 2 in the morning, then I'd have the afternoon off to chill, although in Fakarava I did a whole day trip down to the South Pass for two dives, which was amazing! The diving there is reasonably expensive, but if you can buy packages of a set number of dives that you can use across the different islands, which saves a little bit of money. Rangiroa and Fakarava were definitely the best dive sites I've ever been to, going through Tiputa Pass on Rangiroa is wicked, plus the amount of marine life is insane - huge schools of barracuda, turtles, eels, rays, stonefish, dolphins, hundreds of sharks - everything!

I didn't book accommodation until I got there - I landed in Tahiti at around midnight I think, spent the night in the airport, then booked my inter-island flights in the morning, and headed straight out to Moorea. Once I was in Moorea, I phoned ahead to the places I'd looked up and booked them, just so I'd have someone to pick me up from the airport, but in hindsight, it wasn't really necessary - every island I arrived at, there were people from the pensions just waiting, who you could easily talk to and sort something out. I'll have a look later to see where I stayed in Fakarava - it was really cheap (I managed to get a really good deal when I went to pay), and I had an amazing little bungalow right on the lagoon, plus it was right next to the hotel where I went diving from, so I could just walk down the beach to get to it.

Ben

Ben, your a star man, like you say there is very little info about FP and this thread is probably the most informative on TT about Rangiora and Fakarava that ? I have found.
So would I struggle with having no French then ?
You did say "hundreds" of sharks ?
Where there a few accommodation options on Fakarava ? I know Rangi is supposed to be much busier.
Where there a few RTW trippers about for company in the evenings? Sorry I know I'm asking lots of questions, I just want to make the right choice.
Thanks again.

I'd say Tikehau was probably the most French, but in Rangi and Fakarava, you could get by without it if you had to - all the dive shops speak English, and the places I stayed at spoke a little English. Maybe just try and learn some basics in French just to seem polite.

Yep, hundreds - during one dive in Fakarava, we just sat on the sea floor, at about 25m, either just inside or outside the lagoon, and just watched as a constant stream of grey reef sharks swam past, for a good 10 minutes. Another time in Rangi, we swam out from the edge of the outer lagoon into the blue to try and find the dolphins, and came across a huge school of barracuda, plus down on the sea floor below us (probably at around 50/60m, but still visible), was a school of about 15 eagle rays as well as countless sharks just circling around!

I don't think there's loads of accommodation options on Fakarava - I stayed at a place called Pension Paparara (which is right next to the dive shop), which was great, I loved it. There was another place I was considering called Relais Marama - both have websites I think if you want to have a better look at them (Pension Paparara is also called Fakarava Dive Lodge). Both were pretty reasonably priced for FP, and Fakarava was my favourite out of the three Tuamotu islands I visited, although all three were just as beautiful.

Yeah, I was lucky and met a really cool French/Chinese family in Fakarava, as well as an American guy who I'd met on Rangiroa when I was diving, and a handful of other couples and young families - all were really friendly and it was really great. I was the only one staying at the place in Rangiroa, but the owners were really nice, and I was quite happy to just enjoy my own company for a bit there!

Any more questions, feel free to ask! It's been almost a year since I got home from my RTW trip now, so it's nice talking about it again and reminiscing!!

Thanks Ben,
Much appreciated again , I'll get back to you if I have any more questions thanks. I checked out Relais Marama and thats 70 Euros a night! So I will hopefully find somewhere cheaper than that! thanks again

Thanks for all the great information, Ben.
I have a couple of questions for you--or anyone else!
What was the weather like in April? I want to go to French Polynesia in February but fear the "rainy season" a bit. I live in the Pacific Northwest of the U.S. and live in rain 9 months of the year---so really want sun on the trip.
Do you know if the diving is better at different times of the year?

I plan on diving a lot but also love to snorkel, kayak and hike. Did you do any of these things while you were there?

Finally, is it possible to boat between islands or must you fly?

Thanks so much!

The weather was perfect for me in April - I had one afternoon of rain when I was on Moorea, but otherwise it was lovely and sunny every day for the whole 3 weeks, and temperatures getting into mid-30s (centigrade) when I was on Tikehau and Rangiroa!

I'm not sure how much rain you'll get in February, because that is part of the rainier season, but hopefully someone who's been around February would be able to help with that. Even so, I think you'd be pretty unlucky to have non-stop rain the whole time you're there. How long are you thinking of going for?

I'm pretty sure the diving's supposed to be good all year round, but what marine life you see does depend on the time of year - humpback whales are around July - September time, but you're more likely to see hammerheads in the Tuamotus (particularly Rangiroa) November - February. Mantas have certain times where they're more abundant, but there's a few spots where they're pretty reliably seen at cleaning stations year round - I saw them at cleaning stations on both Bora Bora and Tikehau. The dolphins in Tiputa Pass on Rangiroa are there year round, and you're bound to see turtles, morays, reef sharks whatever time of the year!

I think it is possible to boat between the Society Islands, but I don't think it's very reliable, but you basically have to fly if you want to go to other island groups like the Tuamotus or Marquesas. Also, if you want great diving, I'd say you should definitely fly out to the Tuamotus, as it was by far the best diving there.

I didn't do much hiking, but there are opportunities in the Society Islands or the Marquesas, as they're pretty mountainous, but the Tuamotus are just small, flat atolls, only a few metres above sea level, so definitely no hiking there!! A lot of the time you can see the sea one side of you and the lagoon on the other! They are good for kayaking though - the majority of places I stayed offered kayaks and bikes to borrow for free, so I did quite a bit of both. The snorkelling wasn't amazing anywhere to be honest, but it was OK if you just want to do a bit of casual snorkelling to cool down when you're on the beach.

Hope this helped!