Anniversary Holiday to Tahiti/ Moorea/ Bora Bora

[Dale Eastham]

When the wife rang me to say there were tickets booked for a child-free trip to Tahiti, she was only mildly surprised when my 1st query was which airline & what aircraft.
Air Tahiti Nui gets their 787s later this year & whilst this dismayed my wife (oh god what old planes are we going to be stuck on?!), I was stoked; probably my last opportunity to fly in an A340 - there will be plenty of 787 chances down the track.




Whilst I wasn't expecting flash interiors with planes about to be replaced, the trip north was excellent, with the A340 (Rangiroa) having both comfortable seats & a decent IFE. Food was excellent & the A340 lived up to its reputation of being very quiet to fly on (we flew economy & I'm 6 foot 2, but still comfortable enough for the 5hr flight).

4 nights in Moorea were first up, stayed at the Manava Resort (mid-range resort but with excellent food, staff & facilities), then 4 nights in Bora Bora at the Matitai Resort (cheapest resort on Bora Bora, but to be honest, was still brilliant) - view from our room - postcard-worthy views of sunrises:




Between the islands we took the public fast ferry from Tahiti to Moorea which was a bit of fun. Moorea - Bora Bora we flew Air Tahiti (only option) on thier very nice ATR 72s. They are pretty new planes but they saved a lot of money on the seating (Wife: they look like cargo seats from a hercules!) - but the longest flight is about 35mins, & you spend most of that looking out the window at the islands going by, so who cares?!



From Bora Bora - Tahiti we flew via Moorea for a quick, stay-in-the-plane turnaround, which resulted in the shortest commerical flight of my life (Moorea - Tahiti= 8.5 mins take-off to landing by my watch).

The return leg in the A340 wasnt as nice, more turbulence, poorer quality food & the plane ('Bora Bora') had a much older interior & a malfunctioning IFE which was a shame. The crew did their best to make up for it though, & there was an excellent selection of French wines & whisky to keep us entertained - thank goodness for Kindles though.

My 1st proper trip report so I'll leave it there, if any specific details are wanted im happy to try & remember them. Awesome bucket-list holiday, would highly reccommend & you dont have to spend a fortune to go swimming with sharks & manta rays in Bora Bora!

 

[defurax]

Nice TR. I'm surprised you found the Y seat comfortable, I found it to be the most uncomfortable Y seat for the lower back. Otherwise, the service is great and crew are smiling.

 

[Dale Eastham]

Nice TR. I'm surprised you found the Y seat comfortable, I found it to be the most uncomfortable Y seat for the lower back. Otherwise, the service is great and crew are smiling.

The older seats on the way home were actually more comfortable with more foot room, but I preferred the height-adjustable headrest on the newer seats on the way up which allowed for a better sleep - not much in it overall IMO

 

[LadyC]

Thanks for posting - Tahiti is definitely on my list. I assume food is pretty expensive at the resorts?

 

[Dale Eastham]

Thanks for posting - Tahiti is definitely on my list. I assume food is pretty expensive at the resorts?

The resort food prices vary with the quality of the resorts I suspect (i.e. Bora Bora Nui probably charges a fair bit more for dinner than the Maitai where we stayed, but you'd expect that).
At our one we had a few drinks, a starter to share & a main each (mine was a delicious fresh tuna sashimi dish) for about 100 NZD (roughly) - so I cant say that it was overpriced really. The food was excellent everywhere we went, and the fresh filled baguettes (spelling?) we often bought from the local supermarket for lunches were just brilliant, freshly made with great fillings.