worldtraveller73

Thanks Brettee. The cruise would have been a nice way to visit Fiji and an option I'd definitely consider on a return trip.

Thanks Chongi. It's a pretty neat experience. We didn't linger too long since the weather wasn't all that great on our trip.

worldtraveller73

Le Meridien Bora Bora
Over Water Motu View Bungalow

We ended up at this property as when I presented the Bora Bora accommodation options to MrsWT73, she was insistent on not staying at the St Regis after our St Regis Mauritius experience that we felt had let us down. Indeed, there was a substantial price premium for the St Regis Bora Bora over the Le Meridien Bora Bora property so if we were going to pay the premium, it had better be worthwhile. Since the prices were dear anyway, we decided on the Le Meridien. I dug around on line and was able to use the SPG 50 promotion code to get the 50% off the regular rate as the best price to be located for the over water bungalow, booked via the Starwood Hawaii / Asia Pacific web portal..

During our visit, Starwood was also running their summer “Take Three” promotion that offered 3 X points for weekend stays. We earned a boat load of SPG points with this stay as we earned 4 points per dollar as a SPG Platinum 75 member, 2 points per dollar for charging to the Canadian SPG American Express Card, 3 points per dollar for the “Take Three Promotion”; totaling 9 points per dollar AND 1,500 points from SPG Amex for a stay at a qualifying resort property. Crickey, that was generous. ^

There was no ability to apply SPG Suite Night Awards at this property as “all rooms are suites”. The hotel did not permit upgrading in advance from an over water bungalow to a “view” over water bungalow, which appeared to be their highest room category. We also didn’t try on arrival as our rooms appeared to have been pre-assigned. As a note, since our stay, the hotel appears to have further defined the room categories. On our visit, the options were over water and over water view. Where as now, it states the view or direction you are reserving; Motu View, End of Pontoon View, Lagoon View. Lastly, I also attempted to apply an SPG Your 24 request for 2 PM to 2 PM check out but it was declined outright at about 21 days prior to the stay. I did not attempt to make any follow up attempts closer to our stay.

On arrival at Bora Bora airport, we were “leid”; given a lei with the tiare flowers in them at the airport. Our rooms were pre-assigned at the airport podium and our luggage was marked in the airport with our room numbers. It certainly puts the brakes on those front counter negotiation upgrades when your bags are already headed to a specific room. =)

We were also given some bottled water for the ride.

We transferred to the boat through the lagoon, which took approximately 30 minutes to get to the hotel dock. Just on arrival to the hotel, it started to rain lightly.

These are not all our bags. =)





There were 4 groups checking in on the boat. We were escorted up to the hotel business center for check in processing. MrsWT73 happened to notice, despite our SPG Plat status, that we were among the last of the group to be checked in. We were thanked anyway for the loyalty and selected breakfast item as the plat bonus benefit. MrsWT73 started with the funny comments here: we were better at the Sofitel with zero status.

We were given a brief tour of the main reception and check in area, which included a somewhat robotic explanation of the shops, various restaurants, bars and business center. We were also told our room was now available (at 1 PM) which was appreciated given that it was early check in before 4 PM and my earlier Your24 request for 2 PM had failed to clear. We were then put into a golf cart and taken to our villa #241. Some photos of the check in areas later in our stay when it was sunny.









Surprisingly, another lily pond similar to Le Meridien Tahiti.



My initial impression was that we were not getting a great room thanks to the low #241 number but as we started out on the walkway with rooms starting at #200 and climbing, I got my hopes up a bit.

We ended up out about 5 villas from the end of the villa pontoon walkways, looking eastwards up the Motu toward the St Regis – straight up the channel with a peek a boo view of Mount Otemanu from the deck. Overall, I was really happy with the room assignment as I didn’t want to get stuck in an over water villa located the first one off the dock from the mainland. It turns out that these are the base level rooms and there are less than 8 of them. Aside from the far out room assignment, and the verbal welcome recognition, there wasn’t much platinum treatment here for an SPG-75. MrsWT73 described it as “being treated like any other customer”. I laughed a little bit when the check in attendant at reception asked for our coupon voucher. They must not have many reservations that are booked directly via their website but rather through travel agents.

Our key cards didn’t work at the villa door. Our arrival host let us in with the master key. She gave us a brief tour and explanation of the room. She indicated she would be back with replacement keys but never turned up again.

The room was functional and had a bit of well-integrated style to it. The best part of the room was the over water window that allowed us to look right onto the lagoon. It took me a bit of time before I felt comfortable walking on it.

The villa also had swing doors that opened up to the outside, allowing for a large opening to walk in and out of the room.











The bathroom area was behind the television and was a separate but connected area. It featured a completely separate bathtub, shower at the opposite end of the bathroom area and two sinks. The mirrors were attached with cables, which actually shook delicately in the swaying of the villa.









This property participates in Make a Green Choice. Our coupons were typically not slipped under the door and delivered until well after the morning service and after the evening turn down service while we were out at dinner between 8-10 PM. On one evening, I had to chase down both the house keeping manager and the front desk in order to get the appropriate vouchers. These circumstances were not always easily resolved, since everyone seemed to be pointing the finger at everyone else leading to a consistent run around.

The wifi was lightening fast and I discovered that we had our own personal wifi router in our room above the bathroom. I managed to look up a fix it video to my stuck shutter problem on YouTube and delicately fixed the mirror of my camera that somehow got lodged against the stop that was designed to stop it.

Our first afternoon we had rain showers almost the entire afternoon. Unlike South East Asia or the Indian Ocean, the showers stayed and stayed and stayed. It wasn’t like when it rain showered for 30 minutes and then dried up for the rest of the day- it stayed wet like Seattle or Vancouver for the whole afternoon.









After taking photos in the rain, I ended up saying screw it and going for a swim anyway direct off the over water villa deck. If you’re going to pay these prices, may as well enjoy it for all it’s worth. The villa deck had water access down a a circular staircase to the water. There was an outdoor shower at the bottom of the stairs as well.







It is worth nothing for those that are considering lightly floating away under your over water villa that there is a very strong current under these outer water bungalows. It was among the strongest that I have ever experienced swimming in the outdoors. It was like having a personal swimming machine in your villa and at times at full strength, it seemed like I wasn’t gaining any ground to swim back to the ladder.

I guess there is always this activity to pass the time while on holiday. I was needing it at this prices in the rain. LOL.



The hotel encouraged dinner reservations at one of their three restaurants. Unfortunately, there were no dinner menus in the rooms so I walked back in the rain across the walkways to the concierge. I went to go find the keys that never arrived and got some programmed at the front desk. Unfortunately, the second set didn’t work either, leaving me stuck back at the villa in the rain, pounding on the door asking to be let in.

Third set of keys finally worked. Took efforts to safeguard these with my life. Ha ha.

We had an easy dinner at the Le Te Ava "beach barbecue" restaurant. It's an outdoor "feet in the sand" concept that has been replicated almost everywhere. Our experience tonight in the rain was a bit sad, made even more sad by the dated colors and somewhat drab atmosphere.







I had pork tenderloin tonight. It was slightly over cooked (dry) and aside from the presentation, sadly almost forgettable.



After dinner, we wandered back up the pontoon towards the villa for a night in.

worldtraveller73

On the morning after our first night, it was still cloudy outside. We slept in a bit and headed for an included SPG Platinum Breakfast at Le Tipanie restaurant. It wasn’t anything too outstanding. The breakfast featured a full buffet breakfast including an egg station and everything else usually found at a buffet. It included the awesome Tahitian poisson cru; raw fish ceviche with tomatoes, cucumbers and coconut milk. The poisson cru became the highlight of my breakfasts here. There was only one type of cheese (the horrors ) which was surprising for French Polynesia considering its French influences. Also surprisingly for a European themed country and the price point for the resort was that there was no sparkling wine on offer for breakfast buffet.













The main restaurant, Tipanie was set against an artificial lagoon. The lagoon was stocked with fish so that guests could get a snorkeling experience in. For the most part, the lagoon was absent of any natural coral, so it is a wholly artificial snorkeling experience. The best part is that it made for interesting breakfast viewing seeing all the fish first thing in the morning from the breakfast table.









After breakfast, I arranged a telephone call with my son as it was fathers’ day. The Facetime worked great and I was able to catch up on his activities. I felt bad not being there for him on Father’s Day but he was probably more interested in playing Minecraft with his friends than he was talking to me.

The resort has a turtle conversation center, which runs a feeding session every day at 10:30 AM. The turtle conversation center is reportedly “independent” from the hotel, although the hotel charges guests 1,000 CFP per stay on their bills as a charitable donation. We went for the 10:30 AM feeding. We were given a rules speech and a touch and feel demonstration of the sea cucumbers, star fish and various other fishes in a touch tank immediately at the reception area. We were also given an anatomy lecture about the turtle and its various life cycles. Unfortunately, the presentation was continually interrupted by other guests arriving late (joining the session) so it took well over an hour before we actually got to feed any turtles.









Once the presentation was concluded, we were led into the back and got to feed large and mid sized turtles various shrimps, baby octopus (looked like white calamari) and other sea crustaceans. Some were energetic, whereas others were more sleepy about the whole affair. MrsWT73, an animal lover at heart, loved the experience and we were among the last to leave.









We returned to the deck when the sun started to come out. Sensing a photo opportunity, I left MrsWT73 content on the villa deck while I went around and took some resort photographs. We had some obvious weather challenges with clouding as the next series of photographs are from various times throughout our stay. It's still a scenic place with absolutely beautiful blue green water.



















The resort itself is quite spacious. There appear to be 84 over water bungalows and 11 villas on land. The villas on land seem to be similar in lay out to the over water bungalows. The grounds were nicely landscaped in a tropical style. It’s also worth noting that the lowest room category appears to be the 2-3 shallow over water villas that are closest to land and closest to the start of the two pontoons. During our visit, several appeared to be out of service as renovation teams were busy at work on the inside. I took a wander through the on land rooms that were available in order to get an overall feel for the resort.

















There was also an air conditioned gym that was available. I didn’t actually use it aside from taking these photographs





There are two pontoons that lead out to the over water bungalows. We were staying on the 200 – 244 level pontoons. I took a walk over to the 300 – 344 level pontoons and actually found them to be a bit more photogenic with the mountain in the background.









The beach itself at this resort is an artificial beach. I didn’t care much for it. Many areas of the beach are actually compacted sand, which was almost like walking on concrete as it was so packed down. As it is a Motu, there are no waves lapping against the shore unless a boat passes by on the main Motu. Many people, mostly groups, appeared to be on the beach for their day’s of sunning, instead of hanging out in their villa.















The resort featured a spa. It was actually one of the first water villas closest to land that appeared to have been converted a small spa. It did not look super inspiring compared to some other resort spa’s that I have seen.



I spent the rest of the day on the deck facing the sun, reading and mucking around with the villa taking silly photographs.





We enjoyed some sunset views as the day light went down. Thankfully, we didn't have a rain check for tonight and could actually sit outside on the deck with a bottle of wine. We had a nice view of the Motu as the sun slipped away.









Early in the evening, we had several power cuts in the resort; four times between 6-7pm. None of them lasted over 5 minutes but it made it entertaining getting ready. We ventured to the bar for the evening and finished the sunny day with pizzas. Nothing too exciting but pretty easy going.

TTT

Awesome TR! Have been reading this one all week and reminiscing about my trips to NZ and Tahiti a few years ago.

Thanks for sharing!

worldtraveller73

You are welcome TTT. More coming up right now.

worldtraveller73

Le Meridien Bora Bora
Continued.

On our second last day, after breakfast, I stopped by the front desk to ask about a late check out. I received a really luke warm response about the question; indicated that they would note the request but that they were “fully booked”. They must get this request over and over again. It seemed as well that there were other guests (appeared statusless) at the front counter around the same time that were attempting to get the late check out as well as they were on the late 6:30 PM flight back to Papeete.

On our last day, the Make a Green Choice coupon never arrived. It became another run around situation. I went to chase it down with the housekeeping station on the over water pontoon. They instructed me to go to the “administration” at the front desk. I went there after breakfast on the last day and it turned up finally. Another instance of chasing things down in a resort that doesn’t seem to run very smoothly below the surface.

After breakfast on our last day, we went exploring. Courtesy of Google Maps, I had found the back way to the ocean shore line on the opposite side of the resort. We followed a trail which was actually a trail to a helipad which we never saw used.









We followed the broken trail down to the rough shoreline to see the eastern side of Bora Bora. It was much more rugged than the trimmed shorelines of our resort. It was at least very neat to see.











There were also some distant views of the northern islands of Raiatea.





There were quite a few sea urchins in the shallow waters. The shorelines was much more rugged than the calm waters under our villa. It represented much of what the off resort areas of Bora Bora would likely be.



Later on, we got the departure letter before dinner, indicating our villa check out time and bag collection was 15:00hrs, and our boat time as 16:50hrs for our flight at 18:25 Pm. Generally satisfied with this in pursuit of the later check out and the ability to use the villa as much as possible during the time we were there.



On our last day, we spend the day on the deck sunning. I read the book House in the Sky by Amanda Lindhout. It was the story of a Canadian girl who started her life traveling as way to get away from her small town upbringing. She decided to become a photojournalist and ended up making a short trip to Somalia. She was kidnapped and held in brutal captivity for over 400 days. It was an excellent book and I’d recommend it to anyone. To be honest, I felt pretty guilty reading her book describing her conditions of captivity in extreme hardship in Somalia amid some of the most luxurious beach holidays of French Polynesia.

Closing out the day, we took in some last sunsets. It's still a beautiful affair an a good memory of our stay.









On our last night, we made a reservation at the Tipanie – the gastronomique restaurant (and the location of our daily breakfasts). I called the concierge to make a 7:30 PM booking. After the sunset shots, we went to the restaurant, only to discover it was exclusively buffet without any a la carte options. As with other times, the buffet looked quite tired and empty as we had to pass by it to get to the maitre’d. We aren’t buffet people since we don’t like to eat heavy at night so we passed on our reservation and went over to other restaurant with the pink chairs. It was looking a little sorry tonight as well, with only about 4 couples dining. When we arrived, we were told that it was “BBQ” tonight and a mandatory 3 course dinner for 5,200 CFP ($52 USD). Since the first course was a set tuna sashimi (something that I love but MrsWT73 wouldn’t have any part of) we ended up back at the bar for the evening. They had wonderful looking sushi last night but it was the sushi chef’s night off so that wasn’t available either. We spent the last night of our holiday having a hamburger and some tired nachos underneath the stars. It was a bit of a disappointing way to end the stay. I later saw a small army of guests coming back to the resort on the city boat at 8:45 PM – I suspect many multiple night guests head for dinner in town instead of staying here.



Overall, I had mixed feelings about the Le Meridien. The view and scenery are absolutely stunning, as is the wonderful blue water. We paid Jaguar style prices just to stay here, but didn’t receive Jaguar type service. It was more like Jaguar style pricing and Chevrolet styled service. The service was friendly but pretty non existent; just a number concept comes to mind. I can’t say whether this is exclusively “French styled” or whether this is typical of the Le Meridien here. We certainly had better service at the Sofitel on Moorea or at the Fairmont’s and Park Hyatt’s we had previously stayed at. I recognize that these are more upscale brands than Le Meridien but overall we had paid less for these properties Fairmont (Kea Lani) and Park Hyatt (Maldives) properties than we did at the Le Meridien Bora Bora.

The service was pleasant but very superficial – almost like a Las Vegas waitress who has all the charms, drops your drink and order and heads off, never to be seen again. But is it really worth paying more to stay at other more expensive over water bungalows at different properties on the Bora Bora lagoon that have essentially the same view of the mountain? All the resorts are lined up on mostly the same 10 km of motu. Despite this, I am hesitant to recommend this place since our stay experience here was pretty average. The hard product is nice but the service portion just doesn’t seem to add up and causes more overall frustration than relaxation.

MrsWT73 had stronger feelings than I about the situation. “Not what I expected… Americanized… …you should have talked me into the St Regis… …assembly line transactional… …not an experience, just a hotel.” Had to say that she had some valid points. . .

Oh well. . . We came, we saw, we enjoyed ourselves. That’s the important part. I doubt though that we would be back in a hurry. There are too many other beach areas in the world that are much nicer.

worldtraveller73

Air Tahiti
Economy Class (L)
BOB-PPT (Bora Bora – Papeete)
VT 429
June 19, 2017
Booked: ATR 72
Flown: ATR 72
Departure: 6:05 PM
Arrival: 7:25 PM



As it always happens, before we knew it, it was time to leave Le Meridien Bora Bora. Since we are now out of the room, and in our street clothes, it's time for a celebratory drink at the bar. Unfortunately, the weather was turning foul again. Maybe it's not a bad thing that we are not staying a fourth night. . .







We boarded our transfer boat along with 5 other groups and headed back to the Bora Bora airport. A few last pictures of our interesting stay…







Along with some interesting photos of Mount Otemanu from a different perspective as it was totally obstructed when we arrived.









When we arrived to BOB (the Bora Bora Airport), we got totally drenched. MrsWT73 was the smart one as she stayed inside while I went out to get this cool photograph.







There was only one Air Tahiti check in agent working the airport today and he seemed to be in a rush. He didn’t charge us for our excess baggage like on the way out; although the ramp agent was calling out the weights of each bag to be transcribed onto a sheet. I don’t know whether he couldn’t be bothered or whether the other fees went straight into the check in agent’s pocket at our Moorea stop; probably a little of both.







There wasn’t any free wifi from the airport, but there was a "Pora Pora" coffee shop where we snacked on a surprisingly tasty panini since it was dinner time.







Over at the gate, the downpour was so substantial, that they were loading the flight before us using golf umbrellas. That was something that I hadn’t seen before!!







When it came time for our turn, we were among the first in line. We headed out and boarded the ATR 72. There was no formal security check for our flight, just some signs that indicated not to carry guns and weapons on board.







It was much drier on board and we took among the first available seats towards the back on the right hand side. It was more of the same tight fit seating. As with the way down, there are no assigned seats.







We had a nice climb and got to see the resort row from the right hand side of the aircraft. For some reason, there was no beverage service on the way back. There was no explanation of why not – I suspect it was because they had run out of food or didn’t bother to cater it so late in the day.

We landed in Papeete and the bags were out pretty quick.





All in all a reasonable flight and a bonus that we weren’t charged for the excess. The ATR72’s are great for a short flight, but I think I wouldn’t be so keen on them if I was flying them for more than 90 minutes or on one of their longer segments to Raratonga or the Gambier Archipelago. If you're traveling Air Tahiti - watch the bag situation and you should be okay!

CRAZ8

This is a fun trip report.

I did the Four Seasons Bora Bora a few years ago, and your stay at the Meridien reminds me so much of how poor our stay was for the cost per night. The FS pool and breakfast buffet were great, but everything else was just meh. Luckily, you probably spent much less than I did for your stay!

I'm glad I did it, but I won't be back.

nequine

Just catching up again with the last few parts and idyllic is such an understated word!

offerendum

That´s exemplary effort^

palmjet

Really enjoying your report and pics - thanks for taking the time to post. I went to French Polynesia nearly 20 years ago (Nov 1997) and from what you say about your experiences, it sounds like very little has changed. We were in Tahiti and Moorea and while at the latter, caught part of Cyclone Osea, which passed through the region that month. Although Moorea wasn't badly hit, Bora Bora did get quite a bit of damage. That said, we found the place was very over-priced in general and customer service was either extremely forced or non existent. The friendliest people we met were actually other tourists. You pay for the location, and the fact that everything gets shipped out from France instead of sourcing materials from countries that are much physically closer such as Australia or NZ or even Chile. We thought Papeete was polluted and run down and I am glad we didn't stay on Tahiti Nui for long. The airport at PPT - as you found out, was also a joke. Back then it was even worse and no cooling or air con of any kind then too. We were the only flight to arrive into PPT from AKL (on a QF 767) and it took the 2 immigration officials over an hour to process all of the passengers... needless to see first impressions count, and PPT was awful.

injian

[QUOTE=worldtraveller73;28808681]


Awesome pics so far. Brings back a lot of memories as we did the same boat ride over from Tahiti to Moorea. The only difference was that while you went into the market to kill the time, we stayed inside at the bar (we didnt know any better at the time). Since the locals were drinking at 8am, I figured it was 12pm somewhere in the world and joined them.

We stayed in the overwater bungalows during our honeymoon. We initially booked a regular overwater bungalow but was upgraded to the deluxe. Its the 2nd one to the right of the pontoon. Our bungalow was sitting right over a big bunch of coral, so I had to be extremely careful when coming down the ladder for a snorkel/swim. There were a good amount of fish at that time. I do have pics of the inside of the room and I can share to FT if you like on your thread. Let me know.

When the rooms were refurbished in late 2011/early 2012, it looked really good. Looking at the pics now, it looks slightly out of date but good nonetheless.

Did you book any excursions or dinners at restaurants in town through the Sofitel concierge?

worldtraveller73

Thank you nequine. It is pretty peaceful until you think of the burn rate per hour on your credit card. LOL.

That's an interesting point CRAZ8, which I hinted on in the report. Most of these properties face the same mountain and have mostly the same view. Is it worth spending more (and substantially more in some cases) for better service and hard product? Either way, in agreement with your point, I didn't see a large value for dollar feature here compared to some other places around the globe.


Thanks offerendum as always. My shorts were wet from the rain the entire ride back to PPT.

Palmjet, I'd have to say that I completely agree with your points. French Polynesia has a great deal of legacy marketing as a premium destination. I think it's being outclassed by up-and-comers like the Maldives and the Seychelles. Either way, we won't be in a super hurry to get back any time soon.

[QUOTE=injian;28865967]Thanks injian. By all means throw some photos up. The rooms still felt reasonably fresh. The color scheme mostly works and we didn't get the impression that the rooms were tired. We did not book any excursions or dinners at restaurants in town via the concierge. There was no particular reason for this decision - other than usually hanging out watching the sunset (or limited sunset) after a beach day.

worldtraveller73

Air Tahiti Nui
Salon Manuhiri / Business Lounge,
Fa'a'ā International Airport, Papeete, Tahiti

The Fa'a'ā airport proudly announces on it’s dated website that it is not a 24 hour operation. It encourages guests to be “prepared” that they will have to go land side prior to connecting to their domestic flights. In our case, Air Tahiti Nui international check in opens only 3 hours before their flights. Their lounge generously opens only 2 hours before flights. Despite oddly timed flights that leave around midnight to the Americas, it seems that they don’t want to pay to accommodate people in their lounges while they wait around for a midnight departure. This was indeed the case when we arrived and there was no getting around it. The Arun salon was the only restaurant on the public side that was open and at T-4 hours, the airport was sewn up tight with lots of travelers just sitting or wandering the public side totally aimless.



Yeah, absolutely nothing happening here at the moment.





We ended up taking in dinner at the Salon Restaurant until the check in desks opened at 8:45 PM.





With nothing but time on our hands, I eventually found the “lei” market in the parking lot. It’s immediately outside the front doors of the departure hall at ground level. There were dozens of women sitting there making sea shell lei’s. It was neat to see some souvenirs that were actually hand made in French Polynesia, as opposed to being imported in from China or some other cheap labor country.













When the time came, we went to check in at the easily marked Poerava Business Class line. It’s situated the closest to the international departure gates. We had a document check prior to getting to the podium, along with the usual security questions. We were given our US Customs and Border Protection clearance cards there, prior to being checked in at the proper Air Tahiti Nui check in desk.









At check in, our bags were tagged with priority tags right to Vancouver and we were able to get our Air Tahiti Nui boarding cards to Los Angeles, and our American Airlines Boarding Cards from Los Angeles right to Vancouver on our AAdvantage issued award ticket.





We passed through the exit stamp for Tahiti and the security check to a mostly renovated airport on the main departure level, which was on the ground floor.

We located the lounge, which was up a flight of stairs on the “first floor”, aka European for second floor. Of course, the sole elevator was broken so I carried the rollie bags up the circular staircase.





There were apology signs that the lounge was under renovation. There were not a lot of places to sit and every seat was taken by the time our flight was to leave. The lounge wasn’t directly air conditioned, but had large stand up air conditioners running at about 80% strength. It was blasting intense air in some areas where as other areas were quite warm by comparison.













There were a pretty sorry amount of snacks. There were some cold cut sandwiches and some Cup O Soup Noodles and that was pretty much it. It didn’t look appealing at all. I’m glad we didn’t hold out for dinner here, as we would have starved. Definitely come with a plan to eat dinner elsewhere!







The highlight of the lounge was the Tahiti Coral White Wine that was from the Raigna Archipelago. Of course, we had to have an impromptu wine tasting. It tasted a lot like un-oaked Californian Chardonnay – big mouth feel on the front with a fruity butterscotch finish. Overall, it’s not bad for wine that comes out of a coral island in Tahiti. However, we weren't moved to pick up a bottle from duty free to hand carry home.







At the time of our visit, there were some windows over the apron so we settled in there while we waited the hour for our flight. I should also say at this point, I was madly checking Flight Aware to see if we would end up on the old business class configuration on F-OJTN “Bora Bora”. For those that are in the know about Air Tahiti Nui, the "Bora Bora" aircraft has not been improved and features the old barca lounger non flat recliner style seats. I decided that I would check the entire fleet of five Air Tahiti Nui aircraft on Flight Aware to see what planes were scheduled to fly where and the like. Unfortunately, it promised to be too much to late as Flight Aware wasn’t loading the information super quickly. I had guessed that there was less likelihood that Air Tahiti would use the old aircraft on the flights from Papeete to Los Angeles with continuing service to Paris Charles to Gaulle; which was the flight we had strategically booked on. When I had booked the flight, there was reward availability on both aircraft but I ended up booking the TN8 flight that continued to Paris. I was a bit shocked to see that old Bora Bora aircraft sitting right there at the gate! Yikes – if the lounge was bad, we could be in for a worse flight. There is the "arch nemesis" parked on the apron just below.



There isn’t anything resembling a shower here. The washrooms are outside of the lounge in an area in the public part of the terminal and were pretty filthy for an airport that is only open part time and a few hours a day.

The lounge wifi was terrible. The download speed was great but I barely couldn’t manage to load a single picture to Instagram, let alone a Facebook post over our 60 minute period in the lounge.

All in all, I’d probably give this place a miss next time. Truth by told, you may not have a chance flying through Fa'a'ā thanks to the late evening flight times. Unfortunately, another strike against the Tahiti Fa'a'ā Airport for the arrival experience and a a strike against the airport for the departure experience. Oh well, I guess we were in business class but otherwise it was truly bland.

worldtraveller73

Air Tahiti Nui
Business Class (I)
PPT-LAX (Papeete – Los Angeles)
TN 8
June 19, 2017
Booked: Airbus 340-300
Flown: Airbus 340-300
Departure: 11:45 PM
Arrival: 10:50 AM

We headed downstairs from the lounge at T-45, which was the advertised boarding time on the boarding pass. There were two Air Tahiti Nui flights departing, TN 08 to Los Angeles with continuing service to Paris Charles de Gaulle and TN 102 to Los Angeles.

The boarding area was pretty congested thanks to benches and seats that didn’t allow for proper queuing. We pretty much pushed our way to the front around the masses when the Poerava Business Class call was announced.



The Aeroport Tahiti Fa'a'ā doesn’t have any jet bridges so after our boarding cards were scanned, we walked out into the pleasant evening temperature and had a short walk down to the plane.





There was double door jet stairway boarding today on to the beautiful F—OLOV Nuku Hiva; their newest plane. I was happy as while we were waiting, the old configuration “Bora Bora” turned up as an arrival and became the second TN flight to Los Angeles (not continuing onto Paris like our flight). Generalized Anxiety Disorder no more - a decent sleep tonight!

Air Tahiti Nui Poerava Business Class is offered in a 2-2-2 configuration. We arrived to our seat 4K and 4L. I had heard of Air Tahiti Nui not honoring seat assignments on award tickets (I had called in for seat assignments) but there were no issues there.

On our seats were blankets, pillows, an amenity kit and a bottle of water. The seats were the colors of the tropical lagoons in Tahiti and were quite relaxing.

















With the way the world is developing, it may actually be the last time I fly on an Airbus 340 since everyone seems to be headed for more fuel efficient aircraft.



The amenity kits were pretty basic, although it was handy to have a toothbrush for this long flight.





We were offered a pre-departure beverage of orange juice, champagne or a mai tai. I went with the mai tai, which was quite sweet. It tasted like the Tahiti Delight alcoholic beverage from the milk carton tetra pack that I tasted from our neighbors at the Sofitel. MrsWT73 took a wine chaser to go with it.



We had a quiet climb out with a taxi and U turn at the end of the sole runway in Fa'a'ā. There are no taxi ways here so we monopolized the runway until we got underway.

As we climbed to altitude, I explored the in flight entertainment system. There were about 28 movies on offer. They were a combination of Hollywood blockbusters and some older Hollywood titles. The system was not all too impressive.









Menu cards were handed out once we were airborne. In a low rent touch, the airline appears to have completely done away with a wine list. There was also a copy of the menu electronically in the in flight entertainment system. It was difficult to navigate through as the pages did not load promptly and reminded me of sitting in my office dealing with slow LAN network band with issues. I was happy that they still had printed copies of menus available as the last thing I want to be doing on holiday is looking at information and trying to process same on a computer monitor. I hope this is not the future of business class where you have to scroll through a computer screen to see a menu.





Thanks in part to a midnight departure, the dinner service is a light meal that is presented all at once. There were at least 4 staff serving us in business class today so the service was very prompt.

Today’s meal was quinoa and cold chicken, accompanied with fresh fruit, a chocolate cake, a cheese plate, a bread roll, paired with an unnamed and un-described white wine.



After the service, the window shades were all pulled shut. I took a relax and sleep and slid back into the seat. The seat reclined 160 degrees and was really uncomfortable for this side sleeper. I probably would have been better off just attempting to snooze in the relax mode instead of attempting the angled flat version.

I slept for about 4 hours and I woke up about 2 hours out of Los Angeles.



The breakfast service started. Having had enough eggs from many SPG Platinum breakfasts to last me a lifetime on this trip, I opted for the crepes with vanilla sauce. The crepes were quite tasty.





All through the service, the staff were pleasant, ample in numbers and available. They didn’t have the usual “hardened” attitude of many other legacy carriers and were fun to interact with.

MrsWT73 got some duty free in the form of a Air Tahiti Nui model plane and some unique Air Tahiti Nui Aircraft hang tags which she was kind enough to gift me one for planning such a nice trip for her... The tag is now proudly hanging around my Tumi Alpha 2. . .



We were over Los Angeles before we knew it. . .



With a fairly quick landing and taxi to Tom Bradley International Terminal. We parked next to a Ethiopian 787. One last look at the not so comfy seat...





With only 4 of us on the flight with Global Entry, we were through into the TBIT baggage hall before the bags were even assigned to a conveyor belt.







We passed through the CBP customs hall and toward the public exit. We dropped our bags at the connections desk and headed over to our separate AA flights.



We found the hidden ground floor connections TSA security screening checkpoint. Wow – this place is a hidden gem with no lines compared to upstairs in TBIT or everywhere else!! We were through an upstairs with only 3 others in line ahead of us.





Air Tahiti Nui was just an okay way to get to and from Tahiti. The equipment type (seat) wasn’t much better than the angled flat product that Air France uses on the same route. However, the service was likely much better on Air Tahiti Nui and more friendly. Aside from the lack of a wine list, (the first time I’ve ever flown a wide body business class without one), it was a pretty good service. I was more shocked that I had to spend 80,000 AAdvantage miles for a 7.5 hour flight, which seemed like an expensive amount. You can get all the way to South Africa for about 75,000 Aeroplans with about triple the flying.