jyu174

I say definitely go before it's gone. You can probably get an AXON 4-night award for 125K Hilton points.

tmcneill

.....

jyu174

I was in a similar situation. I did a prepaid 6-nights through SPG, and it was a great rate, about $600 (inc tax) per night for an over-water bungalow. I was able to cancel without penalty with SPG Platinum desk's help, due to the fact that the hotel was leaving SPG. Although it was a great rate, it cannot beat 175K Hilton points!

FlyingYan

Managed to cancel the Sofitel booking I had and booked 3 reward nights at Bora Bora Nui in April... Can't wait!

missdona

When I called the diamond desk last night to book this property for a GLON, they wanted a $1114 advance for taxes. Have any of you heard of this?

jyu174

when I booked my 6-nights online, it did mention some deposit / hold. However, the system didn't show the exact amount.

I'm about to check out today, and the preliminary bill does show some tax to be paid (3 different taxes plus a service charge). However, it's pretty small, less than $10 each day.

Savage76

I am trying to plan my honeymoon and I found the Hilton Nui Bora Bora on the Hilton website. My wife fell in love with the pictures, we got married in September of last year. I am currently a diamond member & have 365k points which would be enough for a 12 night stay with the GGLOB reward. We are looking to travel this coming May.

However we are on a budget and I have read that the Bora Bora is an expensive hotel. I can't find flights for under $1,550 from Cincinnati. So it looks like it is going to cost us $3k just for the flights and if we are there for 12 days I am afraid it could become very costly.

Does anyone have information about the cost of meals there? I believe they would offer a free breakfast with the diamong status. But do they offer upgrades? And are the meals / drinks / activites really expensive? The budget is $5k which at first I thought as going to be a lot but given the cost of the flight that only leaves us with $2k for the hotel. Is this completely unrealistic? Do the flights seem expensive to anyone else?

Does anyone have an e-mail address for the property as I would love to contact them and ask them some questions?

This is my first post and I am really excited to hear what you have to say. Thanks for your help.

rndomtask

2K for food and incidentals should be fine. It all depends on how you want to spend your time. There are stores on the main island of Bora Bora where you can buy food, fruit, wine...etc. There are dinner spots that will run $100 for two and then there are spots that will cost $500 for two. The resorts and the Nui included are naturally more expensive so as long as you don't go crazy at the hotel you can keep in your $160/day budget. You also need to take into account the exchange rate, in the past year there has been a 30% shift! I don't know if the XPF devaluation has translated to increased local prices to stay with the Dollar. When we were there last summer a mixed drink at the Nui was anywhere from 1,500-3,000 XPF. We also drank a lot of Hinano's which were cheaper than bottled water!

PHL

This hotel just changed hands. It was built a few years back (well, maybe more than a few but definitely after 2001) and had been in the Starwood Luxury Collection. Normal rates were $800+/night. Reviews were overall positive but you could search the Starwood forum for info on this hotel because the property is still the same one and, most likely, the staff are probably still the same.

As beautiful as the isalnd is, you might get bored after 5 or 6 nights. Why not mix it up and stay at one of the other FP islands like Moorea or even a few days at the front or back of your trip on the mainland (where you arrive) in Papeete?

Bondiboy

You should also budget for your inter-island flights (Tahiti to Bora Bora will cost at least $400 - the fare is priced in euros) and the possibility that you may have to spend a night or two in Tahiti after/before your international flights.

I agree with PHL about the length of stay. Just as a suggestion, why not consider a four night AXAN award in Bora Bora (125000), another four night AXON in Moorea (125000) and a one or two night award at the Hilton in Tahiti (2 @ 30000 = 60,000).

Thisd is a total of 310,000 for 10 nights.

If you fly Hawaiian Air to Tahiti you can also make a free stopover (each way) in Hawaii.

You have a great problem.

SanDiego1K

Keep in mind that you need a Hilton AMEX to book an AXON award - and that AMEX has announced that award level will be increasing soon. We don't know when soon is.

I agree with Bondiboy's proposal for you to spend 4 nights on Bora Bora, 4 nights on Moorea, and positioning nights if needed in Tahititi. You can buy an airpass that allows you the Moorea stop virtually free.

Be aware that the hotels charge to upgrade you to over the water bungalows - and that in my opinion, it is well worth paying for that upgrade for at least a couple nights. And food IS expensive, no matter how you slice and dice it.

You can find a wealth of information on these hotels in the Starwood forum, as they were Starwood managed til mid January of this year.

azepine00

BB is nice but 12 nights there will bore you to death.
As suggested go for 4-6 on BB and 4 on Moorea.

Savage76

Thank you so much for the advice. I think I am going to try to break the vacation up to maybe a 6 (BB), 4 (Moorea), 1(Papeete). Any idea on how I can get e-mail addresses for the hotels? I spoke with people at Hilton and they said they didn't have any which really surprised me.

rndomtask

check the Hilton Moorea thread for their email address

lvmomof4

My husband will have 1,000,000 points in April. We are planning our trip to BOB and now have the opportunity to stay (relatively) free at the BB Nui. My understanding is the only rooms they give to HH points is the crappy motel setting rooms. Does anybody have ANY ideas how to get us upgraded to an OTW (don't care which one) using miles?