I think some of the expectations people have are a little unrealistic.

I’m in Tahiti. I was picked up in a taxi by a driver in a Lacoste shirt today. When I got to my room, the cleaner was wearing higher-end Air Pods Pro than I own.

This is not a country like the Maldives with cheap labor and lots of it. It’s a country where the people in service jobs have more job security than their American guests, whom they are going to outlive by an average of over 5 years.

But those high wages come at a cost: staffing ratios are nowhere near what they are in poor countries. The staff probably earn four or five times what American servers do, but minus the tips. And the employer can’t afford to employ many of them.

Moreover, the American tipping culture is completely rejected. Remember, European and Australian visitors to the US tend to be horrified by how tipping causes fawning service which they view as fake, exploitative and embarrassing. That culture is replicated by terrible wages for servers on cruise ships and in Third World countries, but that’s not what Tahiti is.

What you get is the best scenery on the planet. And service by highly paid but overworked staff who probably have a better work-life balance than most of their American guests do.

I take issue with these two points. I don’t think it’s unrealistic to have good service in a high labor cost environment when rack rates are 2k a night. You can get that in California where there is a substantial minimum wage. Try New York where the hotel staff now make up to 110k. High wages is not an excuse for slow or inconsistent service.

Second, tipping is NOT rejected. There is a mandatory 5% service charge plus a line for tip at every restaurant. They know they are attracting a primarily American clientele and are angling for tips.

I support fair wages and hate tipping culture but neither of those should factor significantly into service at a hotel of this price and caliber.

that said bora bora is exquisitely beautiful and I will return.

Have you been to the Maldives? When you say Tahiti has the best scenery on the planet are you comparing that to the experience in the Maldives or just your opinion in general?

I'm asking because we're going to Tahiti and Bora Bora in September.

I have been to the Maldives. Both in more open destinations (small guest houses on public islands) and private (St. Regis Maldives). In that region I've also visited the Seychelles and Mauritius.

Although the St Regis Maldives is superb for what it is, Tahiti / Bora Bora outperforms the Maldives in every metric. For beauty, people, culture, scenery, activities, cuisine, ambiance, etc, French Polynesia provides a better experience.

It would be nice if you could balance out your FP trip with some visits to other islands. Moorea is a quick hop from Tahiti and has more land based activities to enjoy. You can rent a car to visit towns, drive up to the Belvedere, and explore the island independently. It's safe and easy to get around. (If you can drive stick shift, I recommend Moorea Scooter, which rents out compact cars at a reasonable rate) Bora Bora is mostly a lagoon with beautiful scenery.

I would only recommend Maldives if the distance is significantly shorter, and if you're staying at a private resort that's accessible by seaplane. For example if you're coming from Europe. Having said that, we enjoyed the Seychelles much more. The Maldives were a bucket list destination that I'm happy to have visited, but wouldn't merit a second visit. In contrast, I've been to Bora Bora / Tahiti 5 times and hope to return every few years.

That's just my opinion.

Thank you. That's reassuring. I got frustrated trying to find 5 nights at the Westin with a decent point redemption. A friend recommended a Paul Gauguin cruise. We booked the first week of September because of the weather and lower crowds. Our first and probably only cruise. Months later I found 5 nights at the Westin for 273K points and it was available right before the cruise. We have 4 nights at the Tahiti Hilton spaced out after landing and before Westin, a night in between the Westin and the cruise and after the cruise before our flight back the States.

We got a request from the cruise to prebook 1 excursion per day. These are our picks: Day 2 4WD & Boat Huahine; Day 3 Exploration of Taha’a; 3-1/2 hr.; Day 5 Catamaran Sail in Moorea; Day 6 Slow paced Belvedere & pineapple valley by e-bike.

On the way home we have 3 days to explore a bit of San Francisco.

We've got a lot invested in this trip. I appreciate you taking the time to post your experience.

Sounds like you have an unforgettable trip lined up. Your timing during the shoulder season is good. When I visited French Polynesia in October we had almost no rain.
I enjoyed staying on Huahine, the locals call it an «île sauvage» (wild island) and the atmosphere is probably what Moorea was like many decades ago.

273K points for 5 nights at the Westin is a great value. Does the MR LT Plat/Titanium mean you have Marriott Bonvoy status? It might be worthwhile to get the Amex Brilliant card if you don't already have Platinum status. You would then get 5 free buffet breakfasts for two people. Otherwise breakfast will cost 5500 XPF ($53) per person, per day. It's a high annual fee card, but easily pays for itself. The Brilliant card includes $25/month in restaurant credits and one 85k/night free night certificate, plus Priority Pass.

The Westin has a free shuttle boat between the hotel property and Bora Bora's mainland. It's mainly for employees, but I stayed on the mainland for a few days before moving to the Westin and used this boat. Though there isn't much near that dock; just the U Express supermarket.

Have a great trip

You seem to have an agenda with your words here, but you already know that

I know what you are getting at, but I’m the most pro-American non-American you will ever meet. I visit the states so frequently that I have an American cell account! And I’m a Westin timeshare owner on Maui.

But there are reasons why essentially only people from the Third World immigrate to the US. And French Polynesia, while poorer than the French mainland, sums up most of them.

People on Bora Bora have a mean life expectancy of 84 compared with 79 in the USA. They have a fixed retirement age of 62. They have a minimum of 5 weeks paid vacation per year, and a maximum 40 hour working week.. Everyone has satellite TV and a car. And world-leading universal healthcare. Over 90% of them have a valid passport.

Those trimmings of modern European life come at a price.

This means that labour costs in French Polynesia are massively higher than for hotels not just in places like the Maldives but also higher than in Hawaii.

The staff are universally happy and friendly. But there is never that fawning fake attentiveness that comes with the master-servant tipping culture that American guests are accustomed to. If you are going to be annoyed that your breakfast coffee takes ten minutes to arrive you are in the wrong destination. But if you are going to smile when you remind the server and she smiles and replies “oh, I’m sorry, I got sidetracked”, then you will be fine.

By the way, one poster asked about a comparison with the Maldives.

Bora Bora consists of a volcanic mountain surrounded by thin flat ribbon shaped islands which were once its ring-shaped coral reef. The Westin and St Regis are both on those flat, ribbon-shaped ringing islands.

In the Maldives those volcanic mountains are underwater. All that remains is boring flat coral islands, nowhere taller than 6 inches above sea level. The lagoon, like Bora Bora, is 10/10. But the actual Maldive islands are all 0/10 for scenery, compared with Bora Bora at 10/10.

The Polynesian people are also, as they have been for centuries, the most welcoming and gracious hosts imaginable. They are friendly but also sophisticated. This is not a false relationship based on economic subordination: tourism has put them in the wealthiest 5% of humans on the planet, and they like that. (They also genuinely like Americans, and have done since 1942. They feel that the Americans have always treated them as equals, which the French never did before 1942.)

The Maldives is different. Where French Polynesians are wealthy and progressive, Maldivians are poor and very conservative Muslims.

Let’s be frank. If your daughter came home and said she was marrying a Maldivian and moving to take up a middle-management job in a hotel there you would be worried and sad about her future financial security. If she came home and said the same about Bora Bora you’d be ecstatic, and you’d be envious.

A couple more words about the Westin Bora Bora.

It’s by far the best Westin on earth even without a lounge.

It’s nicer than Le Meridien was. The remodelled rooms are great, but a bit smaller than at the St Regis or Conrad. More of them than ever before now include a plunge pool.

The hotel uses Bonvoy more faithfully than other luxury island hotels. Almost half the rooms are loaded as award night inventory. The various upgrade instruments really work.

The beach and pool area are much nicer than at the Conrad or St Regis. (The St Regis beach is more obviously artificial and lacks much of a view. The Conrad beach faces bungalows, not ocean, whereas at the Westin the bungalows frame the beach on either side, but Mount Otemanu takes centre stage.)

The TV options are better than at the other resorts. There are all the French terrestrial and Pay-TV channels (including Canal Plus and Bein Sports, etc) plus CNN, BBC News and ABC Australia. You can directly log in to Netflix and YouTube and can mirror your own device.

There are no butlers, but housekeeping is twice daily. The bars are lovely. The restaurant food is surprisingly bland and tasteless but not overpriced.

I am an owner at Westin Kaanapali Ocean Resort Villas on Maui. And I can honestly tell you that the Westin Bora Bora is a million times better on every metric except for car parking!

I get that you love this hotel and french polynesia in general, but when you use hyperbole like this, it really makes it hard to take anything else you say seriously or without a big grain of salt.

I get the impression that this is referring to my observations about the widening differences between American society and other western societies. And to be honest, that is the elephant in the room in this thread.

Price.

I’m in French Polynesia currently. I’ve been coming since 1981, but my two previous visits were 2012 and 2018, after visiting most years between 2000 and 2012.

I have been going through a few old bookings.

In 2000 I paid the following nightly rates:

Le Meridien Bora Bora (now Westin) US$525
Royal Hawaiian US$395 plus tax
Regent Beverly Wilshire (Pretty Woman hotel) US$445
Moana Beach Parkroyal (now Bora Bora InterContinental) US$475

The Hawaii and Beverly Hills hotels are now double the price.

The two Bora Bora properties are now four to six times as expensive.

Partly this reflects a higher cost base. But mainly, a bit like FIFA World Cup prices, it reflects that there is now a top 3% of the US population which earns vastly more than their peers in other countries.

The clientele on Bora Bora is now almost exclusively American at the luxury hotels. I am a handsomely paid Australian and I used to have a Starwood Ambassador because I stayed at the St Regis or Bora Bora Nui for a week each year. That’s way beyond my budget now.

My adage used to be “go to Bora Bora but have a shorter stay than you would elsewhere, and you will earn a mountain of points.”

We live in an era where the wealth of the median American is now $124K, compared with $176K for the median Briton and $268K for the median Australian. Middle class Americans are significantly poorer than their peers in other western countries now.

But the middle classes don’t vacation in Bora Bora overwater luxury resorts. And the massively increasing wealth of the wealthiest Americans has effectively priced out everyone else.

(Middle class Tahitians used to stay at excellent rates on a program called “sejours dans les iles.” Now the overwater resorts like Le Meridien are beyond them too, and they vacation in Hawaii, Australia or New Zealand instead).

People in Australia or New Zealand or Canada or Europe have to weigh up where they can afford to spend a 2 or 3 or 4 week vacation. Bora Bora now has a different niche: very wealthy Americans who have to be back at work in California in 4 or 5 days.

It’s neither a good thing nor a bad thing. But really, twenty years ago Bora Bora used to be a destination accessible to people earning $100K+ and especially those earning $150K+. Now it’s a destination for people earning $500K and above.

Thanks again. Yes we have Bonvoy status. 25 years timeshare owners has given us enough nights that we're both LT Titanium. The only room view left for 273K points and no cash was the Lagoon. I hope we get some kind of an upgrade but can't see any downside if we don't. We'll be on Bora Bora after all. I upgraded from the Bonvoy Boundless to the Ritz last year. Trying to find a use for the 85K FNC. I thought it would be valuable for Europe but we don't have anything currently planned. The lowly 35K FNC actually works well for us as we snowbird MI-FL and have several overnights on the drive south.