Sunday, January 13, 2008
Friday, January 11, 2008
Honeymoon in French Polynesia -- Bora Bora 12.29.07 - 1.1 .08
Saturday, 12.29.07. We booked a half day lagoon excursion based on the Concierge's recommendation. It had the same routine as the excursion in Moorea. The sting ray, shark feeding, and snorkeling. However, since Bora Bora was well-known for it's stunning lagoons, we decided to take the tour again in Bora Bora. On our way to feed sharks at the deep sea, we passed by a private motu owned by some French guy. The motu was worth an estimated $100 million. The tour guide told us that Eddie Murphy was staying at the Motu and was getting married there in a few days. I would say Bora Bora is definitely a great place to own your private island if you had the money. However, almost all the land is owned by the locals, they did not sell their lands. The locals believe that money comes and goes, but lands stay forever. Most of the mega resorts leased the land from local landlords. I think they got a point.
Unlike Moorea's shark feeding at the lagoon, we went out to the deeper water of the ocean for the shark feeding. As soon as we jumped out of the boat and saw the sea through our goggles, we were absolutely blown away. The sea was at least 25 feet deep and had the most beautiful clean deep rich blue color. There were corals on the bottom of the sea. There were countless beautiful velvet black fish swimming beneath us. On the lower layer of the sea, you saw some black-tip sharks. As the tour guide dived in to feed the sharks some huge fish bones, there were more and more black-tip sharks swimming around us. Some of them swam up to the top part of the water and got closer to us. You can't help but get a bit nervous when they came near you. All of a sudden, we saw these 2 HUGE sharks swimming by at the bottom of the sea. They were at least 3 times the size of the black-tip sharks we saw. One circled around the fish bone, it looked like he sniffed at it, took a bite, and swam around again. We learned from the tour guide that they were around 9 feet long lemon sharks. It was the most surreal experience we ever had. The tour guide took us to the last stop, a snorkeling spot called "Coral Garden" by the locals. We followed the guide's lead and snorkeled through a serious of coral reefs. It was like a nice stroll, just with fins in the water.
Sunday 12. 30. 07. The next day we woke up to a gray and cloudy sky. We decided to stay in the resort since we really have not spend much time at this beautiful property and H was not feeling 100% with his stomach. We went to check out their over water chapel. According to the resort staff, many Japanese couples came here to get married. The small chapel was facing directly to Mt. Otemanu and had a glass isle with a lot of fish swimming underneath. I am not sure if the guests would pay much attention to the bride and groom, but this is really a romantic spot to get married. (Huh, maybe our 10 year anniversary to renew the vows?) Majority of the visitors here are Americans. There are quite many Japanese and Australians as well. (Flights from LA to Papeete are 7.5 hours, from Tokyo are 12 hours, and from Australia are about 8 hours.) There were many honeymooners but we also saw many of the visitors with their whole family. After visiting the main island, we were happy that our resort was located at the outer motu. Not only was the view better, we were away from most tourists, which made the whole experience here even more special and serene for us. The most people we saw on the daily basis were at the breakfast buffet, which had no more than 50 guests at any given time. We spent the morning at our villa swimming in the ocean, moved to the swimming pool in the afternoon, and went to the swanky Bubble Lounge for happy hour before we headed back to our villa to get ready for dinner.
We picked this time of the year for our Honeymoon because between the Austria and Taiwan wedding, we really didn't have a lot of vacation days left. By planning everything around the holidays, we were able to stretch our travel days as far as we could. However, we soon realized that Christmas and New Year's were really not the best time to come to this part of the world. The wet season was hardly affecting any of our activities, but the holiday schedules were. Two of the "must visit" restaurants in Bora Bora closed for the month of December, Bloody Mary & La Villa Mahana. UGH...... So, based on the concierge's recommendation, we settled for Matira Restaurant since they had recently hired a French chef from another famous restaurant in town. The whole dinning out process required a little advanced planning. We had to coordinate the shuttle boat schedule to IC Le Moana to be picked up by the restaurant's free transportation, same process for the return, but it really was not much of a hassle. The restaurant was located on the Matira beach and we had a great view of the ocean and the sunset.
By this time of our trip, we just gave up watching our expenses. Bora Bora was so beautiful that we just wanted to enjoy our experience here. And we were getting used to the high costs of everything that nothing shocked us anymore. I figured we would eat instant noodles for 3 months once we get home. We ordered black truffle risotto with shrimp for appetizer. It was most guys' nightmare: expensive ingredients, beautiful presentation, served in a huge plate with itsy-bitsy portion. But it tasted soooo good. we practically licked the plate clean. I had sea bass and H had lagoon fish for the main course. The sea bass was also delicious. The Lagoon Fish turned out to be Mahi Mahi, and I realized on this trip that I really did not like Mahi Mahi all that much. The meat was too heavy and the texture tasted more like poultry than seafood to me. We finished with warm chocolate cake and a banana milkshake. (Very good combination of the taste and hot & cold contrast) H was not feeling well with his upset stomach again. He ended up not touching much of his lagoon fish and we felt obligated to brown bag the dish even though we both knew the chance of us eating it was close to impossible. Somehow, making the effort to bring the dish back, put in the fridge for a few days then throw it away felt less wasteful than leaving the full plate of food in the restaurant psychologically.Speaking of throwing things away, I noticed something interesting during the past week at both resorts we stayed. The house keeping staff did not throw away anything in your room that seemed very apparent to us as garbage, if you did not put it in the trash can. Whether it was a day old French fries, one tiny almost rotten grape, or a piece of wrinkled plastic wrapping, no, they stayed exactly at the same location where you left them. I wonder if it had to do with how everything was so expensive there and people thought all of these things were still usable and eatable somehow?
Monday, December 31, 2007. It was the last day of 2007. What a year we had! And I can't believe that we were ending this year in Bora Bora. I couldn't think of a better place to finish this phenomenal year! It was also an action packed day for us. We finally were able to take our initiation dive in the south pacific ocean. How exciting! After a relaxing morning in the resort, we were picked up by "Nemo World Dive" at 2:45 p.m. On the way to our diving spot, we put on our wet suit (Yum..incredibly sexy...), and got a brief lesson from our instructor about breathing with your mouth, how to balance yourself in the water, how to adjust the water pressure, etc. An Indian couple dived in before us, and somehow, the guy was not able to get down, he ended up floating on the water with the air tank on his back and just snorkeled around the whole time while his wife went down with the instructor. H whispered in my ear mocking this poor guy as I was laughing and elbowed H to stop. Finally, after what seemed forever, it was H's and my turn. We followed the instructor, bit into the air tube, held the rope and slowly descended into the deep water. I had a hard time adjusting to the water pressure. Salt water came into my goggles and I could not breath through the tube. I felt suffocated. Fear took over, I panicked for a second and released the tube from my mouth. As soon as I let the tube go, the air filled my jacket and I was floating above the water. The first thought came to me was "Oh no! I am gonna be the guy that H just mocked!" The fear of humiliation quickly outweighed the fear of suffocation. I was determined to dive. After regaining my composure, we tried it again. I quickly learned that "squeeze your nose and blow" trick to adjust the ear pressure did not work for me. I had to do it with swallowing. This time, I was able to dive in, YEAH!! H was doing great on his own the whole time and filmed everything with our camera. (the waterproof case really came in handy for this trip) The instructor held my hand the entire time. We were 6 meters (18 feet) under the water. There was a huge wall of coral reefs on a side with endless openings to the sea. We could not see the bottom, it was pitch dark when we looked down. The instructor picked up a closed sea star. The shell was hard as rock. We even saw a sea turtle swimming far away! I was so excited that I wanted to scream and jump. But no.. can't do neither one of them in the water. After about 30 minutes, we came out of the water. I was so happy that I just did my first dive. It was something I always wanted to try and now I can cross it out of the list!
We got back to the resort around 4: 30 p.m. and ran straight to the Thalasso spa for our spa treatment at 4:45 p.m. As H was waiting for me with the masseuse in front of the changing room, a gorgeous woman passed by them. The masseuse told H that she was Eddie Murphy's future wife. (We later learned form the entertainment news that they got married on the New Year's Day.) The Thalasso spa was supposedly the best spa in French Polynesia. They claimed to use deep sea water for all their spa treatments. I had no clue why that was supposed to be beneficial, but we had to have our spa treatment because it was a honeymoon. (Ya, I am such a sucker for those marketing tools. Oh well, one more week of instant noodles is not gonna hurt.) The environment was very zen and chic with a private jacuzzi for two, steam rooms, mist showers, and a honeymoon spa treatment room with a glass floor. You could watch the fish swim while you were getting your massages. They offer a "day pass" for resort guests who did not want to have any spa treatments but would like to use their facilities. (Don't bother, it is not worth it.) 
After the spa treatment, we had another hour and half to get ready before our New Year's Eve event. Again, this was the mandatory event for all the resort guests with a cocktail hour, Polynesian Dance show, raffles, dinner buffet, fashion show (Not sure about the thought process behind this whole fashion show idea. I guess whatever kept you awake would work.), live band, and dance. It was definitely better organized than Sheraton's Christmas Eve dinner in Moorea. The food was better and a bottle of champagne was given to each table. But then again, it did cost us twice as much as the Christmas Eve Dinner at the Sheraton. French Polynesia was close to the end of the International Date Line and one of the last countries celebrating the New Year's. It was funny how New Zealand was only a 6 hours flight away, but 23 hours ahead of Bora Bora. For the past two weeks, we had been going to bed before 10 p.m most of the nights. It was a challenge for us to stay up past midnight, but we were determined to see this New Year through. It was an awesome, hectic, and sometimes challenging 2007. I was looking forward to see what the future would bring now that our year long wedding project no longer hung over our heads. H had the conviction that 2008 is going to be better and bigger than ever. And I believe it is true.Except that we were leaving Bora Bora the next day. And we knew for sure that there was NO WAY Tahiti could possibly top this.
Monday, January 7, 2008
Honeymoon in French Polynesia -- Bora Bora 12.27 - 12.28.07
To be honest, Moorea was...nice. It was what you expect for a tropical island, the sun, the beach, the ocean. But I wasn't sure if it had more than Hawaii could offer. If Moorea was all that we experienced of French Polynesia, I would have a hard time justifying the long flight and the high cost. If given the opportunity, I wasn't sure if I would have the desire to come back to Moorea again.
So, after 5 days in Moorea, H and I were looking forward to visit Bora Bora to see what the fuss was all about. The transportation, arranged by our travel agent, showed up at the hotel promptly in the morning of Thursday 12.27.07 and took us to the airport. The flight from Moorea to Bora Bora was about 1 hour long. As soon as we landed our eyes on the island of Bora Bora from our plane, we were in awe of its striking beauty. The lagoon and motus which surrounded the main island created the most beautiful green and blue color we have ever seen. We took nonstop pictures, and became really excited about the next part of our honeymoon.
The docks for the resort shuttle boasts were connected right to the airport. Since the airport was located on a motu, the only way to leave the airport was by boat. We were happy that the weather was great so we had a clear view on the flight and on the boat ride to the resort. I took tones of pictures on the 10 minutes boat ride. I knew I probably ended up taking the same thing over and over again, but everywhere you lay your eyes on, it was just picture perfect.
The InterContinental Bora Bora Resort & Thalasso Spa was located on the motu Piti Aau facing Mt. Otemanu. It was the newest resort built in 2006. As soon as we arrived at the resort dock, we were greeted by a reception staff member who whisked us away in a golf cart. She first gave us a grand tour of their facility. IC Thalasso had a huge property. It was quiet, calm, clean, peaceful, and swanky. The infinity swimming pool had the grand view of the majestic Mt. Otemanu. Some people may find it's lack of Polynesian flair as a shortcoming, but that did not bother us at all. We were so elated with everything we had seen. I loved how the employees smiled and greeted you with Tahitian hello "Ia Orana". It was pronounced as "Yo-rah-nah". When the girls said it, it sounded like singing!
After a quick check-in procedure while I waited on the day bed drinking pineapple juice, we were taken to our over water villa - 207. Every room had a whole glass wall facing the ocean. The glass coffee table in the living room offered us the view of the water beneath. We could look out to the open Pacific from our bed. The huge bathroom had a stand alone bathtub, a big shower, and double sinks. There was a sun deck that allowed us to swim out in the ocean from the villa . H and I looked at each other with joy. Finally, this did not feel like just another trip and another destination. It felt like a true honeymoon. We spent the rest of the day on our terrace drinking champagne, watching the sunset, and taking more pictures until it was pitch dark. It was quiet here. We were completely alone on this tiny little spec in the middle of the South Pacific. Bora Bora felt like end of the world, the pathway between earth and heaven. We were so happy where we were and what we saw. We felt absolutely blessed.
Of course, the blessing came with a big price tag. It was roughly the equivalence of a $20 burger, a $8 can of coke, and $13 charge for room service. However, the view from our bed when we first opened our eyes the next morning made us forgot all about the price tag.
The next day after the breakfast buffet at the Reef restaurant in the resort, we took the free hotel shuttle boat from IC Thalasso to their other propriety on the main island to Matira beach, Inter Continental Le Moana. There were no fish or coral reefs for snorkeling at the Thalasso lagoon. However, we were told by the concierge that there was a motu perfect for snorkeling within 15 minutes by kayak from Le Moana. The friendly beach staff provided us with towels, fins, and bread to feed the fish. We decided to take an outer canoe since we had all these snorkeling gear with us. The beach staff even gave H a quick lesson on how to use the canoe, since it was harder to control the direction and much easier to flip. We were nervous but set out to take this little adventure on our own. After 15 minutes, we were only half way. My arms were sore, and H did the most of the paddling. It took us probably half an hour to get to the motu, nonetheless, we got there without flipping the boat!.
The sun was strong. We piled on our sunblock. We snorkeled out to the deeper water. The corals we saw were much bigger and more beautiful compare to Moorea. We were surrounded by so many different colorful fish. Some looked familiar, and some we had never seen before. We were excited and scared at the same time. Snorkeling is an interesting experience. It almost feels like meditation. All the noise was tuned out when you put your head into the water. You only hear your own breathing. You were in your own world and your own discovery. You discovered another world that was eerie and sacred. Everything moved slower and more elegant. The creatures had the most vivid colors and the oddest shapes. Some of these sea animals must be God's most creative work. I could almost imagine how God said to him/herself, "Wow! I can't believe that I actually came up with this one!" I got nervous as I sometimes drifted closer to the corals. I had this fear of some unknown creature hiding inside of the corals to come out and attack me. My jar was sore from biting hard into the snorkel. But I was happy. We took a brief break back to the motu and went out again with bread to feed the fish. Within 2 minutes, we were surrounded by hundreds of the black/white fish as I was feeding them bread. It was quite a spectacular sight!
We got back to Le Moana around noon. We had some time until the next shuttle to the main village Vaitape at 2:45 PM. After some rest at the swimming pool, we decided to take a quick walk around the area and get some lunch. By the time we sat down in the La Bounty restaurant and ordered a pizza, it was already 2:00 p.m. After we quickly chowed down the pizza and rushed to pay, it started to pour. We had no umbrellas. The restaurant is about 10 minutes walk from Le Moana. It was now 2:30 p.m. We had no time to wait for the rain to stop and I was not going to sit on the bus with soaking wet clothes. But no, this little obstacle was not going to stop me from going to Vaitape! So, we left the restaurant, took off all of our outer wear, put them into our waterproof bag, and walked down the street in our swimming trunk and bikini in the rain. Of course, as soon as we got back to the hotel, rain stopped.We had just enough time to dry ourselves, put on the dry clothes, and get on the shuttle bus to Vaitape. Bora Bora is a tiny island of 8000 residents and 12 police officers. The circle island road is 32km (19 miles) in total length. Naturally, Vaitape was nothing worth noting and two hours were more than enough to visit every store twice. We bought some postcards and browsed through a few Tahitian Black Pearl stores. We were, however, quite tempted to get tattoos. We loved how artistic the Tahitian tribal tattoo designs were, but I still wasn't quite sold on the idea. Oh well, maybe next time.
Saturday, 12.29.07. We booked a half day lagoon excursion based on the Concierge's recommendation. It had the same routine as the excursion in Moorea. The sting ray, shark feeding, and snorkeling. However, since Bora Bora was well-known for it's stunning lagoons, we decided to take the tour again in Bora Bora. On our way to feed sharks at the deep sea, we passed by a private motu owned by some French guy. The motu was worth an estimated $100 million. The tour guide told us that Eddie Murphy was staying at the Motu and was getting married there in a few days. I would say Bora Bora is definitely a great place to own your private island if you had the money. However, almost all the land is owned by the locals, they did not sell their lands. The locals believe that money comes and goes, but lands stay forever. Most of the mega resorts leased the land from local landlords. I think they got a point.
Unlike Moorea's shark feeding at the lagoon, we went out to the deeper water of the ocean for the shark feeding. As soon as we jumped out of the boat and saw the sea through our goggles, we were absolutely blown away. The sea was at least 25 feet deep and had the most beautiful clean deep rich blue color. There were corals on the bottom of the sea. There were countless beautiful velvet black fish swimming beneath us. On the lower layer of the sea, you saw some black-tip sharks. As the tour guide dived in to feed the sharks some huge fish bones, there were more and more black-tip sharks swimming around us. Some of them swam up to the top part of the water and got closer to us. You can't help but get a bit nervous when they came near you. All of a sudden, we saw these 2 HUGE sharks swimming by at the bottom of the sea. They were at least 3 times the size of the black-tip sharks we saw. One circled around the fish bone, it looked like he sniffed at it, took a bite, and swam around again. We learned from the tour guide that they were around 9 feet long lemon sharks. It was the most surreal experience we ever had. The tour guide took us to the last stop, a snorkeling spot called "Coral Garden" by the locals. We followed the guide's lead and snorkeled through a serious of coral reefs. It was like a nice stroll, just with fins in the water.Saturday, January 5, 2008
Honeymoon to French Polynesia -- Moorea 12.24 - 12.27.07
Christmas eve morning, we woke up with a downpour of heavy rain. The
weather looked pretty miserable, definitely not a good day for the
beach. We decided to rent a car to tour around the island. There was
only one road in Moorea that circled the island for 37 miles. It was
funny that they gave you "unlimited mileage" on the car rental deal
since you can circle the island within an hour. We were a bit
disappointed that the "must visit" juice factory was closed because of
the holiday and the visibility of the famous Belvedere lookout was not
all that great either because of the weather. The rainfall was on and
off throughout the day. We prayed that the weather would get
better for the rest of our trip. However, it was still fun to visit the
island, saw the locals, sat in the cafe, and walked from shop to shop
in Maharepa village. Fortunately, we never again had such a heavy rainfall lasting that long throughout the rest of our honeymoon.
Sheraton required a mandatory
buffet dinner/entertainment for all the resort guests on Christmas eve.
(Of course the fortune that we paid for the dinner would not cover the
beverages... those blood suckers!) It was a strange Christmas for H.
Instead of white snow, we had inches of rain on a tropical island. The
Hawaiian shirt replaced the sweater. Polynesian island music was
playing in the background rather than the usual Christmas Carols.
There was tons of seafood. It is probably all we ate on this trip. The
night ended with a Polynesian dance performance which was rather
provocative. In fact, it was banned in the early 1820s by the missionaries. What we saw was a washed down version of what it once was. By 10 PM, we were ready for bed again.
Before we returned the car on
the morning of Christmas day, we were hoping that the sky would clear
up and we could drive to the Belvedere lookout again to watch the
sunrise and head to the village for breakfast. No such luck. It was
windy, gray, and cloudy when we woke up. Nonetheless, with the
"unlimited mileage", we decided to drive up to the lookout. The heavy
rain and wind tore down some trees, and both bays turned dirty brown
because of the mud that was washed down from the mountains. We drove back
to the village, and all stores were closed except a few restaurants. It
was very quiet. We went to an outdoor restaurant "Snack L'Anana Bleu to
get some eggs, bacon, and toast for breakfast. H saw a few crabs
slowly crawling on the ground and tried to take pictures of them. As
soon as he got closer, the crabs suddenly ran away and disappeared into
the holes on the ground. Ah-ha! I was already wondering why there were
so many holes in the ground. The roosters and chickens were wondering
around from table to table. The roosters were everywhere on this
island, like wild dogs. They practically woke us up every morning,
except some days, Andrew's 6 a.m. phone calls beat them to it.
After
we returned the car, we stayed on the resort beach the whole day.
Fortunately, the weather cleared up and sun finally peaked through a
few layers of clouds. We went snorkeling and took the canoe out around
noon for 20 minutes.
Before
the trip, all the guide books I read stressed the strength of the sun
near the equator and the importance of a lot of sunblock. I brought
expensive sunblocks with high SPF & PPA (European UVA blockage
rating) and even SPF clothings recommended by skin cancer foundation.
(Okay, it might sound like an overkill, but who knew, they turned out to be quite useful actually!)
The first few days of our trip has been cloudy and we were
barely exposed to much of the sun rays, although I did get some
decent color. H and I always stayed in the shade when we lay out on the
beach. When we went canoeing, the sun was pretty strong. H and I
applied sunblock, except that I purposely left out the part of my legs
below the knee and above the feet. (My theory was that tan on hands,
feet, and knees made them look dirty, dried up, and aged. And tan on the rest part of your legs actually made you look
slimmer.)
So
getting back to the day. It was warm and windy. We applied sunblocks regularly, even though H was reluctant to do so. When we felt the
heat, we went snorkeling or swimming in the pool. That afternoon,
H picked a coconut from the beach in an attempt to open it. Watch
the video, it was quite hilarious. I was reading under the shade most
of the time. When we returned to our villa after sundown and took our
daily bath, H already looked like a lobster and the part of my legs
that were sunblock free turned red and sensitive. Not a good sign, this
was only our 4th day on the island. For the remaining of our trip, H applied the sunblocks religiously, and my brilliant suntan theory left me a pair of multi-color legs. (Yap, very smart....)
The
next day on 12. 26, it was the best weather since we got there. Sunny,
blue sky, bright and hot. H had a headache and an upset stomach. It
was minor discomfort, but enough for him to stay in the dark A/C room
sleeping through the whole day. The symptoms lasted for a few days. We
weren't sure if it was the food, the sun, or the combination of the
both. I ended spending the whole day on the beach by myself, reading
books, napping, swimming in the pool, and snorkeling around the lagoon.
Around sunset, there was a couple having a Polynesian wedding on the
beach with Polynesian musicians playing the music and dancers dressed
in bright colored costumes. The sun shined on the happy
couple's faces and casted a radiand glow. It was a rather beautiful
ceremony. After sunset, H was able to come out and spend some time
in the pool with me. We saw a beautiful rainbow across the sky.
We
decided to go out for dinner that night and picked Le Sud, a southern
French restaurant. The restaurant was airy and charming. It had this
Long Island New Hampton chic feel to it. We ordered a grapefruit salad
to share. I had Almond cod and H had grill king prawns for the main
course. The Almond cod was such an excellent dish that my mouth started
to water just thinking about it. By then, the geckos on the ceilings
are the norm in the restaurants. At Le Sud, we saw another interesting
sight: a crab walked across the dinning room and caused quite a stir.
We finished the meal with this French pastry dessert that our waitress
recommended. It turned out to be cream puffs with Vanilla ice cream
filling and chocolate sauce, which was good, but ordinary.
We
had quickly settled into this comfortable routine by then. Waking up
around 6 or 7am by either Andrew or roosters, having breakfast at the
garden balcony with birds sitting on the fence staring at us and
waiting for bread crumbs. Our days were involved around the water. We
swam in the swimming pool, snorkeled around the lagoon, napped on the
beach chairs under the umbrellas and took bubble baths after the sun
went down. The contrast between my tanned legs and my pale butt became more and more obvious as the days went by. There
was rain here and there after the miserable Christmas eve, but nothing
that hindered us from any of our activities. Besides watching the
only English TV channel (International CNN), which we probably could
memorize by heart towards end of the trip, we
made a few attempts to watch some DVDs (thanks to Andrew) that we
brought with us should we have the energy to stay up past 9:30 PM.
I
loved how the locals made flowers their main accessories for both men
and women. And every night when we went out, I started to remember to
pick a Tiare and put it behind my left ear. (It meant that I was
married. There were many different ways to wear your flowers, which
also meant many different things.) I loved the subtle fragrance of the
flower, how accessible they were, and when wearing them behind your
ears how it was both innocent and flirty at the same time. I imagined
what it would be like if I would wear flowers walking on the streets
of New York, shopping on the Madison Avenue, or dinning out at some
trendy restaurants? H and I both burst out laughing picturing it.
It was our last night in Moorea, and we had seen enough. We were ready and curious to discover the famous Bora Bora.
Thursday, January 3, 2008
Honeymoon to French Polynesia -- Moorea 12.21 - 12.23.07
We left JFK on the busiest day of the year, Friday, 12. 21 in the
evening. After anticipated delays and a layover at LAX, we landed in
Papeete, Tahiti on the morning of Saturday 12. 22. Custom for None-EU
visitors at PPT was painfully slow, and the line was way too long. Once
we finally got out of the International airport, our local
transportation provider was already waiting outside with flower necklace to
greet us and took us to the domestic airport just a short ride away.Because of the delays, we already missed our transfer flight from Papeete to Moorea. Luckily, we were able to get on the next plane at 9:30 AM. The flight from Tahiti to Moorea was only 7 minutes. The view of Moorea island and especially its lagoon from the plane were just beautiful.
As soon as we got out of the airport, the local travel agent was already waiting outside to take us to our hotel. Reading so much about the outrageously expensive living costs in French Polynesia, we asked the driver to stop by any grocery store on our way to the hotel so we can stock up some basic supplies such as bottled water and a few snacks.
The Sheraton Moorea Lagoon Resort Spa was located between Cook's Bay & Opunobu Bay. It was a very relaxing and gorgeous property with a Polynesian flavor.
We were very happy with our superior garden bungalow. It was comfy and
spacious. We made the most use out of our claw bathtub and balcony
during our stay.
The first night of our arrival, We had dinner at Aito Restaurant based on many recommendations. The restaurant serves French/Polynesian
cuisine. The appetizer poisson cru was served in a coconut shell, how
cute! H had tuna with tomato sauce and I had Mahi Mahi with ginger
sauce for the main course. H's tuna was probably the best tuna we've
ever had. It was fresh, light, and perfect with the tomato sauce. The
tomato sauce took 10 hours to cook, and it definitely was worth
mentioning for it's flavorful taste. On our way to the hotel from the
airport, our driver told us that "moorea" means "yellow gecko" in
Polynesian. We quickly found out that there was no shortages of geckos in the restaurant.
During our 2 hour meal, we saw plenty of them around. We had caramel
papaya with coconut milk for dessert. It was gone within minutes it
arrived at our table. I absolutely loved it! By the time we finished
the dinner, it was around 10PM local time and 3AM New York time. We were beat, and it was time to hit the bed. We woke up the next day with a cloudy sky and drizzles since it was the wet season. We were taken to our lagoon excursion around 9 AM in the morning, with the first stop for shark feeding. We saw many small black-tip sharks swimming around. Some fearless kids jumped into the water right away. H and I were dragging our feet until the boat was almost empty. I didn't care how small and "harmless" these sharks were. They were SHARKS! And there was nothing between us to stop any one of the sharks to attack me, in case they would be in the mood for "something different" for lunch. Nonetheless, the experience was quite surreal.
The next stop was feeding the sting rays. Apparently the cause of Steve Irwin's death was fresh in everyone's memory. We all fled away from the
sting rays' tails as soon as it came close. I don't know what's so interesting about
these creatures and touching their skin. Anyway, after 5 minutes, I was
ready for the next stop.We arrived at an outer island (Motu) and had simple Polynesian dishes for lunch. The tour guide also taught us how to make poisson cru and how to open a coconut. We went snorkeling again before heading back to the hotel.
Tuesday, January 1, 2008
Honeymoon to French Polynesia -- Prelude
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In the process of preparing for the wedding, H & I looked back at all the photos of the trips we took in the past decade.
There were many trips and tons of pictures.
We realized that we had a difficult time keeping track of the time lines and locations of our travel.
I decided to document our future trips in a more detailed fashion to my best ability.
Honeymoon was the first trip of my new travel documentation.
Next: Moorea 12.21 - 12.23.07
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