Day 9 - Good News, Bad News

We arrived in Tahiti last night at around 10:30pm local time (which is in the same time zone as Hawaii) after an uneventful five-hour flight from Honolulu. We then went to the baggage claim and waited for our luggage. We waited and waited and waited. Our bags never came. We met with an airport rep who informed us that our bags would probably have to be rerouted to Los Angeles and then sent to Tahiti on an Air Tahiti Nui flight which meant that we would probably not have them until Monday evening. As you can imagine, we were pretty shell shocked by this news.

After a fitful night of sleep at the Intercontinental Hotel in Tahiti, we went to the gift shop and purchased a few things to tide us over, such as a toothbrushes and toothpaste, deodorant, a couple of t-shirts and some shorts. We then checked out and caught our shuttle bus back to the airport so that we could take our short flight from Tahiti to Bora Bora. We scored seats on the left side of the plane (to get the best view) and then took off. Our plane made a quick stop in Huahine – which looked beautiful from the air – and then we were on our way to Bora Bora.

Bora Bora from the air is spectacular. The water in the lagoon is so blue that it practically brings tears to your eyes. We flew over the St. Regis (where we’re staying our last three nights) and it looked pretty fantastic. We landed and went into the airport terminal (quite small) and met with a rep from the Hotel Bora Bora. We were provided sweet smelling leis made of tiare flowers and palm fronds and some bottles of water for our 10-minute boat ride to the hotel.

Upon arriving at the hotel, we were greeted by Livio, the general manager and several members of his staff along with cool, tiare-scented towels and glasses of champagne. After chatting for a few moments were taken to our overwater bungalow. Here’s our view:

We basically spent the rest of the day hanging out at our bungalow and in the water. The snorkeling is simply amazing and there are so many fish that it’s like swimming in an aquarium. Andrea discovered a huge moray eel over near the boat dock that looked like it could eat someone’s head. We kept our distance.

After watching a beautiful sunset from the deck of our bungalow, we decided to have dinner there, especially since we didn’t have anything to wear other than shorts and t-shirts. Room service was prompt and we ate out on our deck while being serenaded by the water lapping against the pilings of our bungalow.

We were pretty tuckered out by the stress and activity over the past two days, so we hit the hay around 9:30pm.