We will be on the PG (7 days in the Societies)with our child. Are there any "must see" shore excursions that we should pre-book? How easy will it be easy for us to just wander ashore and find our way to a good snorkeling lagoon or get a 4x4 tour?

Any advice for us would be greatly appreciated! P.S., we are also interested in scuba diving.

Welcome to the board, Tehani! How old is your child and are you planning shore excursions that will be child friendly?

I agree with Karen that it depends on your child's age. If he or she is big enough to enjoy water activities, make sure to get them reef shoes (or water socks) to protect their feet. And a good hat and sun protection, the sun is fierce down there.

The motu day will be a real treat, and the Bora Bora motu beach should also be fun. They are all free.

Hi Karen and Wendy---thanks for the welcome--I discovered the intro thread early this morning before work and hope to introduce myself there someday soon. We haven't pre-booked any shore excursions as of yet. We don't want to leave our son with a sitter if there are cool things for him to enjoy (he is 9). He is very comfortable in the water and is looking forward to learning about Tahiti to report back to his class.

Having said that, it would be ideal if we could have family time where I/we can dive and look for giant manta rays and our son could snorkel with supervision.

We have never been to FP and really don't know what to expect when we are tendered ashore. Will there be rows of vendors selling tickets to tours? Rows of taxis waiting to take us the the local establishments? Rows of seashells for us to pick up? :cool: Will we be disappointed to find that things are sold-out? :(

I personally cannot imagine being disappointed while being in paradise---but this is a trip of a lifetime for us.....you know how it goes... :D

thanks in advance---!

Welcome to LCT Tehani.

Oh, you'll have a lot of fun with a 9-year old. Our son learned to snorkel about that age in the Bahamas, and he had a ball. The water on Motu Mahana is very shallow as well, although there are sea urchins, so you'll have to teach him about that.

Hi Tehani.
Glad to see you made it over to LCT.
Tahiti Explorer is great but I just thought your questions might be answered better here.
Hope you enjoy it here! :lct:

Hi Tehani,

Jim B alerted me to your request for information about the PG. We've spent 24 days on the PG and loved every minute of it. As was mentioned above, be sure to get water shoes for both your son and yourselves. Unlike the Caribbean there are few long sandy beaches in FP. You need foot protection from broken pieces of coral, the rare, but potentially fatal, cone shell and sea urchins to mention a few. (Don't let these cautions scare you - we were in the water snorkeling once or twice almost every day.) Also try to take Dominique's guided snorkel lesson and tour on Motu Mahana. Even though my husband and I have snorkeled extensively during the past 35 years we learned a couple of new things from Dominique. He is a great guy.

I have my doubts about you being able to arrange a dive for two adults with supervised snorkeling for your son but it won't hurt to ask. There are certain cruises where they have some programs for children and if a dive excursion happened to fall within the same time period it might work.

You will not find long rows of taxi's, seashells, tour vendors etc. on any of the islands but you'll find some shops and some rental cars particularly on Moorea and Bora Bora. There will be some local vendors even on Motu Mahana and there are several shops right at the dock on Raiatea. But whichever location you are at on Sunday you will find the shops closed. On Moorea you can get a free shuttle ride to the pearl store that has a shop on the ship. It was called the Black Pearl Gem Company when we were there but I've read that it is now named for the designer and co-owner Tahia Collins. That shop is within walking distance of several others in an area known as Petite Village (unless they've also changed locations). You just tell your driver which shuttle time you want to take back to the ship and you'll have time to check some other shops. I seem to remember a seashell shop there.

If you dock at Cook's Bay on Moorea there are several vendors under a large tent nearby and I think they had shells in addition to stuff like a shark's tooth on a leather cord necklace.

I think it was on Bora Bora that I picked up a flyer at the dock to walk across the street to a pearl shop and receive a gift. The gift was a nice oyster shell. So keep your eyes open for little things like this.

If your cruise is one that spends two days at Bora Bora you will be closer to town the first day and closer to the other private motu on the second day. That motu has a long sandy beach and your son could enjoy the sand and also snorkeling. However the snorkeling there is in deep water so it would depend on how comfortable he is with that. Be sure to take plenty of waterproof sunscreen and a sun protection shirt that he could keep on while in the water would be best. My husband and I wore "skins" on the days that we spent more than an hour in the water. They covered us from neck to ankle.

When are you going on your trip? Ask away with more questions. We'll all try to help.

Oh Thank you, thank you, thank you for your encouraging replies! Yes, we all have water shoes and will try to be mindful of the urchines and such. We just bought him some "skins" last week! I sound like there will be plenty of things ot keep us busy. I can't wait---work has been very busy this past month and we need a break! Sounds funny---leaving the busyness of work to attend to the busyness of life in the FP! (busy counting the fish in the lagoon....busy napping on the lounge chairs...)

Any recommendations on black pearl shopping? We will be on the 7-day cruise in a few weeks---Papeete, Moorea, BB, Taha'a, Motu Mahana, and Raiateu.

Ask a group of people on recommendations for Tahitian pearl shopping and you'll receive a group of different answers! Ngaire, the sponsor of this board, wrote some good guidelines some years ago. Perhaps a good "techie" person like Karen S. can put in a link to this or tell you where to find it on this site. My pearl purchases were from Black Pearl Gem Company (now Tahia Collins) and Sabini Pearls (I think that's the name) on Bora Bora. Read up about how to choose, look at the pearls in the boutique onboard to get an idea of what you like color wise etc. and go from there.

Thank you again---I was lost in a trance reading your review of the PG...sounds wonderful

Tehini - I am more awake this morning and thinking clearer. I'm guessing you found how to click on Brown & Keene Cruises at the top of this page and then click on Tahiti where you found lots of information including Pearl Shopping and passenger cruise reviews. Yes, we certainly enjoyed those two cruises!

I was just remembering the impromptu scuba lesson that our son had while on Harbour Island off Eleuthera. He was 10. It was just in the hotel pool. I doubt if you can do that kind of thing through the ship, however. I'm not a diver, but I might stick with snorkelling with a child in tow.