Wind Spirit "Dreams of Tahiti" review

I confirm. At the reception desk

 

 

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Thanks for your review

 

Does anyone know now if Wind Spirit allows early boarding?

The earliest we were allowed to board was 1:30pm. I highly advise boarding early, grabbing a bite to eat at the buffet, making your Candles reservations to get the evening you want, then disembarking to take a walk around Papeete until 5:00pm (when you need to be back onboard for the safety drill).

Appreciate the tips, thank you!

Yes, 13:30. We dropped our luggage and went back to town and had a great meal at 3 Brasseurs just across the pier. We could have had the free buffet but wanted to enjoy local music and flavour. That is the only thing Windstar is lacking. Once on the ship, you could be in the Bahamas or Turkey, the decoration and local flavour is lacking on board. Would you believe they don't sell local Tahitian CD on board? But you could get a Turkish or Greek music cd. Mon Dieu !

 

 

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Yes, 13:30. We dropped our luggage and went back to town and had a great meal at 3 Brasseurs just across the pier. We could have had the free buffet but wanted to enjoy local music and flavour. That is the only thing Windstar is lacking. Once on the ship, you could be in the Bahamas or Turkey, the decoration and local flavour is lacking on board. Would you believe they don't sell local Tahitian CD on board? But you could get a Turkish or Greek music cd. Mon Dieu !

 

 

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Our cruise was amazing! We did not do the drift snorkel but several people whip did said it was incredible. One man got scraped up. We had a private with Lagoon Service and it was amazing. Also rented a pontoon in Bora Bora. It poured rain in Moorea but we went ATV ing anyways with Albert Tours. It was an exciting and wet day. Used my patch during the trip and was fine. What a special cruise! Loved the food and staff. We had a lively group that liked to whoop it up and enjoy life. Hope to do another Windstar in the near future. Never had a problem getting off the ship even if I didn't book my tour with the ship. I had read that someone's review. My hubby got to wear shorts to the beach party night and the bbq on the ship. He was happy. Even saw a guy wearing shorts on deck during our Candles Dinner. FYI to the person who told me to order room service every night because my hubby hates to wear pants. Lol The color of the lagoon on Bora Bora is unbelievable. Hope to return someday.

 

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So glad you had a great time. We adored out time on WS in Tahiti. Ectremely special in every way. My husband has worn shorts at Candles as well as at the barbecue. The Caribbean cruises on the Surf also have that nice feeling. Honestly they all have for us. Thanks for taking the time and happy sailing.

Thanks for letting the other know about your impression. We also wish to return :-)

 

 

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Vlaurend -

Awesome recommends! We are headed to Tahiti March 1st and I'm busy scooping up any and all recommendations I can. Yours have been extremely helpful - Thank You!

This will be our 3rd WS cruise so we know what a great on board experience we are in for!

I've already secured a private jet ski for the day we are on Raiatea - headed to Taha'a to check out the reef over by the Taha'a Resort (which I believe is near where the reef drift excursions go?). My experience with a 'drift' tour has been a working one - many many years ago my family was on a sail boat in the South Pacific and we would have to scrub the hull of the boat from front to back utilizing the current - not quite an enjoyable reef drift, but ya know, still unique!

Your Bora Bora insights are terrific - I plan on heading to the motu prior to the evening BBQ to enjoy the island before the majority of my cruise-mates get there. I just love 'inside' information like this!

We will head back to Moorea after the cruise for a couple days - any insights while there? We will be at the Hilton Moorea.

You are very welcome, cdastager! FYI, the Taha'a drift snorkel you would be doing via jet ski is the same one you'd be doing if you took the morning drift snorkel excursion with Windstar on Taha'a day. You'll be missing a pilgrimage to Marae Taputapuatea on Raiatea day, but the advantage is that you would then be able to do a different Taha'a tour on Taha'a day, i.e., the vanilla plantation, etc. We do kind of regret not having done that, since we had wanted to visit a vanilla plantation and had no other chance after missing the opportunity on Taha'a. If you can get vanilla beans for $5 per bean, buy them there. Otherwise, just buy them at the agriculture school on Moorea, where they are $5 per bean. That's even cheaper than the public market in Papeete. Slice the bean open lengthwise and use a knife to scrape the vanilla caviar into the granulated sugar that you are using for your recipe (I love using them in vanilla pudding).

You are very welcome, cdastager! FYI, the Taha'a drift snorkel you would be doing via jet ski is the same one you'd be doing if you took the morning drift snorkel excursion with Windstar on Taha'a day. You'll be missing a pilgrimage to Marae Taputapuatea on Raiatea day, but the advantage is that you would then be able to do a different Taha'a tour on Taha'a day, i.e., the vanilla plantation, etc. We do kind of regret not having done that, since we had wanted to visit a vanilla plantation and had no other chance after missing the opportunity on Taha'a. If you can get vanilla beans for $5 per bean, buy them there. Otherwise, just buy them at the agriculture school on Moorea, where they are $5 per bean. That's even cheaper than the public market in Papeete. Slice the bean open lengthwise and use a knife to scrape the vanilla caviar into the granulated sugar that you are using for your recipe (I love using them in vanilla pudding).

 

Great recommends again! I've bought a vanilla bean in Hawaii and they recommend slicing it, scrape the caviar and put all in a small bottle of rum - voila - your very own vanilla extract. As you use the extract, keep refilling with rum for a never ending (sort of) supply of awesome vanilla extract.

Our jet ski tour is a private deal, and were told they will take us where ever we would like to go. Maybe we can ask about the Marae Taputapuatea site... My main reason for booking a full day jet ski, private tour, was to get to some awesome snorkel sites. Many moons ago we were on our own sailing yacht in the islands and had the opportunity to visit some very pristine snorkel sites and I am trying to re-create some of those adventures. Looking forward to seeing it all!!!

If you could make it down to Marae Taputapuatea on Raiatea either before or after your drift snorkel on Taha'a, that would be the best of all worlds! Check the tide tables for the drift snorkel. I think the roughest water is when the tide is coming back in. We had calm conditions but I still benefited from wearing a long-sleeved rashguard, leggings and dive gloves. I needed to stop and stand up a few times because I was getting water in my mask, and I accidentally brushed up against the coral while doing that. My leggings saved me. My husband just wore shorts and ended up with a coral scrape on his shin.

Just found this web site and this thread as we started researching for our first Windstar Cruise.

We are going on the Dreams of Tahiti 7 days cruise in July of this year. We are celebrating our 25th wedding anniversary and we are taking our kids on the trip with us. We are coming in a couple days early before the cruise to get adjusted to the time zone and staying four extra days at the Hilton Moorea after the cruise. We are thinking of getting remarried either on the ship or on an Island. We have lots of questions but I thought I start with these 2.

 

1) Has anyone got any suggestion on getting wedding vows renewed -either on the ship or offf the ship?

2) During the cruise we are presently in cabins 124 and 126. Would these be a good location? We need to stay on level one because they are the only cabins with a 3rd berth in each room.

I'd suggest contacting Windstar and asking if this is something the Captain can do on the ship.

As for the cabins, they are right across from a stairwell so you may get more noise than other cabins, but I like Deck 1 because there is the least rocking.

We were on WS cruise in the Caribbean this past Jan. WS does renewals of vows. One was done while on our cruise. You need to contact WS in Seattle to make arrangements. As for your cabins we were in those cabins in Tahiti, we never heard anything very well sound proofed. Great cruise we did the first one back and crossed the Pacific on the Star it was glorious. The Lagoon is georgeous. Congratulations and Happy Sailing

P.S. I would request a vow renewal ceremony the first evening on Bora Bora, since you will be anchored all night and the ship won't be going anywhere. The ship is also docked at Raiatea all night after the Raiatea day, but that is the evening of the deck BBQ so the deck would be in use and the entire crew would be busy with the BBQ.

One other option to ask about--since you will be able to tender back and forth to the little reef island of Motu Tapu in the late morning/early afternoon of your second Bora Bora day--is having your renewal ceremony there, on your own little private island. We found it to be idyllic and there were only about 6 other people from the ship there, since most of the passengers didn't know they could visit the island until the evening before.

Wow

 

Thanks for the quick replies. And does not get any better than having someone be in the same room and not have any problems. We were a bit concerned about the stairwell location as well but it is great to "hear" we won't be bothered by noise.

 

Now on to excursions.......once I have a list of choices .... I would love to get feedback from you on the choices we are thinking of making.

 

My daughter is 18 and son is 15. We were thinking of doing the dolphin swim/getting kissed by a dolphin at the dolphin centre on Moorea - has anyone had any experience with this? It is very expensive.

 

Is there a good place during the cruise to go surfing?

 

Thanks again.

There is surfing on the island of Tahiti. More here: https://www.surftravel.com.au/destinations/french-polynesia/tahiti/

There is surfing on Huahine, but the local surfers are very protective of their waves and are not very open to "guests" joining in.

vlaurend

The Coral Garden Tahaa excursion is $119 ea. So I am looking at $500 US for the family, is there any other way to do the excursion cheaper with a family of four that would be safe and secure? ie a private tour.

When do you get back to the beach where lunch is? My wife is wondering how much time she will have to enjoy the beach?

Thank you for the idea for the wedding idea at Bora Bora, we will ask about the Private Island wedding.

With all due respect, if you had wanted to save money, you would be doing something other than this cruise, or not staying 4 days in Moorea in addition to the cruise. Experiences like the Taha'a drift snorkel will be the unforgettable highlights of your visit to this part of the world and you want that experience to be everything it can be. There are several tour companies that take people to the drift snorkel, but those all leave from Raiatea, so you would have to do that on your Raiatea day instead of the morning of your Taha'a day. You want a really reliable guide for this drift snorkel, and that's one reason I recommend the ship's excursion. Also, if you go with the ship's excursion on Taha'a day, the tour operator delivers you directly to Motu Mahaea afterwards, where you will arrive just as the ship's BBQ lunch is starting. You will have all afternoon on this little private island and won't feel rushed at all. Most people were packing up and ready to go back to the ship at 3:00 or so because they got bored just sitting around on the island.

 

Having said that, if you want to book an excursion from Raiatea that takes you to the drift snorkel, one of them is called L' Excursion Bleue Day Tours. http://www.tahaa.net/index.php/en/ Another one is Arii Moana Tours. http://www.ariimoanatours.com/ TripAdvisor is your best resource for off-cruise tour reviews.

 

Whichever drift snorkel tour you choose, just be sure all of you are wearing water shoes, leggings, long-sleeved shirts or rashguards, and if possible, gloves. You can get brushed up against the coral and get a scrape even when the water is fairly calm. My husband got a coral scrape and I didn't because I wore leggings.

No offence taken. I am looking at swimming with Dolphins for $1400 US so I need to save money where ever I can. ;)

 

Thanks so much your thoughts, they are guiding us as I write this. We were just looking at the sacred site you mentioned on Raiatea and deciding if we want to go there. So knowing we could do the drift snorkel from Raiatea is of great help.

 

vlaurend did you go to the scared site in Huhaine ? We were just trying to figure out the differences and which one would be best to go to. For our kids, it is like Churches in Europe we can do one without complaint - a second one needs a basketball court close at hand for my son. :cool:

We chose to make a pilgrimage to Marae Taputapuatea on Raiatea because it is the only sacred site (marae) in the entire Polynesian triangle--from Easter Island to Hawaii to New Zealand--that is considered an "international marae". In other words, it is the most sacred site in all of Polynesia. None of the maraes are structurally impressive because they are basically just mounds of stones with no permanent structures on them. However, this is the location from which the expeditions were launched that led to the Polynesians from the Society Islands settling the entire Polynesian triangle. 2600 miles by outrigger canoe is pretty amazing! And of course there were human sacrifices made to ensure safe passage for the expeditions. . . Excellent history lesson for the kids. And if you're lucky, you'll get a guide dog for free, LOL! When we parked in the parking lot across the street from Marae Taputapuatea, a very friendly and well-behaved dog met us and escorted us to the marae, then stayed with us and gave us the full tour, even showing us how to catch the little hermit crabs that make their home there. ;)

We took the excursions from WS, we are not a excursion people, we always do independent tours that I research. That being said back in 2014 when we took the first WS cruise back in Tahiti it was very difficult to arrange independent tours and we write and speak French! So we took WS excursions. They were great and I did not feel over priced. We took the Spinner Dolphin tour with Dr. Poole off Morea, Swimming with sharks and skates off Bora Bora, the Marae Tour on Huhine we went to the myseum, the historic site, blue eyed eels, fabulous because we have been on Easter Island. Fascintaing small museum, quite a hike to the site, eels were amazing. The marae in Tahiti were made of straw and wood they hsve not lasted the centuries. You see remanents of their thrones. On Easter Island they were made of stone. Being that Polynesia is a great equalaterial triangle fascinating.

My least favorite island on land was Bora Bora was very touristy. We took a tour of the island on the only cloudy day with a bit of rain and it reminded us why we dislike bus tours. I would beware of the drift snorkeling especially with children, cutting yourself with coral is miserable. We had a person on our cruise who did, not fun. Almost eneviable. I wore water shoes every where we swam due to the coral, nettle type fish, sea urchins, etc I read someplace to do that in Tahiti for safety. I was brought up on the ocean, sailed for years, better safe than sorry. We loved the cruise. I would save the $1400 and do something more natural than a dolphin swim where they are confined. Have a great time in one of the world’s most beautiful places. Happy Sailing

Vlaurend thank you for all your info and tips. We are sailing 26/4 and I would love to do the drift snorkel but confess to being a bit worried. I will wear the full kit but is it a fast current? Can I stand at all? Is there a sandy bottom or is it all coral? I really, really don't want to miss it as everyone says it is the highlight of the cruise. Thank you.

Ozziewanderer, I've heard so much about the Coral garden/drift snorkel that I'm doing it 3x on 17 day cruise in the fall. Maybe overkill but what the heck. We're doing to Le Excursion Bleue from Raiatea, then the ships drift snorkel tour on our two visits to Tahaa. I'll be VERY interested in hearing what you and your family think after spending $1400 on it, as I'll be spending close to $900 to do it 3x for just the two of us.