To the point(s): Our 11-night trip to French Polynesia

As this post publishes, we’ll be a couple of hours from heading to the airport to fly back to the United States after 11 nights in French Polynesia. I’ve posted some tidbits of the trip on Instagram, and a few people have asked for a points and miles breakdown. I’ll separately post reviews of the flights and properties involved, but in this post, I’ll review how we got there, where we stayed, and what we paid.

Flights

Positioning to Los Angeles on Jetblue

This trip kind of started in Los Angeles. We don’t live in Los Angeles, so we had to position there. We had spent November 2-6th at Atlantis, Bahamas, using our complimentary stay from Caesars Diamond status. We flew from the Bahamas to Los Angeles on JetBlue to pick up Fort Lauderdale and Los Angeles, the 22nd and 23rd airports of Jetblue’s 25 for 25 for my wife and kids (23rd and 24th for me). That was unfortunately expensive because of the Bahamas departure taxes. We used Amex Membership Rewards for the 35% pay with points rebate from the Business Platinum card, so we initially paid ~120,000 points (for the ~$1,200 flight) and we got ~42,000 points back, for a net cost of ~78,000 points (about 19,500 points per passenger). That wasn’t our cheapest option to get to LA, but it worked for the situation.

Air Tahiti Nui business class via Alaska Atmos Rewards (Los Angeles to Tahiti)

Our flight to French Polynesia was on Air Tahiti Nui. I booked this via Alaska Atmos Rewards (formerly Mileage Plan) for 60,000 miles + $18.10 per passenger (a total of 240,000 miles and $72.40). I actually booked this trip in reverse: I long ago booked flights for our return from French Polynesia. Then, I set an alert with search tool Award Tool to find flights to French Polynesia. I had set up that alert on March 7th. On September 9th (6 months later!), I got the notification that seats were available from Los Angeles to Tahiti. I booked it within 6 minutes of receiving the alert!

Air Tahiti to Moorea and Bora Bora

I really messed up on our travel within French Polynesia.

I have said before that Air Tahiti sells multi-island passes that can be a great deal for those looking to visit a few French Polynesian islands. That remains true and is the most reasonable way to travel to multiple islands.

Unfortunately, I hesitated forever on nailing down our schedule. By the time I went to book, it was too late to buy a multi-island pass. I ended up making separate bookings for Tahiti to Moorea, then Moorea to Bora Bora (via Tahiti) on Air Tahiti.

Moorea is alternatively (and less expensively) reached by ferry from Tahiti. It would have cost about $50 for my family to take the slower ferry (which is said to feature less motion and which takes about 1 hour). Instead, we flew for about $316 total for our family of 4. I made the choice to fly based on a number of reviews I read about rough ferry crossings. It seems that it can be very smooth at times and very rough at times. One of my kids gets motion sickness very easily, so I opted for a 7-minute flight over an hour-long ferry.

I waited until a day or two prior to travel to purchase, and I could no longer purchase directly on the Air Tahiti website. I was able to book instead through Expedia, even though tickets were not available for purchase via Air Tahiti.

From Moorea to Bora Bora, I booked an itinerary through Chase Travel. I did this to both use the travel credit from my wife’s Chase Sapphire Reserve card and earn 8x on the purchase. The price was $957.60, but we got $300 back for a net cost of $657.60 (and I expect to earn 8x on that, so I expect to earn 5,260 Ultimate Rewards points from the purchase.

Additionally notable: the exact itinerary I wanted for the Moorea-to-Bora Bora portion of the trip was not available on the Air Tahiti website (the departure didn’t show up in search results). However, it was available via Chase Travel and some online travel agencies. I booked it via Chase Travel and the flights took off as scheduled.

Air Moana from Bora Bora to Tahiti

For the flight back to Bora Bora from Tahiti, we booked Air Moana ($704 for 4 passengers booked directly with Air Moana).

Air Moana is a competitor to Air Tahiti, and fares are often a bit cheaper on Air Moana. In this case, the flight was almost $500 less for the four of us with Air Moana than with Air Tahiti. I considered booking Air Tahiti via Air France / KLM Flying Blue, but Air France was only showing 15kg of included luggage per passenger.

Both Air Tahiti and Air Moana offer an unlimited number of checked bags, instead of calculating weight (and charging more if you need more total weight). We had about 85kg of checked luggage (since you need to check rolling carry-ons), so I went with Air Moana since they offered 23kg of checked luggage per passenger (which is what our other Air Tahiti flights had included).

The Air Moana flight was fine. In fact, whereas Air Tahiti only offered juice and a snack on board, Air Moana offered a wider selection of beverages (including coffee, tea, and hot chocolate). I’ve read that Air Moana more often has delays/cancellations, but our trip was fine.

Air Tahiti Nui business class via Alaska Atmos Rewards (Tahiti to Seattle)

This flight was the impetus for the trip: I found four seats in business class via Alaska Atmos rewards to travel from Papeete, Tahiti (PPT) to Seattle (SEA) for 60,000 miles and $53.01 per passenger (for a total of 240,000 miles and $212.04). After I found this, I went searching for hotel availability, and the entire trip came together.

Delta economy Seattle to New York via SAS

Needing to get back east at the end of the trip, I booked a Delta flight via SAS EuroBonus. We paid 15,000 SAS miles plus about $53 per passenger to fly from Seattle to New York JFK nonstop on a daytime flight that fit our needs perfectly. Cash prices were high by the time I booked, and I really wanted to get to JFK in order to close out Jetblue 25 for 25 for me and get the rest of my family to #24.

Jetblue New York JFK to Syracuse, NY via Etihad Guest

For the final flight, we booked Jetblue from New York JFK to Syracuse, NY (SYR) for 6,000 miles and about $20 per passenger via Etihad Guest. This was simply a cheap way to pick up a JetBlue airport. Syracuse isn’t terribly close to home, but it was close enough to get a family member to agree to pick us up.

Hotels

W Hollywood via Fine Hotels + Resorts® (1 night)

In Los Angeles, we spent a night at the W Hollywood using an Amex Fine Hotels & Resorts credit. The night came to about $450, so it was a net cost of $150 after the Amex Platinum prepaid hotel credit. I noted in a previous post that we used the $100 property credit for dinner and the breakfast credits from FHR, the breakfast credit from my Marriott Platinum status, and the breakfast credit from the destination fee to pay for breakfast. Unfortunately, we overshot both credits by about $100, so this stay worked out to be more expensive than it should have been. The hotel itself was great, though, and the Fine Hotels & Resorts rate also includes complimentary valet parking, so it was appealing enough.

Hilton Moorea for 320,000 total points (3 nights)

In Moorea, we booked the Hilton Moorea. A standard room was 80,000 points per night.

I initially booked a 3-night stay in my name for 240,000 points. However, the standard rooms at this property only accommodate 3 people. I set an award alert with MaxMyPoint for space to open up for a second room.

I was eventually able to snag a room in my wife’s name for the first night of our stay. Unfortunately, the second night was completely sold out (whether with points or money). The third night eventually became available within a few days of departure, but I hesitated on booking since the second room was unavailable for the second night of the stay.

Ultimately, we checked in with two rooms on the first day and ended up all sharing one room anyway. That wasn’t my intention here, as I had fully expected the second room to open at some point. Since only one adult was assigned to my room, we ended up being charged for one additional adult for breakfast on nights #2 and #3, but that wasn’t a big deal to me. In total, we spent 320,000 points since we paid for one room for three nights and a second room for one night.

We also ate via in-room dining. At checkout, I split tender over several Hilton cards to use both the resort credit from the Hilton Aspire card and some $50 credits from Business Platinum cards. There was no problem splitting over several cards (inclduing a couple of my wife’s cards).

St. Regis Bora Bora: 5 nights for 535,000 points (5 nights)

We admittedly gambled a bit harder yet at the St. Regis Bora Bora.

We booked a Reefside Garden villa for 535,000 Marriott points with Marriott’s “Stay 5, Pay for 4” (commonly referred to as “fifth night free”).

That room type only officially accommodates 3 people. Having been to this hotel, we knew how large this room type is. I’ll have more details in my review of the property, but the short story is that I reached out shortly before the stay, and they were willing to make an exception since my kids are so young. Again, more to come on this, but we only ended up needing the one room reservation.

Airport transfer to the St. Regis Bora Bora

Worth a quick mention here is the fact that we booked an airport transfer from Bora Bora airport to the St. Regis Bora Bora via TripAdvisor. I did this when they offered targeted rates as high as 70% back via Capital One Shopping (65% is shown above, but I was targeted for 70% back), so we paid $255 for the one-way transfer, but we got $180 back via Capital One Shopping. That was a great deal!

Westin Bora Bora (2 nights)

We spent two nights at the Westin Bora Bora. This property features overwater bungalows as standard room awards (and there are a lot of overwater bungalows here, so award availability is not terribly challenging to find).

We booked 2 villas at this property. At the time of booking, the cost was 70,000 points per night. We used 3 Marriott 85K free night certificates and 70,000 points. Either way was a great deal since standard rooms at this hotel were more than $2,000 per night.

I applied 2 Marriott Nightly Upgrade awards to my two nights at the Westin (more on how this happened to come). I only selected Premium Otemanu View villas for upgrade at the Westin. Sure enough, my upgrades cleared on the first day they were eligible and I got a Premium Otemanu View over water villa. My wife had no upgrade instrument to use, so she ended up with a more standard villa with a view of the resort rather than Otemanu.

I’ll have more to share about both room types in a review of the hotel. We booked two villas here because we knew that the overwater villas would not comfortably accommodate 4 people. The max listed occupancy is 3, but we had heard from others who have stayed that even 3 would feel tight. Indeed, I agree with that — we ended up using both villas (one just for sleeping).

I’ll have more to say about this property in a review, but the short review is that they are really underselling the Premium Otemanu View villas with the room mock-ups on the website. There are pluses and minuses to the property, but the view of Otemanu is unbeatable, particularly from these villas.

Intercontinental Tahiti (1 night)

I used 70,000 IHG One Rewards points to book 1 night at the Intercontinental Tahiti, as we flew back to Tahiti from Bora Bora the afternoon before our morning flight to Seattle.

Unfortunately, this property also has a maximum occupancy of 3 for its standard award rooms. I actually intended to book a cash rate via Capital One Travel for a room with 2 queen beds, but I waited until my wife’s Capital One Venture X Rewards card’s annual $300 travel credit coupon reset a few days prior. Two days before arrival in Tahiti, I tried to book the Intercontinental’s 2 queen beds room via Capital One Travel. Oddly, the booking errored out near the final stage, saying that the price was no longer available, and then the hotel showed up as unavailable via Capital One Travel.

I couldn’t really find a better option, so on the day before arrival, I booked the Intercontinental for 3 people and hoped I could negotiate a cost to upgrade to a room with 2 queen beds at check-in (the difference in cash price was about $200, and there were a couple of different “2 queens” rooms available, so I was prepared to negotiate a price). In another stroke of luck, the front desk agent was happy to upgrade us to a 2 queen bed room, thanks to my IHG Platinum status.

If I had planned better, I would have booked sooner, and I would have reached out in advance to ask about the price to upgrade. That said, it worked out.

Seattle + New York hotels

We still have two more hotels on this trip. The first will be a Seattle hotel booked via Fine Hotels + Resorts®. The second will be a night near New York JFK that I haven’t yet booked. I’ll report back on both when they are complete.

Bottom line

In total, we spent:

• 480,000 Alaska Armos Rewards points (most of these points were transferrred from Amex Membership Rewards points to Hawaiian before that partnership ended).
• 320,000 Hilton points
• 605,000 Marriott points + three 85K Free Night certificates
• ~$1850 in flights between French Polynesian islands

In terms of food, we used a Marriott eGift card (worth $1,100) redeemed from Capital One Shopping, to cover the majority of our expenses at the St. Regis, and we used Hilton credits to cover most of our expenses in Moorea. The Westin has a resort fee of about $105 per night, though that includes round-trip airport transfers (we only took this in one direction since we didn’t need it at the front end, though they did pick us up next door at the St. Regis for free).

There is no doubt that French Polynesia is a very expensive destination, but we got great value for the points. The flights would have cost around $20,000 in business class for four passengers, the Hilton would have cost more than $2,400 for one room for 3 nights, the St. Regis would have cost more than $10,000 for 5 nights, and the Premium Otemanu View villa at the Westin would have been about $6,800 for two nights (plus the other villa, which would have been more than $4,000 for two nights). We never would have spent those cash prices, but we felt like the high point cost here wasn’t unreasonable, at least on the surface (though I’ll have more to say about that in reviewing the hotels).

We also reduced cost by bringing some food with us. We brought a collapsible tea kettle and bowls along with instant noodles and oatmeal, as well as instant mac and cheese, and we generally had lunches in our rooms. We focused on complimentary breakfast (thanks to elite status) and dinner as our main meals. They were still expensive, but having used points for the most expensive pieces of the trip, we were able to splurge a bit on food.

If we had it all to do over again, we probably would have spent more nights on Moorea and fewer in Bora Bora. I’ll address that in more detail in a future post since the primary purpose of this post is to explain what we booked and how.

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