Bora Bora: One of the most beautiful islands on the planet

Some couples arrive to Bora Bora with shiny new wedding day bands. Many others pay a visit to this exceptional Polynesian island to tick off a very long-held bucket checklist product. All provide significant wallets.

I arrived to Bora Bora with none of the earlier mentioned. On assignment for a travel journal, I was the only solo traveller in a sea of liked-up couples.

On my 2nd morning at the Four Seasons Vacation resort Bora Bora’s luxurious breakfast buffet – just me, my telephone and a stack of pancakes – one more guest approached me. “Sorry to trouble you, but we were being questioning if you’d been stood up at the altar and made the decision to arrive on your honeymoon on your have,” she questioned.

When I stated that I experienced a husband or wife and was right here for get the job done, she invited me to sit with her and her spouse, who she’d married in a lavish Texan wedding ceremony ceremony 5 days previously (I know this due to the fact she confirmed me lots of, numerous photographs).

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It turns out that the brash Texan wasn’t so much off the mark: employees at an additional vacation resort later on admitted at least six or seven gals fly solo each calendar year, acquiring had their weddings termed off at the past minute.

“They’ve compensated a large amount for their honeymoon, so they change up anyway,” stated the workers member. “But oddly, it is only the girls who at any time do it, never ever the gentlemen.”

Bora Bora is not a terrible position to get about a damaged partnership (or to rejoice a successful one particular): if your coronary heart quickens even a very little at talcum-powder sand and heat temperatures, then you’ll be in heaven.

Due to the fact throw whatsoever tropical island cliches you want at Bora Bora and they’ll stick: palm trees, pristine waters and multicoloured fish and unique fruit you most likely just can’t uncover a identify for.

Bora Bora isn’t technically a single island but 12 low-lying motu (slender coral islets) sprinkled about a lagoon so luminous the only phrases that will come shut to describing it are ‘ridiculously blue’.

Climbing up in the center of the lagoon is Mt Otemanu, an extinct volcano that reaches 727m into the air. Some far more figures: Bora Bora is only 8.8km long and 4km extensive, it is allegedly 7 million yrs previous and was at the time considered to be the previous remaining suggestion of the sunken continent of Atlantis.

Traditionally, Bora Bora captivated adventurers these kinds of as artist Paul Gauguin and the late Marlon Brando (who preferred it so a great deal he purchased his have island nearby). Writer James Michener referred to as it “the most attractive island in the world” when explorer James Prepare dinner was in the same way moved by what he named “the pearl of the Pacific”.

Currently, the island which is so pleasant they named it two times is a favorite with Hollywood hefty hitters such as Nicole Kidman, Justin Bieber, the Kardashians and Jennifer Aniston (who evidently occupied my area at the Four Seasons a couple of weeks before me).

If that kind of issue is vital to you, there are lots of possibilities to stick to in their footsteps. If it isn’t, just getting in Bora Bora will get paid you big social media bragging rights.

Just one of this island’s serious points of interest is its remoteness – the only way to get there is by sailing on your own, obtaining somebody to sail you (Hawaiki Nui shipping line features two or three inter-island sailings a week) or traveling from Tahiti, a 50-minute hop. If it is the latter, make certain you seize a window seat for a view of this postcard very island as you land at the small airstrip.

Once you’ve stopped sniffing the perfumed air (that will be the tiare you’re smelling, Tahiti’s small but beautifully fragrant national flower), head to the compact airport’s jetty wherever the pace-boat to your resort will be waiting.

If you can swing it, try out to rating an around-water bungalow exactly where you can look at ‘Tahitian TV’, the nickname specified to the lifted glass home windows in the floors of some villas that allow company to eyeball fish and manta ray, and sometimes even feed them. Exciting simple fact: Tahiti is the OG of above-water villas, as the concept was invented below in the 60s when a group of Us citizens made the decision to perch conventional Tahitian fishing huts on stilts earlier mentioned the water.

But if you haven’t gained Lotto or, like a character from The White Lotus, offered your wildly productive IT begin-up, then Bora Bora is not always off restrictions.

Some resorts, these kinds of as the Conrad Bora Bora Nui, provide yard bungalows and hotel block-style flats which can operate you to substantially less than in excess of-water bungalows. So much too does the Sofitel Marara Seaside. And there are a range of pensions and guest residences which will be kinder to your budget, this sort of as Village Temanuata, a selection of 11 rustic Polynesian huts around Matrira Seashore.

The temptation to lie future to the pool/seaside is robust on this magical island, but must be resisted for very long adequate to look at out a couple of of the sights.

Head to the Bora Bora Lagoonarium, a pure aquarium on a modest motu east of the main island. Snorkel in the translucent h2o for secure encounters with turtles, manta rays, sharks and extra fish than Nemo at any time observed. If you signal up for a full day tour, they’ll even throw in a barbecue lunch.

Bring your togs simply because you’ll spend a good deal of time on the water with jet-skies, paddleboards, sail boats, out-rigger canoes and catamaran sailing choices. Large sport fishing and deep-h2o diving are also achievable at the time out earlier the coral reef.

When you have had more than enough of the drinking water, head into Bora Bora’s cooler interior to stroll or retain the services of a bicycle or scooter. The island is mostly flat, aside from Mt Otemanu which you can climb as considerably as the ‘shoulder’ (all around 4km) but no more as the fragile rock is not suitable for climbing.

Or sign up with Polynesian Island Tours which runs a range of nature walks, from the Valley of Kings, a 3-hour comparatively straightforward hike, to a lot more complicated comprehensive-working day excursions. If you are tremendous healthy and really do not go through from vertigo, then the trek to the summit of Mt Pahia, the 658m more youthful sibling of Mt Otemanu, is a six-hour slog that will reward you with superb views.

I was the moment billed NZ$35 for a small salad at a Bora Bora resort so maintain an eye out for much more spending plan-helpful taking in selections. That signifies eating where by the locals consume, like the snack stands at Vaitape and Matira Shorelines, which provide burgers, pizzas, French crêpes, Chinese chow mein and po’e, a community mash-up of bananas, taro and coconut milk.

Also glance out for the Les Roulottes, or foodstuff trucks, a popular function all through Tahiti, which offer you low-cost and delicious meals for close to NZ$20.

You can not go away French Polynesia without having seeking poisson cru. Indicating ‘raw fish’, this Tahitian speciality is ordinarily tuna, salmon, snapper, salmon or mahi mahi marinated in coconut milk and served with rice and some form of greenery, from salad to diced carrots and cabbage. It’s primarily mouth watering eaten though on a solo excursion to 1 of the most stunning islands on the planet.

The author was a visitor of Tahiti Tourism.