I see there has been plenty of discussion over the past year or more on this destination and the new French Polynesia Master and I am only sorry that I had not comes across this debate earlier. I led a group on the TAHITI AGGRESSOR in March 2006 - as I recall it was 14nts from Rangiroa to Fakarava, diving Tiputa on Rangiroa and both north and south passes in Fakarava and many islands inbetween. For this group of very experienced world travelling divers, it was possibly their best trip ever and we all have fond memories of Great Hammerheads and solitary Tiger Sharks, as well as hundreds if not thousands of grey reef sharks, eagle rays, friendly dolphins and the list goes on. Since the we have booked the Aqua Tiki many times - great boat, and are working with the Itemata - also a great boat. These boats follow a recognised European dive profile of 2-3 dives per day with large 15lt tanks, meaning long deep dives. As the best diving is on an inward current thru the passes, 2-3 quality dives per day makes perfect sense. We have been awaiting the arrival of the French Polynesia Master with high hopes, and in fact ended up with the first charter on her staring Dec 31. As a brand new boat there were a few teething problems, to be expected after it had just steamed almost 7000 miles from the yard where she was newly built, but by the end of the trip, most things were running smoothly, and the feedback from the second trip and subsequent trips has just kept getting better. Its a very expensive destination to operate in, and there are many challenges to be overcome, but I am confident this boat will turn out to be one of the world's top live-aboards.
Finally, the main reason that the boat is showing so few spaces is that when the new boat was announced, we and many other agents/groups, booked charters for our clients over the first few years of operations.
However there are spaces out there even if they do not show on the boat's website, and for those with some flexibility, due to a late cancellation, we still have 8 spaces on her for a 10 night trip from Fakarava to Rangiroa for March 22-April 1, which is being offered at a very affordable rate. See our website and availability at
Search for Spaces or contact me at
Dom@diveadvice.com - I hope that some of you will have the opportunity to take advantage of this - it really is a spectacular destination.