FP=French Polynesia
I spent a week on Fakarava and a week on Moorea.
I do not recommend TopDive.
Fakarava is a thrill but very very challenging
From what I have read here, Rangiroa is also awesome, especially during certain times of the year, and perhaps not quite as challenging "shooting the passes"..the small breaks in the coral atolls, you go out to the entrance of the lagoon, hop in when the tide comes in, and go flying through the pass, walls and walls of sharks; rays, giant Napoleon wrasses, etc.
Never seen anything like it in my life. Nothing has even approached the experience of that trip, and honestly, considering the inconvenience of travel from the Pacific Northwest-in terms of length of flights and the RIDICULOUSLY high air fare from the NW to pretty much anywhere, and the fact that I absolutely hate flying-my basic stance is that if it isnt the South Pacific, it's not worth it for me. I'll save my money and go when I can.
Travelnsj is a frequent poster here, and has been diving all over the world, including lots of different south pacific destinations. He would be a wealth of info for you.
When I was on Fakarava, I stayed at Pension Tokerau Village which was really great, run by a Polynesian woman, basically new bungalows, beautiful site, etc. Not air conditioned, and Jan and Feb are very hot and humid. I didnt think I would do well, but it was actually fine. But that's just me...if you are going to FP in their summer, you need to be prepared for really hot weather that does not cool off at night, not even a little, not even out in the middle of the pacific, like on Fakarava.
Moorea diving-billions of sharks; beautiful setting, limited number of dive sites, though, thanks to the crown of thorns.
As I said above, the agent who helped arrange my trip knows alot as she has been there a long time and has dove and also stayed at the places she books travellers with. For what it's worth-after she set up my trip, I went and priced it out individually, and it would have cost me more if I had set it up all myself. I am not trying to discourage you from doing that, it's actually been my preference to do that on all my foreign trips, and my FP trip was the first time I used and agent.
Me and the wife are really pumped. Met with my travel agent today and we leave January the 9th.Any recommendations where yo dive things to check out where to stay etc etc. We are going to be on a boat for 10 days but after that we want to stay in a hotel or a bungalow???
