Moon Tahiti & French Polynesia: Best Beaches, Local Culture, Snorkeling & Diving (Travel Guide)

This is a great book with excellent up to date information. I love the suggested itineraries. I do a ton of research for trips and found Tahiti a bit lacking in helpful information. This was a great supplement to our trip. I only wish it had some real hidden gems but overall seems to capture the majority of the info you’ll need.

This is an awesome travel guide! Very detailed and organized. Each section has itinerary ideas so if you’re not sure how to adequately time your days then this is perfect! I have a hard time planning so this makes it easier to prioritize things to do. It goes in depth on the “10 Top Experiences” and the hidden gems. Then it educates you on the culture and travel essentials. It tells you the distance to certain places and different transportation methods. If you want to dive, hike, snorkel, surf, dolphin/whale watching, find cool beaches, etc this goes into detail on all the great spots. This is just broken down so perfectly. Traveling is stressful enough and this book is a perfect resource to help make your trip easier.

Good mix of useful info for travel to any of the islands of French Polynesia.

We used to be LP loyalists and have a whole bookshelf of old LP travel books. Unfortunately they were bought by a venture capital firm that completely changed how the guides are written and laid out. It’s awful now. So after a lot of research we switched to Moon Guides, starting with Tahiti and Fiji. Couldn’t be happier so far. This is the closest guide series to the *old* LP experience, but better actually.

My main complaint about this book is the low quality of the paper (and its wafer-thin thickness). On pages that have text and images on both sides, there is some "bleed-through" that makes it difficult to read (even with strong sunlight). This occurs throughout the book. If they'd splurged a bit more on the paper, I'd give it four or five stars. It's well-written and organized by island or group of islands. I especially like the blue-tabbed Background section, covering history, food, culture, flora and fauna, economy, culture, conduct and customs (among other topics).

This book was priceless to me on my recent trip to Tahiti and Moorea! I'm a single female traveler, and felt like I had a companion along while reading Chantae's recommendations for sites to visit. Her itinerary suggestions and the accompanying maps gave me insight into the highlights of each island and I roughly followed them. I ended up driving about 670 kilometers, almost all the way around Tahiti and totally around Moorea. Since a lot of sites are not very well "signed" it was especially helpful to have the descriptions of the places so that I could seek them out with confidence from her writings. In addition, I really appreciated her background info on the history, culture, and geography of these amazingly beautiful islands!

With 100+ islands knowing where to go is really intimidating. I liked that there was a lot of info on the main Society Islands but also the further afield ones like the Tuamotus and Marquesas, where finding accommodation information is a bit challenging. Also nice that the itineraries align with the routes featured on Air Tahiti air passes which saves a lot on flights.

Book was okay. I would have enjoyed some photos too

Recently went on a trip to French Polynesia. I was definitely quite under-prepared as I had only booked the first few nights and wanted to just "wing it" afterwards. I picked up this book just before flying out and I'm glad I did. The book is clearly written by someone who's spent a lot of time in French Polynesia. You get all the info and tips (hotels, restaurants, sights etc.) you would expect from a guidebook. On top of that you also get lots of insight into Polynesian culture and history. In the end I just followed the recommendations in this book on my trip and had an amazing time. French Polynesia is amazing and so is this book. (It has plenty great photos too).