20 hour layover in Tahiti

It’s time to say goodbye, but I think goodbyes are sad and I’d much rather say hello; hello to a new adventure. January 27th was the first day of our adventure. As we said our goodbyes, Alex and I looked at each other and smiled, knowing that this is going to be an unforgettable trip.  Though we knew the trip there may be long, we were going to make the most out of the journey. Our first flight was to LAX, which was about 4 hours with a 3 hour layover. Our next flight, from LAX to Tahiti,  was an 8 hour flight followed by a long 20 hour layover. We landed in Tahiti at about 6 am and had to fly out at 2 am the following day. We  figured that if we just walked, we would find something to do; there was only one main road on the island that circled the perimeter and at the very least we could walk toward the water and snorkel.

 

After about 20 minutes of walking and no success, we started to doubt our decision … just before we were about to turn around, we saw what looked like a beautiful hotel and figured it would be worth checking out. Here we met Roland, the director of the marina there, who was one of few who actually spoke English. Roland was the most helpful person we met that day. He made a few phone calls to see what our best option was and he said since all the tours were booked due to a cruise that just docked, our best option was to rent a car and tour ourselves. He personally drove us to the rental location and set us all up. It was his selflessness that allowed us to experience the best of Tahiti. It is people like him that we are excited to meet during our journey. Throughout the day, we drove down the entire West coast of  the island, went snorkeling and were able to relax at the  Intercontinental Resort. Unfortunately the videos were cut short because of the GoPro dying; nevertheless, we had an amazing time..It was definitely the best layover we could have asked for.