Driving around Moorea

June 18, 2013 By Leave a Comment

 Since we had a few more hours to kill before our room was ready, we rented a car (maybe $120?) for 4 hours & took off to drive around the island.  Having just arrived, we were still mesmerized by the beautiful shades of water that surrounded the island.

 Our first stop was the Temple de Papeto’ai, which was located on a lovely little peninsula that offered great views all around.

We could even see the Hilton off in the distance and pick out our bungalow on the end of the pontoon.

 From the point, we could see a people on a viewing platform high above us & we attempted to visit (find) it later that week, but ended up at a different peak.

 We stopped into this little hotel for lunch- I was hoping to find a place on/near the water with a view & after trekking off-road we arrived at this restaurant with a view.  It was a much smaller, more basic hotel & appeared to serve more families and groups of French tourists.

We kept on driving, admiring both the gorgeous peaks on the left and the stunning waters on our right as we kept remarking how much Moorea reminded us of Kauai.  We ran into our only rain (except for an over-night storm) as we passed through the south point of the island.

 It was neat seeing all the small cities & then driving through the “bigger” town with a port and a political rally going on.  We stopped to pick up snacks and mixers for our room & then enjoyed the view from this bluff with Tahiti behind us and another hotel below us.

  We really love to get out & explore when we get to new places, especially ones as beautiful as this with green cliffs & brilliant shores.

 A view of the reef, with the lighter waters being dotted with coral & the island of Tahiti in the background.

GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: Squeezed in a 10 mile bike ride with hubby and cooked dinner tonight- I’m super wife!

Filed Under: Married Life, nature, Travels ->

Arriving in Moorea

June 16, 2013 By Leave a Comment

 Getting to the French Polynesia isn’t too terribly difficult- only about an 8 hour flight out of LA.  We flew into LAX that morning, drove around town & had lunch in Marina del Ray, grabbed a quick nap & then headed back to the airport for our midnight flight to paradise.

 We landed on the mainland of Tahiti around 5AM, but the local band was there to greet us & we didn’t have to wait long in customs because we’d luckily snagged a seat up front on the enormous plane.  We sat around about 2 hours waiting for our connection, but we changed clothes & freshened up, grabbed some cash from an ATM, and got ready for the last flight.

Both the Air Tahiti Nui plane we took from LAX and the smaller plane we flew on to Moorea.  The inter-island flight from Moorea to Bora Bora had en even smaller plane.  I don’t think this airport gets much traffic, except for a regular Air France flight that brings Europeans.

 The Papette airport in Tahiti on the left, and the tiny airport on Moorea (which was mostly shut down).  There were only about 20 people on the 7AM flight with us.

 The island of Tahiti is very close to Moorea (you can see it in the distance behind H) & many people opt to take a ferry because it’s cheaper, but we already had to buy inter-island air tickets to get to Bora Bora.

 We were warmly greeted at our hotel & our room wouldn’t be ready until the afternoon, so we walked around to get our first look at this amazing property as most guests were still sleeping at 7:30.  Our room was going to be just off this pontoon where dozens of these black gulls gathered on the ropes all day long.

 It didn’t take long for us to be ready to hop into the pool for our first swim & then our first swim out in the lagoon.

The Hilton has an amazing lagoon- beautiful waters, tons of coral, hundreds of fish, and stunning backdrop of the mountains.  After a while, we decided to rent a car & drive the island while we were waiting & to pick up some groceries for the room so we could stock our own snack & drink bar.

 When we returned our room was ready & we were so ready to settle in for 4 nights after traveling for 30+ hours.

As we sat on our porch the first night, sipping drinks, playing cards & watching the sunset, we knew we were going to be in for an unbelievably wonderful trip.

GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: Getting to celebrate both of the wonderful men in my life that I can dad today!

Filed Under: Married Life, Travels ->

French Polynesia Trip

June 15, 2013 By 1 Comment

 Finally worked my way through the 1,600+ photos we took  on our 10 day adventure to French Polynesia.  It’s going to take a while to blog about all the incredible things we did & saw around Moorea & Bora Bora, but I like having an index like this & I’ll come back to link up all the posts when I’m done.

This was by far one of our favorite of all the trips we’ve taken- not too far from home, the most ideal weather you could ask for, a perfect mix of adventure & relaxing, super-luxurious, unbelievably beautiful landscape & underwater scenery, and  top notch service and food everywhere. It was VERY expensive, but we were prepared for that & not shocked or appalled.

The trip was nearly flawless for us except for hubby getting food poisoning one day & over-night flight delays coming home from Tahiti.  We successfully completed 2 beautiful dives on each island and thankfully I’m over my diving anxiety.  I finished 2 novels & hubby got to watch the basketball playoffs  most evenings.

Flights: IAH-LAX 4 hours , LAX-PPT 8 hours on Air Tahiti Nui, PPT-Moorea 5 minutes, Moorea to Bora Bora 30 minutes
Moorea Hotel: 4 nights at the Hilton Moorea Lagoon Resort & Spa  (review, hotel website)
Bora Bora hotel: 4 nights at the Intercontinental Thalasso Resort & Spa (review, hotel website)

Moorea

Drive the island, Jet Ski swim with Stingrays & Sharks, Snorkel off our balcony, gorgeous sunsets & sunrises, everything else

Bora Bora

Landing in Bora Bora, 4×4 Tour, Boat tour with coral gardens, ray/shark swimming & picnic, dinner at Bloody Mary’s, spa day, everything else

GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: Only 4 weeks until my triathlon, but had a nice cloudy morning to train today.

Filed Under: Married Life, review, Travels ->

Black Tie Gala

May 9, 2013 By 1 Comment

 One of the main reasons we decided to spend our birthday weekend in Nashville was to attend the annual gala for the JDRF, which our friends sit on the board.

The theme for the evening’s party was a speakeasy & they went all out with decorations & even swing dancers.

 The entire hallways was filled with hundreds of items in the silent auction- everything from original art, bottles of win, travel adventures, music & entertainment packages, and more.

We bid on a few items, like a case of wine, and were quickly outbid.  We moved onto bidding on a few of the super-silent auction items, like a turkey hunt in Arkansas, and were also rapidly out bid during dinner.

 The food was incredible considering they were feeding nearly 1,000 people & we were entertained with the live auction as we ate.

It was a really amazing experience- I’ve never been to anything quite like it & it was so inspiring to see how much money was raised to continue the research against the disease that impacts so many people.

 We had a blast getting dressed up and being all fancy for the evening- hubby had a tux & we even had a driver to take us to the ball.  It’s been a while since I’ve been out past midnight, and I apparently forgot that late night stops at Wendy’s never end well.

GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: It was fun, but glad I don’t have to get all fancy everyday- I’m happy bumming it most days.

Filed Under: friends, Married Life, Travels ->

Running Nashville

May 7, 2013 By Leave a Comment

Although I nearly swore of running in Nashville after the brutal Country Music Marathon in 2011, I was eager to enjoy the cool morning & do a little sightseeing on our recent trip.  Loved how the early morning sun was backing the state capitol just behind our hotel.

 Lots of government buildings downtown, especially in this architectural style.

 We were staying just a few blocks from the Cumberland River & I think we’ve decided that we need to make an annual trek to Nashville to watch the Texans play the Titans in the fall.

 There’s a very lovely riverfront park beside downtown & I was headed towards the pedestrian bridge for a little hill work.

 Although I don’t think I’d want to jump in at my age, there’s something so quaint and adorable about city-life, including bicycle rental stations.

 All my efforts to run up the bridge were rewarded with gorgeous views of downtown.

 It cracks me up that they call the tall building the Batman building.  It was a gorgeous (cold) day- a wicked storm blew through town the previous night & I was battling 20+ mph winds this morning.

Hubby had a work lunch meeting, so after my run I packed up all my work & walked back down to Broadway where I could sit out on the second floor patio of Rippys and have a few drinks while I ate lunch & watch all the other tourists.

 The pedestrian bridge across the river is really nice & just the perfect running challenge, and it’s just across from the symphony and only about a block away from all the bars & clubs on Broadway.

 Although I consider Nashville a relatively small city, they have quite an impressive night life and sports teams, including their hockey team, the Predators, which are a huge favorite around town.

 Back by the Ryman auditorium as I headed back to my hotel; we’re still hoping to catch a concert in this incredible hall one day.

 This was my lunchtime view while I worked, blogged, processed photos, and read through Google Reader.  We ended up checking out most of the bars later that evening & hearing some great music.

GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: Received some great tax news on our houses & they are moving along very quickly.

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