Dive Review of
The Six Passengers/Hotel Kia Ora in
French Polynesia/Rangiroa

Caribbean, Atlantic, Red Sea

Dive Conditions

[Unspecified]  

No place at all for cameras on the boats - you had to hold your camera
throughout the trip  

Overall Rating

The Six Passengers was a short walk down the beach from our hotel. Most of
the staff spoke little English, but enough to provide briefings. Because of
the currents, you drift dive, so you stay together and dive a similar
profile. The staff don't believe in wasting air, and kept us down until the
heaviest breather was down to only 10 bar! Their goal is to maximize bottom
time, and see the biggest fish - no complaints here. We played with a
school of dolphins on two of the five dives we went on in Rangiroa, and saw
tons of sharks. Most of our diving was in and around Tiputa Pass, and
diving through the pass on an inward current was incredible. We were swept
along with large schools of barracuda, butterflyfish, and mating
pufferfish. We saw mantas at the surface on one dive. The coral was in much
better shape than on Bora Bora, due to both the lack of crowds, and
probably that the divers that make it here are more serious conscientious
divers. The boats are all zodiacs, and the ship tries to limit them to a
captain and six passengers, though we had eight on one trip. You have to
wade out to the boats with your gear, though the staff will carry dressed
tanks out for the ladies. There is a dive operation affiliated with our
hotel, but our agent told us ahead of time that it was more expensive and
geared toward resort divers, which other guests at the hotel confirmed.

The Kia Ora was beautiful. We had a "deluxe beach bungalow with
pool", which had its own infinity-edged pool, and a garden tub outside
surrounded by a coral wall for privacy. The garden bungalows were smaller
and a bit cramped but nice as well. The overwater bungalows were also a
little small, but most of them were spread out and appeared to have more
privacy than some of the resorts on Bora Bora where the overwater units
were packed tightly together. The hotel made reservations for us at other
restaurants on the island but charged us $1 to do so, which was not
explained in advance, but it's about the cheapest thing you can pay for in
French Polynesia! For the lack of crowds, we liked Rangiroa much more than
Bora Bora. 

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