Dive Review of O2 Divers/Havaiki Lodge in
French Polynesia

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O2 Divers/Havaiki Lodge : "Great diving in French Polynesia, and not much jetlag", Oct, 2023, by Kelley McDaneld, CO, US ( Reviewer 4 reports with 2 Helpful votes). Report 12865 has 2 Helpful votes.
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Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Accommodations		Food
Service and Attitude		Environmental Sensitivity	N/A
Dive Operation		Shore Diving	N/A
Snorkeling	N/A
Overall Rating
Value for $$	N/A
Beginners
Advanced
Comments	We took United through SFO to Tahiti—seemed very easy compared to traveling to Indonesia, only an 8 hour flight from SFO and only a 4 hour time change for us, so jetlag was minimal. We went for 17 nights, but you could easily go for 14 and feel plenty relaxed. Stayed at Kon Tiki in downtown Papeete on our first night—brand new hotel. Somewhat loud because of nightclub next door. Great location if you want to explore the downtown market or take the ferry to Moorea (hotel is directly across from Ferry building). Reasonable price for hotel in Tahiti. Some good croissants nearby. Overall food in Papeete was quite expensive and just okay. We ate more croissants, sashimi tuna and french fries than we ever have on this trip. Not a bad combo. On our way back through Tahiti, we stayed at the Hilton out near the airport. Really nice hotel—got an upgrade. Expensive but probably worth it. Great views. Flew Air Tahiti to Fakarava and stayed in the North part of the island at Havaiki Lodge. Our favorite place of the trip. Lodging includes 2 meals a day and food was very good. Small bar on site with good cocktails. We stayed in a beach bungalow directly on the beach—was nice, but nothing compares to the Indonesian style of lodging. Lunch restaurant on site is great. Not a lot of outside food options nearby, but there was one we tried called Hiranaki Lounge in the small town that was excellent! Met some sailboaters who had sold everything and bought a boat (German or Swiss so they spoke English) and compared stories. In North Fakarava we dove with O2 Divers—they picked us up at the hotel each morning. Very proficient operation, would dive with them again with some caveats. Some things to note: almost everyone dives with large tanks and almost no one dives with Nitrox. Almost all dives are deco dives, and this wasn’t communicated to us beforehand. We screwed up on the very first dive of the trip because we said we would just take the regular-size tank. Our dive master JC forgot his computer that morning and we had to go back to the shop after making it about half-way out to the pass where they dive, and that put us about 30-45 minutes late for the timing of the incoming tide—which meant the current would be super-strong. Before we jumped in, DM said it would be a wild current and that was an understatement. Nothing like getting back into serious current on the first dive of the trip! At least it was basically a horizontal current (not like Indo) but one of the other divers we were with was definitely doing some head-over-heels flips (good divers too). I ended up running low on air and we didn’t realize that they basically assume everyone will go into deco on the dives and need to do a longer safety stop. So then I was really low on air! We aren’t accustomed to deco diving being the norm, and perhaps the language barrier didn’t help prior to diving as they didn’t explain this to us. So we learned our lesson—TAKE THE BIG TANK! Which we did for the rest of the trip and also had them fill Nitrox so we didn’t end up in deco on each dive. It was a little annoying because even though we didn’t go into deco we would often have to hang out for 15+ minutes at 15 feet to wait for others to clear their computers, sometime in the blue in a significant current. Not sure why they don’t promote the Nitrox more. Maybe a French thing? We also have liberal Oceanic computers so that helped keep us out of deco. The diving was spectacular in the North pass—tons of gray reef sharks at about 100 feet at the drop off and then many colorful reef fish throughout the rest of the dive—you end up in an area called Alibaba (the fish bowl). Second dive was nearby at the tip of the pass—also some current, saw a variety of fish, octopus, etc. We did 2 dives a day with O2 for 4 days. We would check out the Top Dive shop perhaps next time. Super-long safety stops get old. In South Fakarava we stayed at Motu Aito and dove with Top Dive which has an operation on site at Motu Aito. Wow was Motu Aito interesting—definitely the most adventurous part of the trip. First thing when we got into our relatively open-air bungalow we went into the open-air bathroom area and noticed that what appeared to be sewage was leaking onto the stone floor with every flush. There was a toilet and a sink, but no fixtures—just a small sprayer like you find in your kitchen sink. You used the sprayer for washing hands and showering. Being a plumber, I think Tucker attracts these sorts of problems. :) We had to use the staff restroom for the first night and they were able to “fix” our bathroom issue. Next came the Polynesian rat issue—in the morning we would hear them crawling all around the thatch roof of our bungalow. However, somehow this didn’t seem to bother us to much because the diving in the South pass was AMAZING! Top Dive was a great operation and we dove 2x/day with them for 3 days. Sharks were everywhere and much closer to us than in North Fakarava. We saw Grays, Blackfins, Blacktips and Whitetips in great numbers. We did go into deco on a couple of these dives because they don’t offer Nitrox, but it was minimal and we cleared it quickly. The food at Motu Aito was horrible. Except for the fresh tuna—one of the local fishermen caught a beautiful yellowtail while we were there and we had sashimi the following day. Almost too beautiful to eat. We lost weight for sure during this part of the trip and would recommend bringing snacks and liquor (to help with tuning out the rats—tequila saved the day). They offer wines by the bottle which were good. The staff all were really friendly which made up for the food and the rats.You really feel like you are at the end of the earth there. The last day they take you to Pink Beach for an excursion and it is the most beautiful beach I have seen—one part on the lagoon and the other facing the Pacific. Absolutely gorgeous. We would definitely go back to South Fakarava as well if we return to FP—there is another lodge close by (Tetamanu Lodge) but I had read some sketchy reviews about some management issues they were having prior to our trip, so I was glad we went with Motu Aito and Top Dive. Maybe Tetamanu has better food? I think we would just do a day trip from the North to go to the South Pass next time. It would be a super-long day for sure. Or maybe we would just stay 3 nights down there instead of 4. We flew back through Tahiti to Rangiroa and stayed at Hotel Maitai on Rangiroa. Hotel was nice, food was good but expensive. There is a bar, but unlike Americans, the French don’t really utilize such things! :) Breakfast was very good—can get eggs to order, etc. Hotel is in the middle of the island and isn’t near much so you are kind of stuck there for dinner. Taxis are really expensive. We rented bikes for a couple of days and biked down to Tiputa pass for lunch. We dove with Y AKA Plongee. Decent operation, but you enter the boat by beach so you get sand everywhere. They wouldn’t let us go below 100 ft because we didn’t have our “deep dive” certification which was ridiculous. So just be aware of that. Didn’t matter that we were Rescue divers, had lots of dives in multiple areas, had just been diving below 100 ft., doing deco dives, etc. So I guess we need to fork over $ to PADI for that certification if we go back. Diving was okay in Tiputa pass. The highlight is the dolphins, which sometimes are interactive. Reef wasn’t as nice. You dive the same site for each dive—only about 10 minutes from the shop. Currents weren’t as strong in Rangiroa when we were there. There is a lodge at Tiputa pass called Relais de Josephine and this is where we would try to stay if we ever went back. They had an excellent lunch and their dining area overlooks Tiputa pass. The food was French and very good there. Owner seemed very friendly. We stayed 5 nights at Mai Tai and dove 4 days. We flew back to Tahiti and stayed at the Hilton our last night. We had a late night flight, so we rented a car from Tahiti Easy Car Rental and drove around the island and checked out Tahiti Iti, where Teahupoo Wave is and had lunch there. This will be the site of the Olympic surfing competition in 2024 I believe. The drive around the island took about 6 hours with the detour down to Teahupoo and lunch and some stops at some beaches. In the future, we would most likely do all of our diving on Fakarava North and South and then spend a few nights on one of the high islands such as Huahine and do some hiking and relaxing there. We heard good things about Huahine. We wouldn’t spend any extra time in Tahiti. We also would try to do some whale snorkeling if we went back in the fall in Moorea. We are also interested in visiting the Marquesas (3 hour flight North) which apparently can have great diving but it is variable visibility and definitely advanced and can be hit or miss according to our DM JC at O2. Overall we found the people in FP to be friendly. The French are definitely more reserved and don’t go out of their way to speak English if they know it, but that is okay. I don’t blame them as I don’t speak French. The local Polynesians are super-friendly on the Tuamotos. Make sure to book very early for the lodging in FP—we booked about 3-4 months out and it took a lot of coordinating to figure out available lodging for our dates. Things seem to book early and because they have a super-relaxed cancellation policy, people can book and then cancel close to their trip dates. For most of the lodging inquiries we had to just email directly—google translate came in handy!
Reporter and Travel
Dive Experience	251-500 dives
Where else diving	Komodo, Raja Ampat, Halmahera, Banda Sea, Islas Revillagigedo, Sea of Cortez, Fakarava, Rangiroa, Fiji, Phillipines, Grand Cayman, Bonaire, Roatan, Cozumel, Bahamas
Closest Airport		Getting There
Dive Conditions
Weather	sunny	Seas	surge, currents
Water Temp	-°F / -°C	Wetsuit Thickness	5
Water Visibility	- Ft/ - M
Dive Policy
Dive own profile	yes
Enforced diving restrictions	[Unspecified]
Liveaboard?	no	Nitrox Available?	yes
What I Saw
Sharks	Lots	Mantas	None
Dolphins	1 or 2	Whale Sharks	None
Turtles	None	Whales	None
Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):
Corals		Tropical Fish
Small Critters		Large Fish
Large Pelagics
Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Subject Matter	N/A	Boat Facilities	N/A
Overall rating for UWP's	N/A	Shore Facilities	N/A
UW Photo Comments	[None]

Report currently has 2 Helpful votes

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Dive Review of O2 Divers/Havaiki Lodge in French Polynesia

O2 Divers/Havaiki Lodge : "Great diving in French Polynesia, and not much jetlag", Oct, 2023,

Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Overall Rating

Reporter and Travel

Dive Conditions

Dive Policy

What I Saw

Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):

Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Dive Review of O2 Divers/Havaiki Lodge in
French Polynesia