Moorea Underwater Experience

Moorea Underwater Experience provided our group of four adult amateur photographers with the trips of a lifetime. They found for us many humpback whales and we enjoyed wonderful encounters with these magnificent creatures. …

We recently completed the private half-day snorkel and scuba diving boat with my family of 5. We had Angelique and another snorkel guide Mireva (who was lovely) on the boat. The price charged was almost twice the advertised price on Google (price shown is $632… they charged $1100 USD) for a family of 5. For that price we assumed it would be a really special boat ride with top quality care, products and service. The first warning sign we saw of there being issues is we didn’t hear from them until 1.5 hours before the 11 am scheduled start despite multiple requests for a phone call or text. Communication before that was terse and Angie came across as prickly both over email as well as in-person. 25 minutes before the scheduled tour we finally received a phone call that there was a problem with the boat and there would be a delay. The delay wasn’t too bad but the boat was a glorified zodiac, with no formal seating, so everyone just sat on the bumpers on the side of the boat. Despite giving sizes of the snorkels for our children beforehand, they did not have the right size snorkel fins for two of our three children and the snorkels did not have clips to connect to the masks so they kept falling off. Had this been a large more-public snorkel trip it would be one thing, but for $1000+ it should have been done right. The first scuba dive took place at the same time as the 30 minutes of snorkeling. But upon completion we were advised that we would only have time to do one more trip: either a snorkel or a scuba. That was only 2 hours into the trip, so we were only together for about 2.5 hours before they were returned to the hotel and we set out for one more scuba dive. Overall, the trip was okay but not worth the price. The guides made an effort but the boat and trip were not as promised. We spoke to the dive shop at the hotel afterwards (who had been sold out) and they were laughing when they saw our boat and how much we were charged, giving us the impression we were ripped off. Pricing in French Polynesia is high in general, and we were prepared to pay top dollar, but when Angie showed up in that little boat without all of the materials or equipment, the company should have offered a significant credit or discount. We did get the full 4 hours but only when you include having to drop off most of the group early when their snorkel trip was cut short, so that we could then go back out to dive a second time. I’m not sure how there could be so many high reviews; we were advised that the company owns three boats so perhaps the other ones are much better and they were just overbooked, but we could not recommend this company for other families or groups looking to go out for a half-day trip — certainly not at that price point.

Angie was amazing and took us to some wonderful diving spots. So many turtles, sharks, fish, and an octopus!!! They also took us to an awesome snorkeling spot!!! Angie was so easy to work with and accommodated all our needs!! Definitely recommend creating your own personalized trip with her.