Unique Tahiti‘s West Coast Full Day Tour was a very good cruise ship independent shore excursion. Email correspondence with Tracey prior to the cruise was great. On exiting the ship, we walked to the left and outside the port gate to meet Tracey by her red Mercedes 8 seat SUV.
We visited a white sand beach, a black sand beach popular with surfers, an old rock church, an ancient stone Marae, caves, a botanical garden with waterfall, and an old village initially popular with surfers. We also viewed long finned eels from a bridge, and enjoyed and paid for our own lunch with a credit card at a waterfront restaurant. Our tour guide and driver Virginia, from France, was very nice, knowledgeable, enthusiastic, responsive to questioning, helpful and energetic. She adjusted the itinerary to accommodate the weather and our interests so that we were able to see the highlights in a short period of time. We greatly appreciated that Unique Tahiti accepted credit card payments at the end of the tour, so that we did to have to change US $.
It would’ve been helpful to have a microphone/speaker so people in the backseat could hear the guide better, but all in all, it was a fun, active, interesting and educational day that was great for a first time visit to Papeete, taking us to more attractions at a lower price that any ship shore excursion.