Introduction: Tahiti Cruise – Taking the Long Way There
Review: Air Canada International Maple Leaf Lounge Vancouver Airport
Review: Air Canada International Signature Service – Vancouver to Melbourne
Review: Melbourne Marriott Hotel
Review: Air New Zealand Lounge Melbourne Airport
Review: Air New Zealand Premium Economy – Melbourne to Auckland
Review: Four Points by Sheraton Auckland
Review: Air New Zealand Lounge Auckland Airport
Review: Air New Zealand Business Premier – Auckland to Papeete
Review: Tahiti Pearl Beach Resort
Review: Paul Gauguin Cruise – Society Island & Tahiti Iti
Review: Air Tahiti Nui Moana Economy – Papeete to Auckland
Review: PARKROYAL Melbourne Airport Hotel
Review: Air Canada International Signature Service – Melbourne to Vancouver
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For our flight from Papeete to Auckland, we wanted to book everything under Air New Zealand, as we were connecting in Auckland and wanted everything on one ticket. Unfortunately, by the time we went to book, the only inventory Air New Zealand had for this particular flight was in economy class.
As Air Tahiti Nui is not part of Star Alliance, my husband’s Star Alliance Gold status would not allow us to do priority check-in, even though the flight was code-shared with Air New Zealand. Because we were in economy, we were only allowed 1 checked bag each for free. Air Tahiti Nui does offer a Priority Pass that you can purchase – which gives you priority check in, priority boarding and priority-labeled luggage. The cost for the pass is slightly different based on where you are departing from. For our flight departing Papeete, the cost was 5000 XPF (about $60CDN). As we were connecting in Auckland to a flight to Melbourne, we wanted to make sure our luggage made it with us.
Air Tahiti Nui also allows a person to purchase a Lounge Pass for 5000 XPF. However, since we were traveling with my husband’s parents, and we weren’t going to be spending a lot of time at the airport, we didn’t bother.
Because we had booked our flight under an Air New Zealand ticket, we would only be able to find out our Air Tahiti Nui locator number 3 days before our flight. Once we knew the locator number, we would then be able to go online and purchase the Priority Pass. Air Tahiti Nui also allows online check-in from 36 hours to 5 hours prior to the flight.
This flight was on a 787-900. This plane has 3 classes:
- Poerava Business Class – the business class cabin has 5 rows of 6 seats in a 2-2-2 configuration. The seats are fully flat seats. A large duvet, cushion and luxury accessory kit are provided.
- Moana Premium Economy Class – this cabin has 32 seats across 4 rows in a 2-3-2 configuration. These seats have 20.4 inch width and a 36-38 inch pitch. Premium Economy provides a large fleece blanket, a comfortable cushion and a complete accessories kit.
- Moana Economy Class – there are a total of 232 seats in a 3-3-3 configuration. These seats are only 17 inches wide with a 31-34 inch pitch. Economy class provides a large fleece blanket, a cushion and an accessories kit.
Three days before the flight, we managed to get our Air Tahiti Nui reference number. However, when we went online to manage our booking and purchase the priority pass, the Air Tahiti Nui website was showing our flight as being cancelled. This obviously alarmed us, so we ended up making many calls to both Air Tahiti Nui and Air New Zealand to find out what was going on. After a lot of back and forth with calls and emails, we were told that it was a glitch with the Air Tahiti Nui reservation site, but Air New Zealand assured us that we had a confirmed reservation and confirmed seats on the flight. However, because the ticket was booked through Air New Zealand, we could not use either website to do online check in. So, we would have to wait until we got to the airport to find out if we actually were going to be on the flight or not.
On the day of our flight, we were picked up from the cruise dock at 6:00am and taken to the airport. It was only a 10 minute drive away. As we were there quite early, there was a fairly short line for economy class. We were checking 2 bags and had 2 carry-ons. All the bags had to be weighed, and one of our carry-ons (which actually didn’t have that much in it) was overweight. So, we had to take stuff out of the carry-on and stuff it in our checked bags. Which was a pain.
On the bright side, there was no issue with checking in. As we were distracted with the shuffling of goods between bags, we didn’t think to ask about the Priority Pass until one of the bags had already gone down the luggage belt. As we had not been able to use the Priority Check-in feature of the pass, we decided we wouldn’t bother to purchase it at this point. So, Air Tahiti Nui just lost out on some extra revenue – because we would have definitely purchased it if we had been able to do so online.
There were no lines for going through exit customs or security, so we were in the main area of the terminal in no time. There are a few duty free stores and a single place that sells food (and only baked goods and drinks). So, of course this was very busy. We did manage to get some croissants and some water to eat while waiting for our flight.
The terminal was quite busy as there was also a French Bee flight leaving about 45 minutes before our flight. Once that flight was gone, there was much more room in the terminal.
Boarding for the flight was about 20 minutes late. I’m not sure why – as I believe the plane had been sitting there overnight, and I could see that the catering had been finished long before the original boarding time.
Once they finally did start boarding, they started with people in wheelchairs, families with small children and business class/premium economy. We positioned ourselves to be one of the first economy class passengers to board – as we wanted to make sure we found room for the one rollerbag we were bringing on. In Papeete, all the flights are boarded from the tarmac, so we had a nice view of the plane before boarding.
Air Tahiti Nui 181 (NZ #315)
Papeete (PPT) – Auckland (AKL)
Saturday, December 21, 2019
Depart: 8:40am
Arrive: 1:10pm (Sunday)
Duration: 5hr40min
Aircraft: 787-900
Seats: 32A & 32B (Economy)
Our seats were near the front of the second economy cabin – with an window an middle seat. As we had arrived in Papeete in the middle of the night, we were hoping to get some good views on our flight out.
We were able to find room for the rollerbag, the camera bag and my husband’s backpack. There wasn’t a lot of room under the seat in front of us. My backpack fit – but I had to turn it sideways to do so.
The pitch for seats in economy class is listed as 31-34 inches. I’m pretty sure that we were closer to the 31 inch end, as there wasn’t a lot of room between rows (even for my short little legs).
The only seat adjustment was for reclining the seat. The button to recline the seat was in the armrest.
At the seat was a small pillow, blanket and a small plastic pouch that contained socks, eye shade, ear plugs, earbuds and a towelette. That is actually quite impressive for economy class.
Storage at the seat included a slot for magazines, and under that a storage pouch. The pouch didn’t fit a lot of items in it. If you weren’t using the pillow and blanket, there really wasn’t anywhere to put them. Luckily my husband was sitting at the window, so was able to stuff them between his seat and the window.
There was a tray table that folded down from the seat in front. This table could be used in half or full width.
There was also a drink holder that pulled down from the tray table. There was an inner ring on the drink holder that spun around, but we couldn’t figure out exactly how that worked (as we never tried using it).
In the seat back was a personal entertainment system. There was an okay selection of movies and TV programs to choose from.
Under the entertainment screen was the headset jack and a USB plug.
Supposedly there was also wifi available, but I wasn’t able to find out any pricing information about it while we were sitting the ground. And I forgot to check again once we were in the air.
I was in the middle seat, and there was not a lot of room between me and my seat mates. I tried to remain as still as possible so as to not jostle the person next to me. I pretty much felt squished the entire flight.
The plane pushed back from the gate at 8:47am, and they played the safety video. The Air Tahiti Nui safety video was quite similar to the current Air New Zealand video – which presented the safety features in settings outside of an actual plane – like in cars or boats. We sat on the tarmac for a while, and finally took off at 9:03am.
About 50 minutes after take-off, the food cart came around with breakfast. There was a choice between an omelette and something else that I couldn’t quite catch (even though I asked him to repeat it). So, I went with the omelette. I also had a tea to go with my meal.
There was a surprising amount of food on the tray. The omelette came with a sausage and broccoli. There was also a box of orange juice, a cup of water, a croissant, a fruit dish, yogurt and another dish of various meat products. It was definitely more than enough food. They came around to clear trays about 40 minutes later.
During the 5 hour flight, I watched two movies to pass the time. The first was “Where’d You Go Bernadette”, which was a movie with Cate Blanchette that I hadn’t heard of before. The second was the 1984 version of “The Bounty” with Mel Gibson and Anthony Hopkins. While on Tahiti, had done an island tour, and heard some of the history of the Bounty, so thought it would be interesting to see Hollywood’s take on the story.
As we were sitting at the front of the second economy cabin, the bathrooms were right in front of us. As this was a daytime flight, it wasn’t bothersome, but if this was a night flight, the lights from this area might be bothersome. It was handy in that you could easily tell when bathrooms were available. Although with 4 bathrooms in this area, there never seemed to be much of a wait.
We landed in Auckland at 2:00pm local time, but we still had lots of time for our connecting flight to Melbourne.
Overall, the service on the flight was good. The meal was surprisingly good, and they did come around with drink refills and water during the flight. The seats themselves were very tight, and I would not want to spend a lot more time than I did in these seats. And I was not impressed with the reservation issues that we had prior to the flight.
As I have no immediate plans to go back to French Polynesia, it is unlikely that I will be flying with Air Tahiti Nui again. However, if I did have to fly with them again, I would book directly with them – to avoid the same issues that we had, and to be able to use the online check-in and be able purchase any other services I might want.