moorea – You Should Go Anyway

French Polynesia is easily done in a wheelchair

January 4, 2020April 23, 2025youshouldgoanyway

Tahiti has always been on my list and for the longest time I thought it would be so wheelchair unfriendly, I’d just get off the plane and be stuck on a beach with my wheelchair all week. Depending on how you look at it, that might not be the worst thing in the world! But Tahiti, and specifically Moorea where we stayed most of the time was almost perfectly accessible for my low key experience.

Having said that, I did not tool around in downtown Papeete at all and have seen that there is a lack of curb cuts there. I wouldn’t expect much in the way of true wheelchair accessibility anywhere, but my experience was barrier free for all the things I wanted to do.

My biggest takeaway from the trip is THE PEOPLE ARE AMAZING there. I don’t agree that French people are particularly rude, but if that’s your experience then you will be happy to know that the people in French Polynesia are perfectly wonderful — including the non-Tahitians.

The Flight to Tahiti

We flew from Chicago to Minneapolis to Los Angeles and finally to Papeete. This sounds like a lot, and it was, but the flight from LA to Papeete was only about eight hours. You could easily spend a day or two in LA to break up the trip. The main reason I chose these tickets was price! It was $550 round trip on Delta and Air France thanks to an alert I got from Scott’s Cheap Flights.

On arrival in Tahiti, I was carried off the plane by helpful flight attendants and crew on the ground. They had an ambulift truck to use since there was no jetway. The international flights to Papeete arrive infrequently so it was a quick breeze thru immigration, to baggage claim and out to my wheelchair accessible(ish) taxi I had booked about a week prior to arriving.

The taxi too us to the Papeete ferry port where we took a ferry to Moorea where we were staying.

Staying on Wheelchair Accessible Moorea

I booked all but one night on Moorea where we stayed at the Sofitel resort. It was amazing. We stayed on the resort the entire time except for one circle-island journey we arranged with the Moorea wheelchair accessible(ish) taxi company.

Accessible things to do in Tahiti/Moorea

On our day tour we drove around and visited the juice/alcohol distillery and picked up some great treats, including bottles of Tahiti Monoi oil which is amazing. We also headed to the Intercontinental resort to see the dolphin center and sea turtles. There are many little restaurants and shops around the island, but we didn’t do much shopping. We made a very nice stop up at Belvedere lookout and had an amazing view of the bay. The island is just beautiful.

Most of all, I just enjoyed relaxing at the resort. There were paved paths everywhere and great service. Breakfast was amazing and being over the water was very relaxing.

Staying one last night at the Tahiti Airport Motel

I don’t like messing around with getting to the airport, and especially when there are few accessible taxi options. Because of this we took the ferry back to Tahiti and stayed our last night at the Tahiti Airport Motel across the street from the airport since the flight was at 8am.

It’s a very basic place to stay, but it had a HUGE wheelchair accessible bathroom in the PMR room on the first floor. MAKE SURE you request this room beforehand. If you have the taxi drop you off at the door, you won’t have to deal with the steep driveway or hills. But we rolled to the airport the following morning and although it was steep, I could do it in my power chair. There was very little traffic at 5AM so having to roll a little on the streets at the airport was ok. Just be careful. I would definitely not recommend trying to sleep at the airport the night before. It’s all outdoors and HOT.

Why you should go to French Polynesia anyway, even if you use a wheelchair

If you have ever wanted a true tropical experience, this was as close as I have gotten to an imagined island experience and I used to live in Hawaii. Moorea was what I think most people think Hawaii is. And while you can certainly find tropical experiences in Hawaii, the cost is likely more and or the hospitality will be less if you find somewhere affordable.

Even though you’re going to have to sacrifice a little bit in terms of accessibility, if you prefer to relax, watch for deals to Tahiti and just go anyway!

More about accessible Tahiti & Moorea

Photos from the Trip

Wheelchair accessible overwater bungalow in Tahiti

January 4, 2020April 23, 2025youshouldgoanyway

I was fortunate to find the Sofitel Moorea Ia Ora on Moorea in French Polynesia. It’s just a quick accessible ferry ride from Papeete and a great alternative to the larger Tahiti island. I would stay there again in a heartbeat!

I always wanted to stay in an over-water bungalow with a hole in the floor to see the water and this is exactly what I got. It was off-season so it wasn’t as expensive as I was expecting, which was great!

The accessible bungalow on the property is the closest one to the beach. Originally I was a little disappointed it wasn’t closer to the horizon bungalows further on the water, but it was actually nice to be really close to the beach for convenience and for the beach scenery.

The accessible bungalow had a nice big bathroom with a high toilet, grab bars, and a roll-in shower with a seat. There is no step to enter and a very small threshold to get onto the deck. The property would benefit by making the entire sun deck accessible (there was a step down to the sunning chair) and if they got really proactive, they’d have a lift that could drop you down right into the ocean and pull you back up! Unfortunately there was also no lift for the pool.

There was, however, a ramped access to the water which I found useful. The rest of the beach was pretty inaccessible to wheelchairs. You could go along the harder sand/stone along the beach but I was starting to get a little stuck in my power chair. The good thing though is that at least you can roll up really close to someone who is on the beach itself.

There was at least one accessible garden bungalow and you could stay a few days there and then move to the overwater if you wanted to save some money.

The property was a short drive from the ferry port and there is at least one accessible taxi company to get you there. The buffet breakfast is awesome too and the staff was absolutely incredible!

The wheelchair accessible bungalow on the water.

Tahiti to Moorea ferry with a wheelchair

January 2, 2020April 23, 2025youshouldgoanyway

During my trip to French Polynesia I decided to stay solely on Moorea except for one night on Tahiti. As a result we had to go straight to the ferry port in Papeete after landing. After arranging a wheelchair accessible taxi to the port, I did research and determined that I would have no trouble getting a ferry to Moorea.

The ferries run almost all day, every day. There are two companies that operate various schedules. I decided to go with the Aremiti due to our arrival time but there is also the Terevau company.

The staff on the ground at the port was so helpful in getting our luggage on their little luggage carts, but the best part was that they have a disability rate for the ferry. If you have “proof of disability” then you can get this discount. If you don’t have a card because your country doesn’t have one, then go ahead and use my tongue-in-cheek disability card generator, which I used for this purpose. The guy was about to give me the discount anyway but I managed to load mine up and show it to him.

Once the boarding started someone came and guided us up a special ramp to the front of the boat where the elevators were. There is a nice lounge with food and drinks and a quieter front lounge, all with open seating. There was an accessible bathroom and plenty of room to move.

There was no need to set up anything in advance either, which was great! But if you prefer to do this, you can call the number on their site.

Someone will help lead you up the ramp for wheelchairs as cars roll onto the ferry.

Wheelchair accessible taxis in Tahiti & Moorea

January 1, 2020January 1, 2020youshouldgoanyway

The first thing I did after booking my tickets to Tahiti was look for an accessible taxi service in the area. While I didn’t find any that were outright advertising as wheelchair accessible, I did find two companies that make do with what they have.

The first was Robert Carpentier who has a van with a portable ramp. When boarding, we made sure the ramp was on a curb to make the angle more do-able. I use an electric wheelchair and sit fairly high, so inside I was ducking down during the transit, but it was ok for short distances. If you use a taller chair, you may want to confirm that you’ll be ok.

Robert picked me up at the Papeete airport and was waiting for me when we came out of baggage. He took us directly to the ferry port where we headed to Moorea.

You can email Robert here: carpentier.r59@gmail.com

Robert was helpful in connecting me with Taxi Gisele on Moorea for our trips there. When we arrived at the port, the taxi was waiting, also with ramps for me.

We had a little trouble because these were two individual ramps made more for manual wheelchairs whose wheels align. But we made it work. The great thing was that because these two taxis communicated with each other, Robert actually sent his ramps over on the ferry so my future trips with Taxi Gisele would go more smoothly.

We booked a 5-hour tour around Moorea with Taxi Gisele as well and it was totally worth it! Got to check out the distillery and a bunch of great photo spots in addition to the dolphin and turtle sanctuary at the Hilton resort.

You can contact Taxi Gisele for Moorea trips here: pahigisele@mail.pf