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VISITING ST. REGIS BORA BORA DURING COVID (CHRISTMAS 2020)

If you’re looking for a home away from home, you have to stay at the the St. Regis Bora Bora once in your lifetime!

The St. Regis Bora Bora is known for its large villas, ranging anywhere from 1,550 sqft to 13,000 sqft. Besides the large villas, the property itself is massive! It’s so big that you need bikes and golf carts to get anywhere. With that said, you will definitely not get bored in Bora Bora (Boring Boring) with all that the St. Regis has to offer.

- Getting to the St.Regis Bora Bora -

Once you arrive at the Bora Bora airport, you will be greeted with kiosks with the St. Regis Bora Bora sign. The Bora Bora airport is tiny so you will definitely not miss this. Once we arrived, we picked up our luggage and headed straight to the kiosk with the St. Regis sign. Once you find your hotel kiosk, you will proceed to check in and they will take your bags and give you a lei.

Once you’ve checked in, you will walk over to the dock with the St. Regis boat. Depending on how many people arrived on your flight, you will either be greeted with a small boat or a bigger boat. The transfer itself is $140 USD round trip per person.

- Checking in at the St.Regis Bora Bora -

When you first arrive at the property, you will be greeted your assigned butler. As a Covid precaution, half the group on your boat will proceed directly to check in while the other half will get a tour of the property. This allows for less people to be checking in at once.
After checking in at the plexiglass counters, you will be escorted a golf cart to your villa. Overall, the check in process was effortless and only really took about 10 mins.

- Arriving at your Villa -

After an 8 hour plane ride from LAX to PPT and a 50 min plane ride from PPT to Bora Bora, we finally arrived at our overwater villa.
When you first walk in, it is evident that the entire place has been cleaned and sanitized thoroughly to meet Covid-19 standards. There’s even a little amenity kit that has extra masks and disinfectant for you to use at your leisure. From what I know, the St. Regis Bora Bora is the only hotel in Bora Bora that offers the amenity kit.

- Villa Types & Views -

We were lucky enough to score an upgrade to the Overwater Deluxe Otemanu Villa from our original Overwater Superior Lagoon view. I would have to say that if you’re already splurging on going to Bora Bora, you should just go for the Mt. Otemanu view. At first I didn’t think that the mountain view was going to differ that much from the lagoon view. But if you’re planning to take a lot of photos in your overwater Villa, the mountain view provides an amazing backdrop.
As you can see from the photos above, the villas at the St. Regis are spacious to say the least. From the large bathroom with a his and her side to the spacious king size bed, there’s definitely more than enough room for two. For further details about all the amenities in the room, check out the St. Regis website.

- FOOD & DINING -

Breakfast

As titanium members, we actually had free breakfast every morning. I would also say that breakfast was my favorite part of the day because they just had a lot to accommodate the American palette.
Breakfast is served every morning buffet style. However due to Covid, you can’t actually get up and grab the food. You have to order a la carte but you’re able to order as much as you want and as many times as you would like.
Every morning, they will bring you a basket of fresh bread and pastries to start your breakfast experience. After that, you’ll be served a wellness shot followed a fruit parfait. As for the main dish, you have a huge selection of American, French, and Tahitian specialties to choose from. Honestly I tried everything from the American omelets, to the French crepes, to the Tahitian Poisson Cru and I’d really have to say I love them all!

Lunch

Lunch was a meal we kind of just winged everyday. Some days we would go to the main island and enjoy some food while others we would grab a couple of bite sized happy hour food at Te Pahu. One of my favorite things to do was to grab a drink and get an order of the fish and chips. It was super fresh and the portions were decent. With that said, I would have to say that the lunch items were heavily American. So if you wanted your burgers and sandwiches, then lunch is your time to shine!

Dinner

Our butler actually reserved for us dinner every night at all the restaurants during our 5 night stay so we had the chance to experience it all! However, one tip is if you’re an early bird like us, try to get dinner reservations closer to 6PM. Most of our reservations were much later (like after 7:30PM) and a lot of the times we weren’t seated until 8:30PM. The later dinner reservations did not work well for our 5AM wake up call but nonetheless the dinner was very good.

- Activities & Things to Do -

If you think you’re going to get bored here, think again. There’s so much to do at the St. Regis that we feel like there wasn’t time to do everything!

- St.Regis Calendar of Activities -

During our holiday stay, there were daily events that were offered. For us, we decided to partake in the champagne and desserts, flower crown making, and water bike challenge. I’m not sure if these were only offered over the holiday season or all year round. But I would definitely check with concierge and butler services to see if those activities are offered

Water Sports

If being on land isn’t your thing and you would rather be in the water, then you’re in for a real treat. The St. Regis offers the following.

paddle boarding: you can easily go to a pool boy and they will set you up with one
kayaking: you can easily go to a pool boy and they will set you up with one
snorkeling: you can get your snorkel gear from the pool boys. These are sanitized after every use but we kept ours for the entire stay
water biking: the pool boys can set this up
jet skiing: this is not included in your resort fee and is an additional fee. The rates depend on the hours that you plan to use the Jet skis so make sure to check in with concierge regarding the prices

Biking

There are two bikes assigned to every villa. For those of you who do not know how to ride a bike (I learned during my stay at the St. Regis Bora Bora) learn now! I cannot stress how important it is to know how to ride a bike while you’re at this resort. My first couple of days there I had to call for a golf cart every time I decided to leave my villa. As accommodating as the resort is, it’s just more convenient to just pick up the bike and go over wherever you want.

Gym & Tennis Court

For gym rats like us, we really didn’t get to use the gym much. Every time we entered the gym, we would say “eh maybe we just lie on our dock and look at the blue water instead” The only times we really used the gym was when it was pouring outside. For us, we would have rather been outside and soaking in Bora Bora than go to the gym.
However, with that said, the gym is quite nice. It has your basic cardio machines and free weights with some upper body and leg machines.As for the tennis court, we never had the chance to go during our stay. But, it’s definitely up to par with a professional court.

- Covid Precautions -

Upon stepping foot onto this property, you can tell that everything has been cleaned and sanitized to meet Covid protocols.
Unlike some hotels that have suspended housekeeping during your stay, the St. Regis Bora Bora is still offering housecleaning everyday. In fact, they go one step beyond and offer turndown services as well. So everyday, housekeeping comes once in the morning to clean and tidy up and one time in the evening, to get your villa ready for bedtime.
When housekeeping comes in, they will have masks and gloves on. However if you’re more comfortable with no one entering your villa during your stay, that can be arranged with housekeeping as well.
As for everything else, for the most part guests had on masks in public areas and there was proxy glass set up to enforce some of the social distancing. I personally felt very safe and Covid was never a concern during our stay.

- Overall Review -

The St. Regis Bora Bora definitely exceeded all my expectations on so many levels. From the unparalleled hospitality to the amenities to everything else, I literally have nothing bad to say about this place.
We were so sad to leave but we’re currently planning our trip for the upcoming year to come back to the St. Regis Bora Bora so hopefully this is a see you real soon!
In the meantime, I will be writing in depth reviews of all the different amenities and activities offered at the St. Regis Bora Bora so stay tuned!