Lauren and I had another fabulous adventure off Moorea with Whaleswim. Maire our outstanding guide ensured we got closeup to mothers and calves everyday with the added bonus of hearing a “singer” and seeing an escort “ spy hop” just a few metres from our boat. Thanks to Rae and Magenta for fabulous hospitality and our fellow swimmers from across the globe who helped make our holiday so special. We will return.

This is a hard review to write because Ray and Magenta are really wonderful, sweet, friendly ladies and I really wanted to like their operation. But from the very start they failed to deliver.

For starters, I had sent them my itinerary twice, clearly showing that I was arriving a day early (to adjust to the time change). A few days before the trip Rae sent out a bulk email to the group saying we would be met at the ferry port on the Sunday. I immediately responded, reminding her that I was coming on Saturday, not Sunday, and was arriving by air, not ferry. She replied, "Yes, I have your schedule, you're covered." There was nobody to meet me at the airport, so I took a taxi to the lodge, where the manager said he did not have me arriving until Sunday! Fortunately, he did have a bungalow available so I did not have to seek out other accommodations. Rae then sent me an email saying, "I'm so terribly sorry, I didn't see that you were arriving on Saturday."

I had just sent her an email saying "I'm arriving Saturday, not Sunday," and she had written back saying that yes, she had my schedule. And yet in all my emails, she never got it.

The lodge we were at, Moorea Beach Lodge, is the equivalent of a very cheap motel, with tiny, barely-acceptable rooms, in an absolutely idyllic location right on the beach. My room didn't even have a chair to sit in, but the view was fabulous.

The first day on the water was bad because there were four-meter swells, but that's nobody's fault. The next day the boat did not go out because conditions were so rough that it would have been unsafe to get in and out of the water, and the following two days I did not go out because there were still three-meter swells. Following that, I doubled my dose of seasickness pills and went out again.

Typically, we'd see a whale, and the captain would go in the water, swim out to it, stay there for ten or fifteen minutes, and then come back and continue on without letting us in the water. Maybe 2/3 of the time we would not get to go in, and only one out of three we'd get to go in the water.

But now I come to the biggest reason for rating WhaleSwim one star. (Would be zero if TA allowed zero-star ratings.)

When I first contacted them, I told them I wanted to freedive with the whales. (Freediving is breath-hold diving. No tanks. Just the air in your lungs. I am a trained and certified freediver.) They told me that I would be allowed to freedive at the captain's discretion, depending on his assessment of the mood of each individual whale. I asked if I needed to bring my own dive weights, and Rae specifically promised that they would provide weights for me. Not wanting to add an extra seven pounds to my already heavy luggage, I believed her and did not bring weights.

For a week and a half, every day I went on the boat (after the first day, when it was too rough) I asked for weights, and every day they refused and promised that I'd get weights tomorrow. And every tomorrow they promised again for tomorrow. They told me I could not freedive if there was a baby whale, but the captain, the guide, and the videographer all freedived, including when there were baby whales. And then on the excuse there there was a baby, they would not give me the weights they had promised.

I must stress that I told Rae very clearly that freediving with the whales was THE REASON I was coming there, and she promised that I would be allowed to, and would be provided with weights. And for a week and a half that promise was broken every day.

The captain of the boat never smiled the whole time I was on the boat, and he never spoke a word to us other than telling us when we could go in the water. The guides/deckhands were the same, though they did speak occasionally. They all did their job and nothing more. They never made me feel they really cared about us.

After a week of disappoint and broken promises, someone told me about another boat, Enjoy Boat Tours Moorea (see my 5-star review of them) and I went out with them. Enjoy Boat Tours was everything WhaleSwim was not. Friendly, welcoming, they talked to us and laughed and smiled, and made us feel they really loved having us on the boat. And when I asked, they even got me some weights, so that, no thanks to WhaleSwim, I was finally able to do some freediving. The last half-week of my two weeks with WhaleSwim I didn't go out with them at all, going with Enjoy Boat Tours instead.

As an example of the poor organization of WhaleSwim, on our first morning Rae told us that breakfast would be served at Moorea Beach Lodge at 6:45 a.m., but that they take egg orders at 7:00 a.m. She told us to leave the lodge at 7:10 to walk the short distance down the beach to her house, where we would catch a taxi to the boat. The lodge started taking egg orders as promised at 7:00, cooking them one order at a time, so that it was about 7:30 when the group left the lodge, and 8:00 when we got to the boat. The boat captain was upset because he was expecting us at 7:00. Rae said, "Oh, I'm terribly sorry; I forgot that I had booked the boat for 7:00."

Notice a pattern? Rae is really a very nice and sweet lady and I wanted to like her. I'm sure I'd like her if I met her socially. But she has no competence for detail. Whether it's booking her guests in to the lodge on their arrival date, or coordinating the boat time with the breakfast time, she seems unable to deal with details.

The whole reason for booking with an outfitter like WhaleSwim is that they handle the lodging and the boat booking. They provide no value except that, and they fail at that. And they make promises they are unable or unwilling to keep.

The only reason this trip was not a complete bust is that I had booked a week at an upscale resort after my two weeks with WhaleSwim, intending to do some kayaking and snorkeling in the lagoon. So that being there an additional week I was able to go out with Enjoy Boat Tours several more times and had some really great whale encounters.

My recommendation: Come to Moorea to swim with whales, but avoid WhaleSwim Adventures. Instead book a resort or lodge or other accommodation, and then go out with a local boat operator like Enjoy Boat Tours Moorea. You will spend a lot less money and have a much better experience.

WhaleSwim Adventures: Unacceptable and provides no value for your money.