Honeymoon Advice - relaxing vs adventure

We are looking at bora bora! We are looking at relaxing since the wedding planning is so stressful that we really just need some time for ourselves and plus there are some great things to do there

I'm a big fan of both adventure and relaxation. When we vaca we usually do half adventure and the second half relaxation. For us relaxation is snorkeling/boating. Adventure would be safari, exploring caves, ruins etc. so I would probably go with Cape Town because it offers both. Bora Bora looks great, but FH and I would go stir crazy. There are only so many days of sitting on a beach we can take, but I feel like this is a really personal thing. We look for unique adventures that we can only experience in that place.

I'm worried about the stir crazy too but reading through the brochure looks like they have many water sports and activities. I'm also thinking that with SA - it's much easier to do on a budget. so potentially in 2-3 years we can go do that.

Adventure! I've had lots of experienced travelers say bora bora is nice...for a day. Beautiful but boring!

Cape Town FTW!

Africa all day every day. We're doing Hawaii so that we can have beach and adventure, but if we had the money, Africa would've been our dream honeymoon. Maybe for an anniversary. . . .

I think they both sound amazing... but I just wanted to point out that South Africa could absolutely include time for relaxation and romance too! I mean some of those luxury safari camps.... the private outdoor tubs etc... i think they look SUPER romantic!

And if you really wanted to combine with the quintessential honeymoon resort type stay you could always pop over to Mauritius for a couple days afterwards. Flights are probably pretty cheap from SA

Yeah, the luxury lodges are very romantic at Kruger Park. I'm taking a look at pricing and they are also rather affordable when you convert to US dollars. I think we're going to go to Bora Bora since it's really once in a lifetime... SA we will save for 2/3 years down the line

Bora Bora! Thats where we are going. We can always go on a vacation jam packed with activities. But after all the planning, I think relaxing for a couple weeks in paradise will be amazing. Just remember, your honeymoon is literally a once in a life time trip!

Depends - you know yourself best. Are you going to be incredibly bored with only a few activities options? Or will you welcome the downtime?

My fiance and I almost immediately nixed anywhere beachy, for instance, because it doesn't work for us: we find lying on beaches incredibly boring, and he doesn't do well with heat.

Our dream honeymoon was a trek to Everest Basecamp or climbing Kilimanjaro, so I vote adventure

I can't decide for you, obviously, but I was so stressed and drained by the time i got to my HM-- wedding, grad school, seriously ill mother-- that I didn't want to even *think* about adventure. We spent the first 5 days lying on a Hawaiian beach in a hammock, eating ourselves silly-- it was perfect for me!

But that's me-- from your post, it sounds like you will really regret not doing the adventurous stuff (and keep in mind-- people tend to regret what they didn't do, not because of the lost opportunity, but because it's unknown and you can fill it in however you want in your imagination-- "It would have been so perfect...!").

I'm totally partial, but we are heading to Bora Bora because it involves relaxing and adventure. There are tons of water sports, hiking, 4x4ing, etc.

Do SA! They absolutely have relaxing things. As a PP mentioned, they have luxury camps (which are truly amazing) and beach resorts. I think it's the best of both worlds (I'm planning on Mauritius for that reason). I want the relaxing part, but I want the adventure too. I don't think you'll regret going to SA. Africa is a once in a lifetime experience. Bora Bora, amazing, but not not necessarily unique.

A lot of people are commenting that they booked a tropical paradise honeymoon destination because they want to relax after all the stress of planning. DH and I went to Jamaica and our choice was for that very same reason. I thought that I would want to just relax and lay on a beach for several days after the wedding craziness. However, when the wedding actually came I was pumped. I could have happily endured the biggest adventure of my life. I'm glad we went to Jamaica, and it was fun and relaxing and all, I just found that I didn't need so much relaxation after the "stressful planning" season. I was on a high and I could have ridden that all over the world.

Adventure! Think about a feeling or a place that will be harder to get to once you settle down or are older. You can get that relaxed feeling by going to a beach resort anywhere in the US (for much cheaper than Bora Bora too). If I were you I'd pick South Africa just because you have many options to do something...and how many people do you think you will meet that have actually been there? Not very many!

Thanks all.. we booked Bora Bora last night - spending 4 nights in Tahiti and 6 nights at the St Regis on Bora Bora

i definitely wanted to go there, and am very happy with our choice!

as for SA - we decided to do it for our 1 year anniversary trip - i spoke with a travel agent and did some research.. looked up flights, etc, and it can be done for much cheaper. we'll both be 25 at the time of the wedding (it's 2 days after my 25th) so we're still young and can swing it. i was even thinking it might be fun to do as a girls trip or have a bigger group!

So jealous!

If you don't mind saying, how much were each of the trips? I want to go to both of those places so bad! I spoke to a travel agent and he said it'd cost like ten grand, but I've just started my own research.

We chose relaxing over adventure for our honeymoon because our wedding was almost all DIY and about 9 months of planning, for the honeymoon we wanted to just chill!

Keep in mind that to do a wildlife safari in Kruger you will have to fly all the way across South Africa, a pretty large country. So depending on how much time you have set aside for your honeymoon, you may not want to spend a bunch of days in transit. I can't speak to Bora Bora, but I did spend about a month in South Africa almost 8 years ago, and it has some of the most stunning landscapes I have ever seen. Kruger was fantastic, Cape Town is lovely (go see penguins!), and there is a lot of adventure to be had in the country in between.

Jomabago - bora bora is costing us about 14K with flights out of Newark, NJ. this does not include excursions, transportation, or food (however breakfast is included at the St Regis).

We were willing to spend about the same amount for SA.. i can't really say for the price there because it really depended on the length, the cities you visited, and the "class" you decided on.. but the cheapest trip was about 2K not including flights - 8 nights to Kruger park, and cape town. even the flights are cheaper though - 1200 to fly to Johannesburg pp vs 2400 pp to BB.

minnemiska makes a great point about transit days - even though we are on tahiti for 11 days - our honeymoon is 13 days counting in transit time