Visit French Polynesia: when to go and which islands to choose

This is the gateway: all international flights land in Tahiti. Papeete has its market, its food trucks and its museum, the island has waterfalls, a 114-kilometre ring road and world-class surf spots such as Teahupo'o. Moorea, 30 minutes by ferry, already offers the jagged bays, the lagoon and the rays: many spend their first nights there before reaching the other archipelagos.

An hour's flight from Tahiti, these high islands ringed by lagoons are postcard Polynesia. Bora Bora and its Mount Otemanu, Taha'a the vanilla island and its pearl farms, Raiatea the sacred island with the UNESCO-listed marae of Taputapuatea, Huahine more rural and low-key with its eel-filled sacred river. This is where the overwater bungalows are concentrated, but also many far more affordable family guesthouses run by locals.

Seventy-seven atolls, rings of barely-emerged coral around a lagoon, spread over a huge stretch of ocean. Rangiroa, the largest, and Fakarava, a biosphere reserve, are the two diving hotspots: the passes concentrate grey reef sharks in the hundreds, manta rays and a dense underwater life. You sleep in a guesthouse at water level, get around by outrigger, and the rhythm is that of the tide and the boat.

Three and a half hours' flight from Tahiti, the Marquesas have no lagoon: black cliffs, deep valleys and archaeological sites overgrown by banyans. Nuku Hiva and its Taiohae bay, Hiva Oa where Gauguin and Jacques Brel rest, the giant tikis of Puamau and the arts festival held there every four years. A trip apart, often on the mixed cargo ship Aranui or by plane.

The southernmost and least visited archipelagos. Rurutu, in the Australs, is the best place in Polynesia to watch and sometimes swim with humpback whales, from July to October. The Gambier, at the far south-east, keep the Rikitea cathedral, built by a 19th-century missionary, and produce a large share of the black pearls. These islands are earned: few flights, few places to stay.

The water is warm year-round, 26 to 29 degrees. Diving is done everywhere, at varying levels: drift dives in the Tuamotu passes, coral gardens of Moorea and Taha'a, shark walls at Fakarava. Away from diving, you swim with rays and blacktip reef sharks in the lagoons, watch humpback whales from July to October around Moorea, Rurutu and Tahiti, and dolphins at Rangiroa.