Tahiti
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50 free Tahiti trivia questions with answers — geography quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Tahiti is the island that gave Europe its dream of the South Seas. Explorers raced to reach it, sailors refused to leave it, painters and novelists crossed the world to find it, and its language slipped words into English that are used every day. This quiz turns the best fun facts about Tahiti into questions: how the island was formed, who ruled it, what visitors eat and dance to, which sports its people excel at, and the odd records set there. Every answer comes with a short explanation, so each question leaves a fact worth repeating. It suits travellers planning a trip, students of Pacific history, and anyone who likes knowing more about a place than its postcards show.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which French painter left Europe for Tahiti in 1891 to paint scenes of island life?
Paul Gauguin
Paul Gauguin sailed for Tahiti on 1 April 1891, promising to return a rich man. He never did, spending his last years in the Marquesas Islands.
Q 02HMS Bounty spent five months at Tahiti collecting seedlings of which plant for the Caribbean?
Breadfruit
Breadfruit was meant as cheap food for enslaved plantation workers. After the mutiny wrecked the first attempt, a second expedition sailed in 1791 and delivered the trees.
Q 03Tahitian Kauli Vaast won gold at Teahupo'o, on his home island, in which 2024 Olympic sport?
Surfing
Surfing was the only 2024 Olympic sport held outside mainland France, on a wave almost 16,000 km from the host city.
Q 04Which star made Tetiaroa atoll his retreat after filming Mutiny on the Bounty on Tahiti?
Marlon Brando
Marlon Brando first saw Tetiaroa while scouting locations in 1960 and built a small village there in 1970. A resort on the atoll now carries his name.
Q 05James Cook sailed to Tahiti in 1769 so that astronomers could watch which planet cross the Sun?
Venus
Venus crossed the Sun on 3 June 1769, and timing it from Tahiti was meant to reveal the distance between the Earth and the Sun.
Q 06Which English word comes from a Polynesian term that James Cook recorded at Tahiti in 1769?
Tattoo
Tattoo comes from the Polynesian tatau, a mark made on skin. Fifty years later Tahiti's first written law code banned the practice.
Q 07Which gem, cultured in French Polynesia's lagoons, is sold worldwide under Tahiti's name?
Black pearls
Black pearls grow inside the black-lip oyster, and the farms are not on Tahiti itself: they sit in the lagoons of the Tuamotu and Gambier archipelagos.
Q 08Which port city on Tahiti's northwest coast is the capital of French Polynesia?
Papeete
Papeete means "water from a basket". A missionary founded the town in 1818, and it grew into the island's capital.
Q 09Which rum cocktail, made famous by Trader Vic, takes its name from the Tahitian word for "good"?
Mai Tai
Mai Tai comes from the Tahitian maita'i. Victor Bergeron said he invented the drink in 1944 at his restaurant in Oakland, California.
Q 10Which captain was set adrift in an open boat when HMS Bounty's crew mutinied after leaving Tahiti?
William Bligh
William Bligh and 18 loyal men were put in a 23-foot launch, and he steered it more than 3,500 nautical miles to safety.
Q 11Tahiti is the largest island of which archipelago, given its English name by James Cook?
Society Islands
Society Islands is often said to honour the Royal Society, which sponsored the voyage, but Cook wrote that he chose it because the islands lay close together.
Q 12Tahiti's two round halves, Tahiti Nui and Tahiti Iti, are the eroded remains of what?
Extinct volcanoes
Extinct volcanoes built both halves between about 0.25 and 1.67 million years ago, over the same hotspot that raised the neighbouring islands.
Q 13Tahiti's classic raw-fish dish, poisson cru, mixes citrus-marinated fish with which ingredient?
Coconut milk
Q 21Which white flower, also called the Tahitian gardenia, is French Polynesia's national flower?
Tiare
Tiare buds are steeped for days in refined coconut oil to make monoï, the scented oil Tahitians use to soften skin and hair.
Q 22Which spice has a variety named after Tahiti, a hybrid orchid brought there in 1848?
Vanilla
Vanilla from Tahiti has shorter, broader pods than the common kind, and away from Mexico's bees every flower has to be pollinated by hand.
Q 23Which animal, fed a vegetarian diet, was served as a feast delicacy in old Tahiti?
Dog
Dog was a dish for feasts and high chiefs, and James Cook was among the visitors served it. The native breed later vanished through interbreeding with European dogs.
Coconut milk goes in after the fish has turned opaque in lemon or lime juice. The dish's French name simply means "raw fish".
Q 14Va'a, the national sport of Tahiti, is a race between crews paddling which kind of boat?
Outrigger canoes
Outrigger canoes get their balance from a float lashed beside the hull, and Tahitian crews race them between islands across the open sea.
Q 15Which island, Tahiti's nearest neighbour, lies a short ferry ride northwest of the capital?
Moorea
Moorea is close enough to reach by ferry in under an hour, and parts of the 1984 film The Bounty were shot in one of its bays.
Q 16The royal name Pōmare, taken by Tahiti's first king, has which meaning?
Night cough
Night cough is said to honour his daughter, who died of tuberculosis in 1792. Four more monarchs carried the name.
Q 17Which naturalist explored Tahiti in November 1835 while sailing round the world on a survey ship?
Charles Darwin
Charles Darwin arrived aboard HMS Beagle. He praised the scenery and the islanders' sobriety, but was unflattering about Tahiti's queen.
Q 18Which American novelist turned his 1842 stay on Tahiti, after a ship's mutiny, into the book Omoo?
Herman Melville
Herman Melville reached Tahiti on an Australian whaler in 1842. Omoo, his second book, picks up where his Marquesas tale Typee ends.
Q 19Two armoured cruisers from which country bombarded Tahiti's main harbour in September 1914?
Germany
Germany's Scharnhorst and Gneisenau came for the port's coal, but the French destroyed the stockpile before the raiders could seize it.
Q 20In a 1940 vote, Tahiti's citizens overwhelmingly backed which general against the Vichy government?
Charles de Gaulle
Charles de Gaulle's Free France won the unofficial referendum of 24 August 1940, putting Tahiti on the Allied side two months after France's surrender.
Q 24Which ship, a converted coal carrier, took James Cook to Tahiti on his first Pacific voyage?
HMS Endeavour
HMS Endeavour began life as the Whitby collier Earl of Pembroke. The Navy bought her in 1768, and she lay at Tahiti for three months.
Q 25Which currency, pegged to the euro and shared with New Caledonia, is used in the shops of Tahiti?
CFP franc
The CFP franc was created in December 1945 alongside Africa's CFA franc, to shield the colonies from a steep devaluation of the French franc.
Q 26In the names Tahiti Nui and Air Tahiti Nui, what does the Tahitian word "nui" mean?
Big
Big is the meaning: Tahiti Nui is the larger, north-western part of the island, and its little south-eastern partner is Tahiti Iti.
Q 27In 2020 an airliner flew non-stop from Tahiti to which city, then the longest domestic flight ever?
Paris
Paris was 15,715 km and about 16 hours away. Pandemic rules ruled out the usual stop in Los Angeles, and both ends of the trip were French soil.
Q 28Tahiti's national team reached the World Cup final in 2015 and 2017 in which sport?
Beach soccer
Beach soccer gave Tahiti a first: beating Italy on penalties in 2015 made it the first Pacific nation to reach the final of any FIFA tournament.
Q 29Tahiti's footballers won the 2012 OFC Nations Cup to reach which FIFA tournament in Brazil?
Confederations Cup
Confederations Cup entry went to Tahiti as Oceania's champion, the first other than Australia or New Zealand. Jonathan Tehau headed its goal against Nigeria.
Q 30The Bounty mutineers who left Tahiti for good in 1789 burned the ship and hid on which island?
Pitcairn
Pitcairn Island was misplaced on naval charts, which kept the settlers hidden until 1808, when only one mutineer was still alive.