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Bora Bora Aerial, French Polynesia, 1996

"Lacy breakers lap the coral reef that rings Bora-Bora, an ancient sunken volcano 165 miles [266 kilometers] northwest of Tahiti. With sugar white beaches edging its electric-blue lagoon, the island fits everyone's image of a South Seas paradise—but not everyone's pocketbook: Waterfront thatch huts go for up to [U.S.] $700 a night."

—From “French Polynesia: Charting a New Course,” June 1997, National Geographic magazine

Photograph by Jodi Cobb