My trip report R635 Peach Sunset

Well Jane started so now I feel guilty, so I am sitting down and writing.

Well as you know, once landing in Brisbane, we got the P&O bus to the dock, checked in our luggage, then sat around awhile waiting to embark.

We didn’t have to wait too long once embarkation started, about ½ hour, then it was our turn. We all checked in together, then found our cabin and as my luggage was not there yet, I was eager to start exploring, so off we went, to get our bearings, before going up on deck to secure our spot for departure.

Was nice to sail away in the afternoon instead of the evening, like on the sun.

Met our dinner companions tonight, they were great company for dinner, bit surprised about the age difference at first, but getting to know them was great.

First day like every day (for me at least) started nice and early with a trip to the gym. Had decided that even though I was on holidays, I wouldn’t give up the gym. Jane occasionally joined me, but the other two just found it too hard.

As usual got involved in as many of the activities as possible, hardly missing the trivia’s, (even coming in from the beach if required to join in, then going back out). Even went all out this cruise and bought a horse at the races.

Noumea: did the essential trip to the chocolate shop, and then just walked around for awhile, before heading back on board, nice and relaxed this time without the kids saying “I’m boared can we go back now”.

Lifou: Took advantage of no kids again, this time to go snorkeling. Though next time when the kids are with me, I will take them there too, as I found it wasn’t as hard to get to as is made out. Was very nice, but as luck would have it, the first timeI needed my snorkeling stuff, my mask had to go and break on me, so I had to borrow a friends for awhile, but it was still great, got some nice underwater photos.

Vila: This was a port I was really looking forward to, as Robyn and I had the Cascade Waterfall abseiling booked.

I must admit this was an excellent tour to do, we all had a ball. After climbing up to the top of the falls, we had our rundown on all of the equipment, and brief instructions, before being sent down the training slopes a few time, until everyone felt as comfortable as possible about what we were about to do. Then headed to the falls. The abseil was in two parts, with them saving the best for last. The second stage was actually repelling through the falls, getting totally drenched, as you go down through the main falls. Then about 2 meters from the bottom, if you had the nerve, you just let go of the ropes, and fall back into the water bellow. Absolutely brilliant. Then walking back to the base when we thought it was all over, we had to done on the helmets again, to go down a rock slide into another swimming hole. I can highly recommend this tour, and am thinking of doing it again, and even taking the kids next time.

Champagne Bay: Absolutely gorgeous, what else can I say. A day of just floating around enjoying the sun and the beach. Went on a little canoe, where they paddled us out to the coral for some snorkeling, and they waited about 15 min for us. Got more great underwater photos, and great photos of the beach too.

Luganville: This was the first port that I hadn’t yet been to, and Jane was always going on about the blue hole, so we finally found a taxi whose price we were happy with, and we headed out. (I almost gave up the chance to go, as I was getting a bad headache, but I am so glad that I persisted). The Blue hole was amazing. Jane had photos from here last visit, but they just didn’t do it justice. It was an amazing ‘Kerosene’ Blue, just beautiful. Of course Jane lost here snorkel, but luckily it didn’t go right to the bottom, it stopped on a ledge. Robyn managed to dive down to retrieve it, but with a lot of pressure on her ears. (what a good friend she was J). Had a ball on the taxi ride there and back, jumping into the back of the ute.

Wala: Day started of raining, but it did clear up. Went of to see the turtle man at the far end of the beach. Every visit to Wala, I go with my girls to see his turtles, this time I couldn’t et them down, just cause they weren’t with me. So I went and took photos for them. Good thing too, ‘cause Jane left here memory card on the ship, so I had the photographers job for the day.

Tonight was a special night for us, as the captain had invited us to dine with him (you see it’s not what you know but who you know).

Had a really nice dinner, even though we were trying to be all-proper, the captain made us feel so comfortable, Jane even laughed at his ordering of dinner. He was so easy to talk to, there was no need to be intimidated at all.

After dinner we told the captain we’d see him on deck for Island night, and we ran down to change.

Again in between dancing and drinking, found time to chat with the captain. Well this was my first really big night. I headed down to bed after 4:30, when everything was packed up, even out danced, and outlasted the younger crowd. Mind you my ‘getting home’ at that hour didn’t stop me from getting up at 6:30 to head of to the gym.

The last two days were just normal sea days, doing as much as possible, and in the evenings drinking heaps.

On the last day, we had the owners horse race, which we wouldn’t miss out on, even though our horse didn’t win, we had a ball getting him ready for the big day.

As usual all of the staff were brilliant, I think for the first 3-4 days, I had a couple of staff members a day come up to me and ask how the rest of the family were, and where they were, as they remembered me from previous cruises. Even the kids club staffed asked about my kids by name. It just makes it that extra bit special, like coming back home after being away for a long time.

Had such a good time, Hubby felt left out, so have booked the next one, again to coincide with Kezza, so we will get together in Feb again.

Will post photos soon

Great review Sandra. I'm looking forward to your photos. Have some for you guys as well which I'll send to you.

I'm going to try and do my review - soon!!

Kerri

Thanks for the review keepcruising. The abseiling sounded great. We booked Cascade Waterfalls - no abseiling. We hope that this will still be good. Do many people swim there?

begginer_cruiser, yes there are a few people who swim there. We passed the Cascade tour group, (without abseil) there were about 20 of them, and they all go swimming. They had left by the time we got there. But as I splashed down at the end, there were about 6-10 people still there, they were crew that made their own way there.

Here are a few phtos, as I promised

http://community.webshots.com/user/malnars

Thanks for sharing and the walk down memory lane, Keepcruisin' . It was great. R 635 was our first ever cruise and it will be something we will never forget. We are looking forward to planning the next one.

Cheers,

Kinka

Great review and photos Keepcruising. I noticed from your signature that that was your first time on the Star but you didn't comment much on the ship itself. Also you have booked to go on her again in February even though you come from Canberra and I would have thought that the Sun from Sydney would be more convenient for you - I guess that means you were happy with the ship but would be interested in your views just the same.

Hi Rallo, this was our first time on the Star also. I didn't think I'd like it that much but was pleasantly surprised.

There are only a few things I would improve on and they are:- windows in the restuarant, when we boarded and got to our room, the corridor had the most nastiest smell. thankfully once in the room you couldn't smell it but out in the corridor, phew!!! I think Jane or Sandra complained about the smell and after that you couldn't smell it (I couldn't anyway.)

I found it surprising that they would have a library in the Starlight lounge, not that I borrowed any books.

The photo area worked better than I thought it would. You at least weren't jammed in like sardines.

The Cassablanca lounge was very much like the Sports lounge on the Sky. The seating in the Showlounge was better than the Sky and the Casino I thought was a little smaller than the Sky and it was very busy at times, but it was still good fun.

The piano bar area was nice and intimate for that quiet drink before or after dinner.

On the Star you can get to the front of the ship and this was great when arriving at or leaving an island. This was locked on really windy days.

The restuarant works really well for being the only one. I thought we maybe crammed in but that's not the case. The Lido buffet also worked well. There were ques but it all seemed to move fairly quickly. We always ate outside and there always seemed to be enough seating about.

The only complaint about the buffet would be breakfast. It was pretty much the same everyday, except for baked beans and hash browns occasionaly and the bacon wasn't real bacon. (it was always just a thin strip of something and quite salty I thought).

We never had a problem with tender tickets or waiting hours to board, we got our tickets at any given time and got onto a tender pretty much straight away which was great, especially as some past reviews had commented on how long they had to wait after getting their tickets.

The one thing I didn't like was the Steakhouse area. On the Sky it's outside and the atmosphere was wonderful. On the Star it's inside. We didn't give it a go this time because of that reason.

Hope this helps a little.

Kerri

Hi Rallo,

Yes it was my first time on the Star, like Kezza I was pleasently surprised.

I agree windows in the restaurant would have been nice, but it still didn't feel dark, and I guess I only used it at dinner, and even if there were windows, you wouldn't have had much to see, at 8pm.

The Casablanca, I found a bit smokey at nights. The Casino was good it had 1 maybe 2 smoke free nights, where smoking wasn't permited, I don;t recall them doing that on the Sun.

I thing I did notice was that as the pizza place was out by the pool, in the afternoon, they would section off the pizza area, which meant loosing all but 3 tables on the non smoking side of the pool. They did change some of the tables in the smoking section to non smoking, but hen your surrounded by smoking tables it makes no difference.

It didn't really effect me, but I know of some people who would have been very bothered by that.

One thing I did note, and as I have kids it was importantfor me, was that the kids club is much better equipped. When I got home I told the kids all about it.

Really Sydney would be more practicle for me, but I have to let DH and Kids try the Star too otherwise it wouldn't be fair. (LOL).