Brief review, Sea Princess to New Guinea

We have just returned from the Sea Princess cruise to New Guinea. It was an identical itinerary to the cruise on 21st February, 2015. I posted this information on the Princess Cruises section because of questions about the cruise. I am also putting the information here because not everyone would read the Princess Cruises section.

Some comments -

Alotau - Princess had two tours. One was to the 'festival' and one to Milne Bay WWII historical sites. The Milne Bay tour sold out well before the cruise and it appears that the Shore Ex manager wasn't able to get extra buses/guides. A good guide would be essential and passengers who went on this tour were very happy with it. If you want to do this tour, I suggest you book as soon as the tours are available on the internet. We went on the 'festival' one. It wasn't really a festival, rather a continuous show put on by the locals with singing/dancing and with their colourful boats. It was very interesting.

Kitava - Unspoiled island where people enjoyed swimming/snorkelling. The natives from several islands have their wares laid out for sale. They were mainly wood carvings (lovely pieces with mother-of-pearl inlaid), baskets and shell jewellery. Passengers can walk to the village/school etc. It is a couple of kilometres - people mentioned a two-hour return walk. The track goes uphill. We went to the island too late in the day to do the walk. It was midday before we started off and it was simply too hot. We will leave the walk until next time. :)

Rabaul - Tours are either to WWII sites (cemetery, museum & Japanese tunnels). I heard only good reports. We went on the volcanological observatory tour which was excellent. We visited the observatory, a local village where the children danced for us, an area of hot bubbling water close to the volcano and saw the wreck of a Japanese bomber. There were tours for sale outside the port gates. Prices were around AUD$70-AUD$90. Volcanic ash gets into everything. I suggest you wear dark-coloured trousers. When I showered and washed my hair that night, there was quite a bit of volcanic grit on the shower floor. Take care of your camera if you take photos out of the window of a moving vehicle. One of our cameras got grit into the closing mechanism of the shutter. This was easily blown out when we got back to the ship, but it is something to beware of.

Kiriwina Is - Once again, swimming etc, but there is coral close to shore so swimming can be a bit tricky. There are a lot of carvings etc for sale. They were probably more elaborate than at Kitava, with a lot of stunning bowls - both round and free-form, all inset with mother-of-pearl and sometimes cats' eyes as well.

Doini Is - Probably the loveliest island. This is a great place to swim with sand underfoot. Tenders bring passengers ashore at tiny resort. Many people seemed to spend a lot of the day enjoying drinks at the bar. There were several groups of bare-breasted locals dancing. Carvings etc. were a bit similar to the previous islands, but I felt they were a little bit more expensive.

PNG currency (kena) was available on the dock at Alotau, but they ran out of currency. Passengers were able to purchase souvenirs using Aust dollars, but the locals can have problems trying to bank them at the smaller islands. A comment was made that the ship would have kena available on board for the Feb cruise, but I wouldn't count on that as it might have just been a rumour.

Overall - We had brilliant weather and the cruise was great.:)

On our arrival at the first port of Alotau, we were able to exchange Australian currency to Kina at the bank. It is within a short walking distance from the port.

Agree that whilst the locals will willingly take A$ it is a real hassle for them to exchange them to Kina on the Islands. For that reason I recommend using Kina.

Thanks for the review.:D

Thanks for all the information on the ports. Very interesting and helpful.

Karryl

Thank you for the review. Great to hear you had a fantastic cruise and what a wonderful itinerary.

Its a geat chance to visit such places before they get spoilt by civilization.:D

Thanks for your review. I'm looking at doing PNG in 2016 sometime. It was very helpful.

Thanks for sharing. I've only been to Rabaul (2009) but would enjoy more of the PNG island experience. Makes for a nice change to the usual New Caledonia/Vanuatu destinations.

Oct - Nov is always a good time to cruise the Pacific.

Thank you, Aus Traveller! Helps in planning for my Sept 2015 PNG cruise.

thanks aus traveller, we are on birder 1 in sept one of our cruises. morrie;)

We have just returned from the Sea Princess cruise to New Guinea. It was an identical itinerary to the cruise on 21st February, 2015. I posted this information on the Princess Cruises section because of questions about the cruise. I am also putting the information here because not everyone would read the Princess Cruises section.

 

Some comments -

 

Alotau - Princess had two tours. One was to the 'festival' and one to Milne Bay WWII historical sites. The Milne Bay tour sold out well before the cruise and it appears that the Shore Ex manager wasn't able to get extra buses/guides. A good guide would be essential and passengers who went on this tour were very happy with it. If you want to do this tour, I suggest you book as soon as the tours are available on the internet. We went on the 'festival' one. It wasn't really a festival, rather a continuous show put on by the locals with singing/dancing and with their colourful boats. It was very interesting.

 

Kitava - Unspoiled island where people enjoyed swimming/snorkelling. The natives from several islands have their wares laid out for sale. They were mainly wood carvings (lovely pieces with mother-of-pearl inlaid), baskets and shell jewellery. Passengers can walk to the village/school etc. It is a couple of kilometres - people mentioned a two-hour return walk. The track goes uphill. We went to the island too late in the day to do the walk. It was midday before we started off and it was simply too hot. We will leave the walk until next time. :)

 

Rabaul - Tours are either to WWII sites (cemetery, museum & Japanese tunnels). I heard only good reports. We went on the volcanological observatory tour which was excellent. We visited the observatory, a local village where the children danced for us, an area of hot bubbling water close to the volcano and saw the wreck of a Japanese bomber. There were tours for sale outside the port gates. Prices were around AUD$70-AUD$90. Volcanic ash gets into everything. I suggest you wear dark-coloured trousers. When I showered and washed my hair that night, there was quite a bit of volcanic grit on the shower floor. Take care of your camera if you take photos out of the window of a moving vehicle. One of our cameras got grit into the closing mechanism of the shutter. This was easily blown out when we got back to the ship, but it is something to beware of.

 

Kiriwina Is - Once again, swimming etc, but there is coral close to shore so swimming can be a bit tricky. There are a lot of carvings etc for sale. They were probably more elaborate than at Kitava, with a lot of stunning bowls - both round and free-form, all inset with mother-of-pearl and sometimes cats' eyes as well.

 

Doini Is - Probably the loveliest island. This is a great place to swim with sand underfoot. Tenders bring passengers ashore at tiny resort. Many people seemed to spend a lot of the day enjoying drinks at the bar. There were several groups of bare-breasted locals dancing. Carvings etc. were a bit similar to the previous islands, but I felt they were a little bit more expensive.

 

PNG currency (kena) was available on the dock at Alotau, but they ran out of currency. Passengers were able to purchase souvenirs using Aust dollars, but the locals can have problems trying to bank them at the smaller islands. A comment was made that the ship would have kena available on board for the Feb cruise, but I wouldn't count on that as it might have just been a rumour.

 

Overall - We had brilliant weather and the cruise was great.:)

Thanks for this great review. We are doing the same cruise in February 2015. In Alotau, we are thinking of doing the Festival but we read that it was a 10 minute bus ride. Do you know if it is possible to walk to the Festival?

Thanks for your help. Kind Regards,

Thank you PNG is on our list.

Thanks for this great review. We are doing the same cruise in February 2015. In Alotau, we are thinking of doing the Festival but we read that it was a 10 minute bus ride. Do you know if it is possible to walk to the Festival?

Thanks for your help. Kind Regards,

We visitied Alotau on DP back in Sep and went to the Festival. Its not the "real" Festival which is held at another time of year (not sure exactly when). It is put on for the ship and there is a cost to get in and the fee also covers the shuttle buses that run all day. We walked back to the ship, which is pretty interesting in itself. Took about 40 mins with detours to some of the shops & Milne Bay Memorial.

When we were at Kiriwinia Island as we were walking back to the ship we were harassed by locals wanting to change AUD into Kina. We didn't have any as the island was a last minute to the itinerary as we weren't able to get into Rabaul due to issues with the volcano.

We were wary of buying anything made of wood in the islands due to potential quarantine issues. When we returned quarantine was very thorough and we saw some items confiscated at White Bay. Overall this was the best trip we have done.

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Thanks for your interesting review.

Hi Aus T. Haven't been on CC much until lately. We did this cruise in Nov 2013, but on P&O. Found the same as you did. We got some kina here but they did not have small denominations. We changed them at the bank at Alotau - the place was packed out with passengers and locals so I'd advise doing it all before leaving Australia.

At Rabaul we went on a tour from the wharf. We had booked it online and it was very good value AND their buses are air-conditioned - which was a blessed relief. It was supposed to be for 3 hrs but ended up being 5 hrs. Very good value. The only place we didn't get to was right to the hot springs near the volcano. A 'frightening' figure, backed up by a truckload of 'bouncers', denied us access as he said the bus driver owed him money. I have read of this happening before.

We thought Doini Is was lovely too - certainly the best snorkelling. :)

Good on you for your interesting review. I find that looking on the cruise line boards can be a bit of hard work at times with all the USA first world problems, as well as issues for other countries. You can learn some interesting things there, but my first stop is always the Aussie/NZ board, and then others if there is time.

We have looked at the PNG cruises a couple of times, and it good to hear positive things about it.

Thanks for the review. We're going to PNG on Sun Princess in April We're going to Alotau, Doini, Kirawina, Rabaul & Honiara in the Solomons. Thanks Sandi for the info about local tour in Rabaul. Would you have found that info through Tripadvisor? Were there local tours being offered at Alotau? Are the islands, Kirawina & Doini similar to say, Dravuni Island or Mystery Is with just swimming & snorkelling? Are any of them accessible for people with mobility problems? Or are they straight onto sand or uneven ground from the wharf? It seems that they prefer small denominations of their own money? Can we get small denominations in Australia before leaving? We usually get our foreign cash from Aust Post. How much would there tours be?

Sorry for all the questions.

Thanks for this great review. We are doing the same cruise in February 2015. In Alotau, we are thinking of doing the Festival but we read that it was a 10 minute bus ride. Do you know if it is possible to walk to the Festival?

Thanks for your help. Kind Regards,

The walk is quite an easy flat one for reasonably fit people - a few klms. BUT - PNG can be a rather daunting place and I am not sure that I would have liked to walk to the Festival grounds upon arrival. After we had been there for the day, we did not worry about walking back to the ship - although my personal "radar" was on high alert setting all the way.!!!!

Barry

Hi Bazzaw...

Thanks for the advice re our walking to the Festival. We have booked the shuttle now and will make a decision when we get there about walking back. We really love walking/exploring in our ports of call but are very aware that we need to be careful, not only with regard to our personal safety and the terrain but also to ensure we don't upset the locals....

We got the shuttle to drop us off in the town centre and walked back to the ship via the Milne bay battle memorial it was fairly easy and a pleasant walk.

We could have spent time in the town and caught one of the shuttles back to the ship if we wanted to.

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Many thanks for your review, I am just wondering what you thought of the Sea Princess as have read a lot of mixed reviews of her, we are thinking of going on her in November to PNG

Many thanks for your review, I am just wondering what you thought of the Sea Princess as have read a lot of mixed reviews of her, we are thinking of going on her in November to PNG

Hi Subaru94,

We sailed in Dawn Princess, RTW, for 104 days in 2010. And we sailed on Sea Princess in 2013... They are sister ships. And also Rhapsody of the Seas in 2013. I preferred the Sea and Dawn to the Rhapsody of the Seas and the RCL way of doing things. Rhapsody might have had a bit more sparkle but the Sea and Dawn feel nice and comfy to me. But this is just my opinion. The ship is older and not as swanky as it could be. Sometimes things don't go as you hoped. We have experienced breakdowns in not so safe places and we have heard other passengers complain about a variety of things. So I think sometimes it is more about your own attitude. The ship is older but the good side of that is that there will be less than 2000 passengers onboard. The service and the food are always exemplary. We love exploring our destinations and returning to the ship knowing that we will be well cared for. After all we are on an adventure and living our dream so going with the flow is all part of that. Hope you enjoy your cruise.....

Hi Subaru94,

We sailed in Dawn Princess, RTW, for 104 days in 2010. And we sailed on Sea Princess in 2013... They are sister ships. And also Rhapsody of the Seas in 2013. I preferred the Sea and Dawn to the Rhapsody of the Seas and the RCL way of doing things. Rhapsody might have had a bit more sparkle but the Sea and Dawn feel nice and comfy to me. But this is just my opinion. The ship is older and not as swanky as it could be. Sometimes things don't go as you hoped. We have experienced breakdowns in not so safe places and we have heard other passengers complain about a variety of things. So I think sometimes it is more about your own attitude. The ship is older but the good side of that is that there will be less than 2000 passengers onboard. The service and the food are always exemplary. We love exploring our destinations and returning to the ship knowing that we will be well cared for. After all we are on an adventure and living our dream so going with the flow is all part of that. Hope you enjoy your cruise.....

Thank you for your response, just trying to work out whether to go to PNG on Sea Princess or try the Celebrity Solstice 8 nights to Fijian Islands, so many choices now