Trip Report - Carnival Pacific Islands

[ceeceeDee]

Do give P&O a go. We've sailed RCL (Symphony of the Seas) so we do know about all the bells and whistles, but to be honest we prefer the much maligned P&O. Sailed with them multiple times and never had a bad experience. Sure, it's not perfect but definitely doesn't deserve the disparaging reviews.

[arxcards]

53 minutes ago, Amaroo Andrew said:

In Feb 2018 I was invited to join friends on Carnival Legend for a NZ cruise. It was the worst cruise I had ever been on and I vowed to avoid Carnival like the plague. In 2022 a mate puts me on to a very cheap repositioning cruise from Seattle to Sydney on Carnival Splendor in September. Surely I couldn't get two dud cruises with Carnival.

I did !

I must emphasize that the crew were terrific and have no complaints about about that part of the cruise. 

The good  bits were the Masala Tiger for lunch and the Red Frog Pub for karaoke. So endth the good bits.

If you think the pink donuts are bad try the brown Greek urns on Legend. I must admit I did start to like the art deco style decor in the accommodation passageways.

Overall the food was woeful and the entertainment was worse than the Sunday afternoon free concerts at the local RSL.

The cabin wasn't too bad but I am still trying to work out why they needed to put a 8 foot lounge into a two person cabin. If the TV was any smaller it could have doubled up as a monitor on a laptop. The bathroom was better than a Princess offering.

Port stops requiring tender use was a complete shambles and the embarkation at Seattle and disembarking at Sydney were even worse.

It is my opinion that Carnival has come to Australia to make P&O look good. That said, I have been hearing reports P&O is improving and not too bad. I might give them another go.

As for Carnival:- Never ever ever again.  

P&O is worth a try if you haven't cruised on them since 2015. Still the same limited menus breakfast lunch and dinner (minus a N/C eggs benny). They are OK enough, but not when the dining room feels like groundhog day each time you board. Apart from that, they are decent value for money on familiar ex-Princess ships.

 

Quite a few friends loathe Carnival, while quite a few others loathe P&O Australia equally. P&O has disappointed us the most recently, but maybe Carnival will trump them in December. We have used a chunk of our sizeable OBC towards the steakhouse as a food insurance policy. 

[Amaroo Andrew]

2 hours ago, arxcards said:

P&O is worth a try if you haven't cruised on them since 2015. Still the same limited menus breakfast lunch and dinner (minus a N/C eggs benny). They are OK enough, but not when the dining room feels like groundhog day each time you board. Apart from that, they are decent value for money on familiar ex-Princess ships.

 

Quite a few friends loathe Carnival, while quite a few others loathe P&O Australia equally. P&O has disappointed us the most recently, but maybe Carnival will trump them in December. We have used a chunk of our sizeable OBC towards the steakhouse as a food insurance policy. 

Had many good cruises on Fairstar, Pacific's Sky, Sun, Dawn and Jewel before moving onto Princess. The drawback to Princess is one can't do a quick Sth Pacific cruise and their ships are getting too big. I'll keep looking.

[OzKiwiJJ]

On 8/8/2023 at 4:32 PM, arxcards said:

Ahh, yes. The table dancers in the dining room. A bit on the strange side, but probably more entertaining than a Baked Alaska parade.

It was funny, when I heard about that before we did the Carnival cruise I thought "oh no!" but by the end of the cruise we were actually enjoying the nightly song. It made everyone smile and most people sang along if they knew it. Pure kitsch but definitely better than the Baked Alaska parade.😄

[aussielozzie18]

Little bit of chatter elsewhere that cruise ships (p & o and Carnival) are not stopping at Lifou on upcoming cruises. Anyone heard of a valid reason for this?  

[Tripmode33]

35 minutes ago, aussielozzie18 said:

Little bit of chatter elsewhere that cruise ships (p & o and Carnival) are not stopping at Lifou on upcoming cruises. Anyone heard of a valid reason for this?  

I have a Lifou port scheduled on Carnival Splendor in a few week's time. Haven't heard it has been cancelled so fingers crossed.

It will be good though to include ports of Mare and Isle of Pines again in future as both amongst my favourites.

[Tripmode33]

8 hours ago, arxcards said:

P&O is worth a try if you haven't cruised on them since 2015. Still the same limited menus breakfast lunch and dinner (minus a N/C eggs benny). They are OK enough, but not when the dining room feels like groundhog day each time you board. Apart from that, they are decent value for money on familiar ex-Princess ships.

 

Quite a few friends loathe Carnival, while quite a few others loathe P&O Australia equally. P&O has disappointed us the most recently, but maybe Carnival will trump them in December. We have used a chunk of our sizeable OBC towards the steakhouse as a food insurance policy. 

By rotating through the three dinner venues on our first P&O. this year, we found that avoided the limited MDR. Enjoyed both Angelo's and Dragon Lady to give variety.  At lunch, preferred the buffet where the Indian was the standout for us. On Encounter.

[Tripmode33]

On 8/8/2023 at 4:32 PM, arxcards said:

Ahh, yes. The table dancers in the dining room. A bit on the strange side, but probably more entertaining than a Baked Alaska parade.

Did you notice though they still use real flames on the Baked Alaska.  Haven't seen that on Princess for many years!

But definitely not my favourite desert on any cruise line....

 

 

[arxcards]

2 minutes ago, Tripmode33 said:

Did you notice though they still use real flames on the Baked Alaska.  Haven't seen that on Princess for many years!

But definitely not my favourite desert on any cruise line....

 

 

Haven't seen one for years, as we often do the steakhouse on the last night.

[arxcards]

6 minutes ago, Tripmode33 said:

By rotating through the three dinner venues on our first P&O. this year, we found that avoided the limited MDR. Enjoyed both Angelo's and Dragon Lady to give variety.  At lunch, preferred the buffet where the Indian was the standout for us. On Encounter.

Rotation does help. Since they started the current format of Angelo's, Waterfront, Dragon Lady & Pantry in 2015, we have done 8 or 9 cruises across 4 of their ships - same menus on every cruise and same stations and food options in the Pantry. There are a couple of standout dishes among them, but otherwise dining is a meh experience. On a couple of cruises the meals were really bad, but generally their food is a decent standard. It is just the same offering as the past eight, with reduced menu options at breakfast & lunch. Familiar ports, familiar ships plus familiar food is like they have hit on a formula that works for those that like those options, just not us. 

 

For a 1st time cruiser testing the waters, I still recommend a 7 night Qld Coastal out of Brisbane. P&O is the only one offering that year-round and all the menus are new and fresh for them.

[arxcards]

3 hours ago, aussielozzie18 said:

Little bit of chatter elsewhere that cruise ships (p & o and Carnival) are not stopping at Lifou on upcoming cruises. Anyone heard of a valid reason for this?  

I have recently heard that Encounter skipped Lifou yesterday, with passengers notified around a week before departure. They were informed that the island chief had asked them not to call, but I don't know if this is for a short duration or indefinite. Only speculation in this case, but tribal disputes or a dispute with the government of New Caledonia have caused these sorts of diversions in the past. Sometimes for a brief period, while an island such as Ouvea hasn't seen a ship for 15 years.

[Hammer61]

23 hours ago, Amaroo Andrew said:

The good  bits were the Masala Tiger for lunch and the Red Frog Pub for karaoke. So endth the good bits.

Agree, although not sure about the karaoke, but Masala Tiger was fantastic, ate there most days as most everything else was so poor, the mock cream on all the deserts just ruined them, the MDR had good service but food was for the most part mediocre at best, entertainment for the most part not great, the only plus was the cloud 9 spa, we had booked the Spa Balcony and it was ok, i spent most of my time away from the crowds in the relaxation areas that you got access too.

 

But maybe the biggest negative (apart from the food) were the endless queues for everything and the amount of people around the ship, it really was full.......

 

Wont say Carnival is awful, just not for us and we wont be back, seems aimed at family's on a budget and youngsters and to be fair they seemed to be having a great time.

[cruiser3775]

New Caledonia, or at least Noumea is still on the cruise ship visiting list, but not Isle of Pines. In both places you can't go swimming or snorkelling at the moment, because there have been two fatal shark attacks this year, and the government has closed all the beaches, pending installation of shark nets. Baie des Citrons (Lemon Bay) was almost deserted on the two different days we stopped there. There was a small net around a little bit of the beach and a couple of children were paddling, watched by adults.  I had lunch at one of the restaurants there, and the waiter told me that things are very quiet because of the shark attacks, and business is very slow.

[mr walker]

On 8/7/2023 at 7:22 PM, yes!yes!yes! said:

In our family we refer to the South pacific islands as the boring islands. 

We have loved all our visits to Sth Pacific Islands, both on cruises and land visits. The weather, the people, the scenery... just wonderful.

We have been to New Caledonia, Vanuatu, Fiji, Samoa, many of these multiple times. Can't wait to get back to them over the coming season, and on next cruise we will get to see Tonga for the first time.

vive la difference

 

[OzKiwiJJ]

23 hours ago, Hammer61 said:

Agree, although not sure about the karaoke, but Masala Tiger was fantastic, ate there most days as most everything else was so poor, the mock cream on all the deserts just ruined them, the MDR had good service but food was for the most part mediocre at best, entertainment for the most part not great, the only plus was the cloud 9 spa, we had booked the Spa Balcony and it was ok, i spent most of my time away from the crowds in the relaxation areas that you got access too.

 

But maybe the biggest negative (apart from the food) were the endless queues for everything and the amount of people around the ship, it really was full.......

 

Wont say Carnival is awful, just not for us and we wont be back, seems aimed at family's on a budget and youngsters and to be fair they seemed to be having a great time.

If Carnival is anything like Princess then the quality of the cuisine can vary greatly from ship to ship. Same menus but it's amazing how different some of the dishes look and taste. On one ship everything was oversalted even for me and I like salt a bit too.much for my health! Sloppy presentation and plating also detracts from the enjoyment of a dish. And stretching escargot with mushroom should be a crime!

[OzKiwiJJ]

20 hours ago, cruiser3775 said:

New Caledonia, or at least Noumea is still on the cruise ship visiting list, but not Isle of Pines. In both places you can't go swimming or snorkelling at the moment, because there have been two fatal shark attacks this year, and the government has closed all the beaches, pending installation of shark nets. Baie des Citrons (Lemon Bay) was almost deserted on the two different days we stopped there. There was a small net around a little bit of the beach and a couple of children were paddling, watched by adults.  I had lunch at one of the restaurants there, and the waiter told me that things are very quiet because of the shark attacks, and business is very slow.

That's a shame. We always enjoy going round to Anse Vatu and Baie des Citrons but not to swim. There used to be a really good cafe at Anse Vatu plus a great souvenir shop with quality items, and the Lemon Bay restaurants were good.

[Relaxing Robbies]

We disembarked Splendor yesterday after a 10 night cruise to North Queensland. We enjoyed our cruise, but do prefer the Princess product.

 

We like to share tables in the MDR and had many enjoyable meals with others on tables seating 6, 8, or even 10 people (10 is too large for whole table conversation). We had anytime dining and when we were ready to eat we checked in on the app and indicated that we would like to share a table.  Normally we tend to eat around the same time each evening, so we were often seated with people we had dined with previously. We met some great friendly people (including some of the 400 or so Americans onboard) and generally enjoyed our dinners.

 

Unfortunately the weather was not great and we could not tender to Port Douglas. The captain then decided that we would not bother travelling to Willis Island, but would head down to Bundaberg so that the ship could have her bum scraped in preparation for lrips to New Zealand later this year. Unfortunately the divers who came out to the ship decided that it was too rough to do this work safely so that task was not even commenced. I am very sceptical that the attempted bum scraping was a last minute booking and had not been booked and planned from the outset, but who really knows?

 

Wine prices were much cheaper than the prices Princess charge for the same wines and started at about $36 per bottle. We purchased a 5 bottle package that cost $180 and included a choice of 26 wines. There was also a premium package available - 5 bottles for $260.

 

We enjoyed the production shows in the theatre, avoided the comedy, took part in a couple of sports and general trivia competitions, and listened to some music around the ship, read a book and just relaxed.

 

The Sports Bar on Splendor is too small for Australia and was packed way beyond capacity during AFL, NRL and the Womens World Cup games. No sports channel was available on the tiny tv in the cabins. Carnival finally gave in to the many requests and made a last minute decision to show the Australia v Denmark game on the large screen by the pool. I think that after the cancelled port stop and the aborted Bundaberg hull clean they were afraid of a passenger uprising if they didn’t   agree to show the game.

 

Our cabin steward was friendly and efficient, and made great towel animals which all survived until the last day of the cruise when they had a huge party on our bed! The crew seemed very happy and service was mostly good, although could have been faster occasionally in the MDR.

 

We have another Carnival cruise in October and will see how we like Luminosa. After that it is back to Princess for our next few cruises we have booked.

[colourbird]

3 hours ago, Relaxing Robbies said:

We disembarked Splendor yesterday after a 10 night cruise to North Queensland. We enjoyed our cruise, but do prefer the Princess product.

 

[snip]

 

The crew seemed very happy and service was mostly good, although could have been faster occasionally in the MDR.

 

We have another Carnival cruise in October and will see how we like Luminosa. After that it is back to Princess for our next few cruises we have booked.

 

That's an interesting note about the speed of food delivery in the MDR.

 

On our recent Coral Princess cruise, meals in the MDR took an enormous length of time to arrive. We'd never experienced such slow service before  and that surprised me as we have done several behind the scenes tours where we saw meals mass produced and waiting to be delivered to passengers in the dining rooms.

 

On the plus side, it gave us more time to chat to others at our shared tables.

[Tripmode33]

5 hours ago, Relaxing Robbies said:

We disembarked Splendor yesterday

 

Wine prices were much cheaper than the prices Princess charge for the same wines and started at about $36 per bottle. We purchased a 5 bottle package that cost $180 and included a choice of 26 wines. There was also a premium package available - 5 bottles for $260.

I would like your advice on the wine package please, as we board Splendor later this month and will be buying wine by the bottle.

Do you order the package at any bar or Main Dining Room via waiter?  Would both have a list of included wines?  Is it only for consumption in dining room or could you take a bottle to your cabin?

Thanks for this information and your other feedback on your Splendor cruise.  Much appreciated.

[Relaxing Robbies]

6 minutes ago, Tripmode33 said:

I would like your advice on the wine package please, as we board Splendor later this month and will be buying wine by the bottle.

Do you order the package at any bar or Main Dining Room via waiter?  Would both have a list of included wines?  Is it only for consumption in dining room or could you take a bottle to your cabin?

Thanks for this information and your other feedback on your Splendor cruise.  Much appreciated.

The packages can be purchased via the waiter in the MDR or at the Cherry On Top lolly shop onboard. There is a list of the included wines at the shop. I took this photo, but missed the bottom of the dearer package list. We were given a piece of paper that included 5 tear-off coupons that we handed over when we redeemed each bottle.

 

The wine can be consumed anywhere on the ship. If you have some left in the bottle at the end of a meal you can ask the waiters to store it for you for the next night or take the bottle with you and either drink elsewhere or bring it with you the next day.

[Tripmode33]

2 hours ago, Relaxing Robbies said:

The packages can be purchased via the waiter in the MDR or at the Cherry On Top lolly shop onboard. There is a list of the included wines at the shop. I took this photo, but missed the bottom of the dearer package list. We were given a piece of paper that included 5 tear-off coupons that we handed over when we redeemed each bottle.

 

The wine can be consumed anywhere on the ship. If you have some left in the bottle at the end of a meal you can ask the waiters to store it for you for the next night or take the bottle with you and either drink elsewhere or bring it with you the next day.

Thanks very much for that information. We'll definitely make use of that package.  I must say it's much better value than Princess prices on bottled wines when we don't have a package.

[arxcards]

6 hours ago, colourbird said:

 

That's an interesting note about the speed of food delivery in the MDR.

 

On our recent Coral Princess cruise, meals in the MDR took an enormous length of time to arrive. We'd never experienced such slow service before  and that surprised me as we have done several behind the scenes tours where we saw meals mass produced and waiting to be delivered to passengers in the dining rooms.

 

On the plus side, it gave us more time to chat to others at our shared tables.

Lots of hit & miss across several ships since the restart. Most ships have been operating with a varied level of understaffing due to a mix of visa delays, covid isolations and a general pull for labour everywhere. That also caused a larger % of inexperienced staff who aren't able to work at the same level of efficiency. Our two Coral ones were OK in the main, but we did have a couple of excessively slow meals at breakfast & lunch. One of our two Majestic cruises was pretty good, while the other was seriously slow and it felt as if the waiters were being over-stretched.

 

Yes, it isn't as if we were going to miss our bus, but some nearby tables were skipping dessert to get to the show. A bit of chat, an extra drink, and thankful if the meal was still hot when it finally made it to the table.

[buchhalm]

Ah Carnival. The main line at least. A hard "NO thanks " from us.

What we remember most from the one time we cruised on a Carnival ship on a spur of the moment decision on a one-week loop from New York to the Caribbean. 

A decor inspired by a fever-dream of a love child of Liberace and Elton John.

A cruise director "comedian" who's catch-cry at his late night shows (as compere AND performer) was "if you can't f..ing handle it, then get the f.. outa here".

A massive cabin at the aft of the ship with a humongous balcony. -As a $200 last minute upgrade at check-in.

Wonderfully hilarious and camp US table mates from Flaaarida, who we are still in sporadic contact with.

Soft drinks ("sodas") by the bucket load (for some). Even at breakfast.  And in the most bizarre flavours.

Food so forgettable that we rember.

[sayaguru]

Thanks for the report. And the heads up on Brunch. I normally eat breakfast late so that's perfect. Also the reminder about the Indian food. I love it but hubby doesn't (except my butter chicken) so I rarely have it. 

We went on Splendor many years ago in America. We thought it was a lot of fun. For the price point I think they are good. 

I generally like the Comedy Club but last year on the Melbourne Cup cruise they weren't up to par. Pity. Hopefully our Sept 4 cruise is better.  

Looking forward to relaxing onboard. 

[Cruisers47]

4 hours ago, sayaguru said:

Thanks for the report. And the heads up on Brunch. I normally eat breakfast late so that's perfect. Also the reminder about the Indian food. I love it but hubby doesn't (except my butter chicken) so I rarely have it. 

We went on Splendor many years ago in America. We thought it was a lot of fun. For the price point I think they are good. 

I generally like the Comedy Club but last year on the Melbourne Cup cruise they weren't up to par. Pity. Hopefully our Sept 4 cruise is better.  

Looking forward to relaxing onboard. 

I think you made a valid point.  Reading price.   I think it is cheaper now than P and O and I have read on CC that you have now to pay for various things, like the Shows?   You get what you pay for but given if you want to cruise in Oz in winter, there is not much choice.