Buckcruise

And so it should be. We booked direct with them. They called the house 3 times apparently. We only picked up the one voice mail remotely, and there was no deadline on it, just said call them back. We had no TA for this one…booked direct with a darn good deal!

So glad most of you have been sorted. We received a voice mail saying cruise cancelled while we were on a Celebrity ship. No email! the app still showed it as an upcoming cruise….was it a mistake, a scam? on our return home after a month, we find the deposit refunded to the credit card. Still nothing in writing. Called celebrity… no lift and shift? No, because you didn’t respond and have now received a full refund of the deposit, and by the way the cruise wasn’t cancelled, it just had a date change! unfortunately, we have a cruise booked on the Millie from Bali, arriving in Singapore on the 7th Feb, so no can do. Now we need to cancel that too. Guess we wont be getting that deposit back? Not destined to do Hong Kong/Singapore. 3rd time cancelled now.

Our experiences Tonga. we booked a Celebrity Excursion to the Blowholes, Flying Fox Colony and lunch. It was a total disaster. The tour company obviously was not ready and staff not trained sufficiently in time for their first cruise ship. We did not go to the flying foxes. The least said the better. we did see some of the Island which is very different from the other ports as it is totally flat. The country needs the tourism after Covid and the Tsunami which destroyed a large part of the island. Despite a lack of info out there, there are taxis and tours to be picked up at the port, but be early!

Our experiences Apia. we did not book anything here, but took the 20min walk into town. we stopped by the cultural centre as we understood they had a tour there. We paid $10 Tala each, about $5 USD( local currency required) while waiting for it to start we got caught in the rain, as did many other people. We gathered at the gathering place to make basket woven plates. However, many people joined in at that time who had not purchased tickets, as it was an open shelter. The $10 Tala was well worth it and I sincerely hope those that did not pay made a donation, as they certainly made it a crowded experience. We then headed off to see the cooking fire and food prep, wood carving, and traditional cultural tattoos being done. Then returned to the gathering place for performances of songs, dance, including fire dance and eating the samples of food- fish, breadfruit, taro etc. Overall a great experience! in the afternoon we went to the Marine Reserve, a 10 min walk in the opposite direction. It was interesting, very rustic. The water was rather murky though and the current strong. The tide was not right to swim out to the Coral Reef. Apparently there was a free beach a bit further along the road too. This had a minimal cost.

I hope I am not hijacking your report, but thought it may be useful to add my experiences. All in all a good cruise, itinerary not the greatest. We found all stops very similar with similar offerings. Basically the same culture on all islands. Tonga was just different in that it is flat. we found it most frustrating that there was so little information out there before we set sail. All islands were very new to receiving ships since Covid and in the case of Tonga, the Tsunami. Private tours and taxi availability information was very hard to find, and Cekebrity really messed things up by not allowing anyone to prebook excursions online for both Samoa and American Samoa, as they were both on the same date 20th Jan as they are on either side of the dateline. The post cruise survey even asked about our experiences in the international dateline instead of the port names.

We also went on an AIGA bus, but on a tour with a private company “Best Tours” .It was very interesting, we went up the hill where the cable car used to be, Rainmaker, Flowerpot Rock, a beach where swimming wasn’t allowed. This was the most organised of all the ports.

And didn’t it stink? !!!

We also went here to Pearl but on the Celebrity Excursion. We were at the other pool though. Nice food and entertainment. Beautiful beach.

Raymond Burr! We also went there ( and enjoyed it) on a tour that we picked up at the port, ending up with a short beach stop. Beach wasn’t great, no shade except umbrellas at the bar patio, but the water was like a bathtub!

Have you travelled yet? How was it?