sayvan

Despite the rain the views were still great.

This is Duck Island. You can hope on a water taxi and be at the Island in about 15 minutes.

Our first stop on this cruise was Noumea, New Caledonia. This is an Island owned by the French. Our adventures here would involve renting an electric car and driving around the Island. The weather of the day was not that promising as it rained for most of the day. We had no control on the weather so you we didn't let it slow us down.

We rented the car from Noumea Beach Car rental. We had a four hour rental and that was plenty of time to get around the island. I should mention that the ship docks at an industrial port and then they offer bus rides into the town and cruiseship centre. It was about a 15 minute ride give or take. When you return you just hop back on the bus to get back to the ship.

This is our little vehicle for the day.

The weather was raining on our parade..

Our sea day was uneventful with great weather.

A little about Voyager:

Overall the ship was very clean and the staff were incredibly friendly and accommodating. What was interesting on this particular cruise was that the ship was probably one of the most crowded we have ever been on. By that I mean, that of the 3100 passengers there were a total of 1120 children. I will leave that at that! Apparently, the cruise we had chosen had been heavily advertised in Australia as an end of the vacation season family cruise.

We spent a lot of time in the evening in the Schooner Bar. The place was one of the most rockin spots on the ship and the piano player Paul O'Shea was absolutely fantastic and had a wide range of songs. He kept the crowd going and the place was standing room only every night. This was a definite highlight.

The dining room was also nice and the food was not bad at all. We did not take in any of the speciality restaurants. The buffet was pretty good with a wide range of selection but again the crowds were bothersome for sure. But hey, what can you do.

We did not bother with too many of the shows but our friends indicated they were pretty good.

I realized when we returned that I did not take to many shots around the ship but here a few.

Thank you so much for your amazing review of my dream vacation!!! Someday I will make it to Australia...and Hawaii

too kind.. Thanks for following along.

Wow the photo's are just amazing. I am reliving our recent trip through your photo's. Thanks!

Thank you. Work is going to get in the way for a couple of days but I’ll get back to this as soon as I can.

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Following along, looking forward to more of your reports and photos.

Thanks for following

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and with that we were on our way out of Sydney harbour making our way to the South Pacific. Our next day would be a sea day and then we would arrive in Noumea, New Caledonia.

See you in 10 days Sydney...

and the sun starts to set over Sydney as we sail out of the harbour...

The sail away is absolutely beautiful.

As a result of the long wait to get onboard there was one positive for sure. Our rooms were ready right away. We dropped off our backpacks in the room and then headed out to explore the ship and get ready for the sailaway.

We had booked an oceanview room on the third floor. The room was spacious enough and we had no issues. We were now ready for our 10 day adventure.

Of all my cruises, I have to say that cruising out of Sydney Harbour is a fabulous start to a trip.

The next day we were up and ready to go. We headed for the port and dropped off our luggage. I have to say at this point that if the luggage drop off was any indication we were about to experience a long wait to embark. We had arrived early and they were not yet letting anyone into the terminal. The luggage drop off was confusing and completely unorganized. It was actually difficult to figure out where you had to go. There were no formal lines and people were just coming from every direction. We did manage to figure it out and we dropped off our bags and then headed around the harbour for a bit while we waited to get on board.

Everyone knows this Sydney icon.

and this....

and there she was...Voyager

our crew...

We then headed back to the terminal where we stood in line to get through customs and get our room keys and accounts set up for about an hour and a half. This was the longest I ever had to wait to get on a ship. Things seemed very unorganized.

So with that we were on our way to Sydney. We had an early flight out of Honolulu and had left the hotel around 5:30 am. Our driver from Go808express was there right on time and off we went.

The flight from Honolulu to Sydney was 10 hours and we lost a day. We would have one night in Sydney and then board Voyager the next day.

We arrived in Sydney around 3:45 pm and hopped in a taxi and made our way to meet up with our friends Craig and Vicki. We were very tired so not much went on that night. We basically had a few drinks when we got to the apartment we were staying at (Meriton Suites). We walked down to the Hard Rock Cafe which is located at Darling Harbour for dinner and drinks. The next day we would be off to Voyager.

Our third day in Hawaii was a day where we just hung out at the pool and around the hotel. We were off to Sydney the next day nice and early so we had no real plans. The hotel had 2 pools. The main pool looked over Waikiki Beach and had a nice Tiki Bar that we managed to take advantage of. Here are some shots from the pool area.

Looking forward to reliving our Solstice cruise through this review. :):D

Stay tuned... its coming...

Thanks for the ongoing review and great photos. What type of camera did you use? We just returned from Solstice Aus and NZ 16 night that departed March 5 from Perth. Loved it!

Thanks for following. I use a Nikon D750 and I use a GoPro Hero 4. I flip up lenses but for the most part, but on this trip I primarily used the Kit lens it came with which is a 24 -120 mm.

 

 

 

 

 

We were in Hawaii in July and swam here! :) We also did a tour of Oahu, but started in the other direction. Such a beautiful place. I'm really looking forward to the cruise portion of your review, too.

 

Heather

Thanks Heather...l’m sorry about the Sens season... guess your cheering the Leafs now...

This was Waikiki... there is just something about this beach no matter how many times we head there. I will get to the cruise portion of this story starting tomorrow... thanks for tuning in...

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Chinaman's Hat

A few more shots from our tour around Oahu and then I will call it a day for today.

...and then the skies opened up so we decided to pack it up and head back to the car.

There is about a 15 minute walk to get to the bay. Heading down its not bad at all. Heading back up its an exercise program. They do offer a free shuttle if you need or want that.

Once back up we had to take a couple more shots of this beautiful bay. You can see how the sky is already clearing by the time we reached the top.

We then headed back on the road toward the North Shore.

You can see the weather still would not give us a break. But hey, we were in Hawaii so it didn't really matter.

A few miles down the road the weather did start to improve.

Well kinda improved...

Hi sayvan.

Bob and Chris from aussie following along. We just got back from a solstice cruise to nz also and loved every minute of it. Looking forward to checking out your great pic review.

CHEERS Bob.:D:D

Hey Bob and Chris... Thanks for following along. When were you on Solstice? We got off her on February 17th.

Cheers...

As I mentioned earlier the beach was really nice albeit crowded.

Towards Koko Head...

A few more snorkel shots..

Our next stop would be at Koko Head and Hanauma Bay Nature Reserve. The scenery around this spot was absolutely stunning. The area is also known for its natural reef and snorkelling. In fact, you have to watch a 5 minute movie before you are allowed down to the bay area. We did snorkel in the rain and I have to admit the water wasn't as clear as we had heard it would be or hoped it would be. I think the weather played a role in that. The area is also very crowded. Close to 3,000 visitors a day we were told. If your looking for a less busy beach, this is not the place. You do have to pay a fee to get into the park. The cost was $7.50 unless you have state ID then its free. The beach was beautiful though. These shots were before he clouds really rolled in.

Over the course of the trip we did a fair amount of snorkelling. This was our first swim for that and we were trying out our new full face masks. I highly recommend these. They take a few minutes to get used to but you can breathe through your nose or mouth.

Courtesy of my GoPro Hero 4 camera here is some snorkel shots. As you can see the coral (although lots of it) wasn't really that great. The water was very murky.

Looking forward to the rest of your review. I am in the process of planning our second trip to Australia/New Zealand. We are booked on Solstice Sydney to Auckland followed by Explorer to the South Pacific Islands. Will have lots of interest in your review of the South Pacific Islands as we will be stopping at all the ports you visited other than Mare.

I will try and answer any questions you may have... a bit of a spoiler alert... our itinerary did change slightly for the South Pacific islands as we found ourselves on Voyager out manoeuvring a cyclone that was trying to mess our trip up. We actually never made it to Mare. We had Luganville, Vanuatu added to replace Mare. That was a fantastic switch.