2026 Sydney to Sydney Cruise

Today I didn’t have an excursion selected before we left on the cruise and by the time I checked the ones that I wanted were full. That meant I had the day on-board while in port to enjoy. Although maybe enjoy isn’t quite accurate as I spent time on financial matters (checking accounts, paying credit cards, answering emails). I liked the faster Wi-FI tho.

I did enjoy getting off the ship and seeing the little market that was setup just outside the pier. Plus I set foot on the land of another country (Vanuatu).

Oh and it was tartlets for Afternoon Tea so that was fun plus we had a Captain’s cocktail hour for those that have been on Oceania cruises before. The person with the most cruises on this segment was from Arizona and had been on 142 cruises for a total of 1947 days. Third place was from Missouri and had been on 84 cruises.

We are scheduled for a stop at Port Villa in Vanuatu but a recent earthquake damaged the pier and the captain said we’d have to see about visiting because the weather may make it unsafe to visit without a pier. We’ll find out tomorrow.

Today is a quiet sea day and I enjoyed afternoon tea.

Each person has free Wi-Fi for one device and it works quite well for short texts and emails. It hasn’t worked so well for much else unless you are in port.

Notes about on-line access:

• There is no cell service unless we are at port so when you need to enter the ‘text verification code we’ll text you’ you can’t logon.
• Some institutions do not like it if they can’t tell exactly where you are which happens when we’re in the middle of the sea/ocean and they will report a random error that says you can’t logon.
• Sometimes the ship’s time isn’t the exact time that would match your location. The ship changes the time in increments. For example they will have three(3) days of one(1) hour time changes instead of one(1) day with three(3) hours time change. This also causes some institutions to report a random error that says you can’t logon.
• Google mail works great while google drive, sheets and documents will hang or report an error.
• The wi-fi is slow so something that takes a few minutes while in port will take over 30 minutes while at sea- many websites don’t know what to do when responses are very slow and, as you guessed it, they will report a random error
• Don’t really understand why Wi-Fi is faster when we are docked at port than when we are at sea

All those issues magically go away when we are at port- the time matches, the location matches and if your phone has cell service you can get the verification code.

There are over 1100 people on board and most will take excursions. Destination services is in charge of these excursions. When you have a paid excursion, they give you a ticket with the meeting date & time. You turn in your ticket and get a small laminated bus/van number. When your bus/van number is called you leave the ship and walk to your bus/van which takes you on your excursion. Many of the islands stops on this cruise use small vans instead of large busses because the roads are narrow, steep & twisty therefore each excursion can use many(4 or more) vans. There are frequently multiple departures for any given excursion e.g a morning departure and an afternoon departure

There is lots and lots of counting and recounting involved(count the tickets, count the bus tags, count the people in the vans, count the people leaving and returning to the ship) to be sure everyone is accounted for in the vans and on the ship. Everyone is happy when the last excursion returns to the ship and everyone is accounted for.

Another lovely snorkeling day today. The excursion said “4o minute ride on a fast boat to Roderick Bay Resort & Bungalow”, then snorkeling and then 40 minute return to dock.

Well, the boat wasn’t that fast and it took us over 2 hours to get to the resort and another 2 hours to get back. We were, once again, the very last group back.

It was a lovely smooth ride to the resort and the resort was beautiful and peaceful. I was happy it wasn’t a flashy, modern, new resort. We were greeted with a spear and a question “do you come in peace or war?” we, of course, answered with “peace”. They gave us a lei and a fresh cut coconut so we could drink the coconut water. They played music as well.

They did not have snorkel gear for us but I spoke to one of the guides and he found a mask & snorkel for me. He requested a tip and I was happy to oblige.

The water was clear and I saw lots of fish. I watched a sea slug/serpent type animal for quite some time then as I was swimming back I saw a hole bunch of them- that wasn’t nearly as nice as they reminded me of snakes so I quickly swam past them. I looked on google to see what they were- I searched ‘sea slug’, ‘sea serpent’ and ‘sea snake’ with no luck. Jennifer figured out they were sea cucumbers!

There was a cruise ship wreck that happened in about 2000, the ship was still in front of the island. The children loved to play on it.

I finished snorkeling and realized, folks were heading back to the large boat. I found the gentleman that lent me the snorkel and gave it back along with a tip and went to the gathering place. While I was there another gentleman came over and asked me if I still had the snorkel….I had given it to the wrong person. I gave the correct gentleman a tip and we both laughed.

It took another 2+ hours to get back to the ship and since they only had one engine, it took a small boat to steer us to the pier. They loaded us up on vans and drove about 3 minutes to our ship. Just as we got there it started raining. The guides all held umbrellas for us and we didn’t get wet. When the ship departed a few minutes later, it was pouring rain.

A very lazy day today. The highlight was a wine tasting dinner at the La Reserva restaurant. The food was amazing and we sat at a table with someone that worked where I used to work. It was a fun evening. I especially liked the sweet white and the red sparkling dessert wine. Most others really liked the reds.

Today was lots of fun, so well organized and once again I felt 100% safe on an excursion. I went on the snorkeling and skull cave excursion.

The van had comfy seats and air conditioning. We didn’t really need the air conditioning as the weather was mild but the cool air felt nice. We drove thru the countryside for almost an hour and half to get to the dock where we got on small boats. The small boats took us to the resort. At the resort we could hangout, go swimming in the pool, go canoeing or go snorkeling. Almost everyone chose to go snorkeling. The equipment was provided. There were four(4) vans of about eight(8) people each that went on this excursion. All the vans stuck together during the drive.

The two organizational bits I really liked were the megaphone so we could all hear the guide and the siren indicating it was time to stop snorkeling and come in for lunch.

I was almost the first one into the water- that hardly ever happens. After about 30 minutes I got out to get my camera and might have been the first one out of the water too.

After snorkeling and lunch, we boarded our small boats again and were boated to a different island where there was a skull cave. Turns out each island has it’s own skull cave but this one is very easy for tourists to get inside and see the skulls.

There are many stories about what the skulls are but our guide told us the ‘true’ story. The skulls are from slain warriors from other tribes. In the cave we went to there were about 300 skulls separated into three piles- the largest pile was the ‘winner’. The large holes in skulls are from clubs, the small holes are from spears. Only the skulls are in the caves, the rest of the bones aren’t- pretty sure the rest of the body was eaten.

After skull cave, we boated back to the dock to catch our bus for a hour and half drive back to the ship. We were the last group to get back to the ship and got there shortly before it was time to leave.

When asked about the road conditions, our guide said they are 95 percent and he didn’t know what happened to the other 5 percent.

There was hardly any garbage along the roads and we saw a number of schools and churches.

The houses are raised off the ground to protect against pigs, dogs, animals and flood water. The guide said that if a man had a raised house and a garden it proved he wasn’t lazy and was a good worker. That made him an excellent husband choice for the local ladies.

Today’s excursion was “Bird Watching at Variarata National Park”. It involved an hour and a half bus ride to the park, some driving around in the park, an hour or so walk on a muddy trail and then an hour and a half bus ride back to the ship.

The excursion description suggested the bus would have no roof and no air conditioning, the roads would be bad and there would be lots of bugs. The bus did have a roof and it was cool enough with the breeze that we didn’t need air conditioning and there were no, well maybe one or two, bugs in the forest. The roads were ok but did have a number of potholes.

I enjoyed the drive and the views of the countryside and liked the walk and the multi-species forest in the park but I was in the minority. Almost everyone was upset with the muddy, slippery conditions & tree roots on the trail. A number of folks slipped or fell and one woman broke her ankle.

We were at the park about noon so I didn’t really expect to see very many birds but others really expected to see some of the specialties such as the cassowary (a huge emu sized bird with fist sized claws that could eviscerate you) and the Raggiana bird-of-paradise (a beautiful bird with amazing tail feathers that is the national bird of Papua New Guinea and usually displays early in the morning and again in the evening). We did see a pretty cute owl.

This is the first excursion I’ve been on that I didn’t feel 100% safe. There was lots and lots of garbage along the streets and graffiti was everywhere. In Bali there was garbage and graffiti but not to the extent as here.

Abandoned/wrecked cars were frequently seen along the road and in the fields. There were no scooters but lots of walkers along the highway. The vans drove very fast so that was a bit scary too. I did like all the Pepsi signs.

The other thing I noticed was there were no temples, shrines, offerings or churches which we saw everywhere in Bali and West Timor. I only saw a couple of missions(that were not thriving) on the drive.

Many folks waved was we drove by and there was lots of yelling- I couldn’t tell if they were saying ‘hi’ or something on the order of ‘tourist go home’. It sounded happy anyway.

Men and women chew betal nut here. Betal nut is a seed of a palm that is a stimulant as well as carcinogenic and turns the mouth, teeth and gums red.

Another very quiet day and I didn’t even get to the “Ladies Pamper Party”. I did enjoy phone calls to home and we went thru some beautiful aqua seas.

It rained pretty much the entire day today and the only thing I did was to go swimming in the ship’s pool while it was raining. Neither the air or the pool water was cold. There had been so much rain that the pool was overflowing and the water was sloshing from side to side was we traveled. It made for pretty fun swimming.

Today we were at dock in Darwin Australia. It’s our second visit of the cruise. I enjoyed the Territory Wildlife park last visit so this visit I enjoyed the cell service and speedy internet and walked into town to get my glasses fixed. It was a rather quiet day with rain.

A quiet day today at sea. I did enjoy the “Ladies Pamper Party” which was a fancy title for a DIY facial.