Noumea

Date: 20th December 2022

Arrival

Woke to a miserable, cloudy sky.

As usual was up about 6 am and visited The Pantry for breakfast at half past, before beginning my daily walk. As I walked the ship made its way between the reefs that protect Noumea and by the time I had finished walking it was well into the harbour preparing to dock.

After my shower the ship was along side and the ship’s PA announced that most of the shore trips had been cancelled because of bad weather. Fortunately (or unfortunately as it turned out) the tour I had booked, the Tchou Tchou Train, had not been cancelled but would be a coach only trip.

The crew were issuing debarkation tickets for visits to the town via free shuttle bus and announcements for this continued on a fairly regular basis. The dock is a working dock so it was too dangerous for people to be wandering about in the port and they had to come and go on a bus.

At 10.30 I made my way onto the dock to join my tour bus.

The Tchou Tchou Train

This tour was definitely not a highlight of the trip but a fairly dull coach ride around the bays of Noumea in the rain with a stop at a very damp lookout. The view would have been quite spectacular in decent weather but today’s rain obscured just about anything except the guns (donated by Australia but never fired in anger) and the French Military area. I think we actually passed the Tchou Tchou train tour at the top of the lookout and even though it was raining and the carriages had transparent weather protection it would still have been a more interesting trip than just being driven about in a bus.

The bus allowed passengers to depart in the town to catch the shuttle bus back to the ship. I elected to stay on the bus and go back to the ship, I have been to Noumea before in better weather.

My cabin steward had left a very odd towel arrangement.

As it was after midday made my way up to The Pantry for some lunch.

Afternoon and Evening

I spent the afternoon lazing about in a couple of the lounges, had a beer or two in the Blue Room, read my book and before I knew it it was time to think about dinner.

Tonight it was my turn at Dragon Lady again, this time I was rather stuck away in a corner but another couple at the table adjacent chatted to me, it was their first cruise which was a surprise as most of the passengers seemed to have gone cruising multiple times.

For some reason the staff at the restaurant seemed completely disorganised and the meal, while perfectly edible was actually a shambles, I was given two desserts but as I had waited ages between courses I ate them both.

At 7pm attended the The Marquee theatre to see Lisa Couch “Powerhouse Diva”, actually she wasn’t bad she sang some good songs – Tina Turner, Cher, Roy Orbison type of thing – and she was moderately funny too. However in my opinion one act with a band is not a “show” but something you expect to find in one of the bars. So far the theatre entertainment had been pretty disappointing.

When the show was over I made my way back to the Blue Room for the last set of the Leon Experience while I waited for the Spicy Margaritas to perform.

The Spicy Margaritas weren’t bad either they sang a a few older songs, some Van Morrison, even “Stand By Me” but then they moved on to modern stuff that I hadn’t heard before and after 40 minutes I decided it was time for bed.

Where is Noumea? I hear you ask…

Second Day at Sea

Date: 19th December 2022

Breakfast

I am happy with my morning routine. First a loooong walk from my room to the far end of the corridor which stretches the full length of the ship then up two flights of stairs to The Pantry for breakfast of cereal and coffee.

After breakfast it is up another flight of stairs to deck 15 for a 30/40 minute walk around the ship’s gangways on that level. Ironically it takes me past the ship’s gymnasium where there are many people doing exactly the same thing but on a treadmill. There seem to be a few regulars walking at this time of the morning – we nod and chat as we circulate.

Following this I returned to my cabin for a shower and a change of clothes. I also washed a couple of T shirts and undies so that I have enough clothes to last me the entire holiday. I set up a temporary line on the balcony to dry them.

Morning

This morning was going to be slightly different as there was a compulsory Covid test for all passengers to be carried out at 10am, all activities ceased and everyone remained in their room to self test and were not allowed to leave until the cabin staff confirms a negative test. Mine was good and I was out very promptly.

Went down to the Avalon Cafe for a chai latte and Danish Pastry to celebrate.

Sat in the lounge watching activities and reading my book until lunch time when again I went to The Pantry but this time settled for a decent sized roast beef sandwich and a coffee. I did notice that the Fish and Chips looked very good. I arrived much later than yesterday but the crowd seemed bigger if anything, I suspect arriving when they open at 11.30am might be the way to go in future.

Afternoon

Spent most of the afternoon in the Oasis Bar or on the deck above lying on a lounge chair listening to music on my headphones. No, I was not sunbathing but ensured that I was always in the shade. To be honest I didn’t think the lounge chairs were that comfortable.

Evening

This evenings meal was at Angelo’s Restaurant. It is Italian style food and the menu is in Italian. The food was decent enough and I had a pleasant meal.

Afterwards visited the Blue Room for a VB or two and some live music before attending the early concert in the Marquee Theatre. I can’t say either provided music to my taste. The singer in the Blue Room sang sort of soul and R & B but it was an enjoyable enough way to spend the evening with a couple of beers.

The concert was not to my taste either, The singer was actually quite funny and the music passed the time. The theatre was much less than half full (at a guess) possibly because it was the early 7pm performance and a lot of younger people walked out during the show but I stayed until the end.

Afterwards I had intended to go back to the Blue Room for a band called Spicy Margaritas but in the event I was quite tired so read my book and settled for an early night, this band will have to wait for another night.

First Day at Sea

Date: 18th December 2022

Breakfast

I woke up just before 6am with the sun streaming in my window – didn’t close the curtains (seems little point).

Had a shower and got dressed, found the daily newsletter in my letter holder outside the cabin door, I checked to see what time breakfast was served in the various restaurants. The Pantry seemed to be the earliest opening at 6.30am so I made my way up the stairs to the 14th deck.

My first mistake! I found myself on the 15th deck couldn’t understand it and it was only when I checked the deck plans near the lifts that I discovered that there is no 13th deck, it goes from 12 to 14. Daft!

The Pantry is a number of separate “stores” each providing things like bacon and eggs, fish and chips etc. Personally I am not a fan of a cooked breakfast preferring coffee and cereal and at first thought that was not a choice but asking one of the girls proved me wrong she showed me where to get cereal like Weet-Bix etc.

Exercise and Exploration

After breakfast went looking for a place to walk, Actually this ship doesn’t really have a long(ish) walk but on Deck 15 found a reasonable circuit for an half hour walk which brought up a bit of a sweat.

Needed another shower after that and took my book with me to look at the bars and other facilities which seem to be clustered around decks 5, 6 and 7 in the middle of the ship. I tried sitting in various areas watching the other passengers between reading, even enjoyed a Chai Latte in the Avalon Cafe before wondering if there was an adults only area on the ship.

There is indeed – the Oasis Pool a small swimming pool and bar right at the stern of the ship behind The Pantry Restaurant where there were comfortable seats and tables as well as lounge chairs.

Lunch

By now it was lunch time and because it was close I thought it was time to try The Pantry’s selection of food, I ended up selecting sausage, mashed potato, peas, onions and gravy. Actually it was too much for lunch so will try sandwiches over the coming days. It was also very crowded so perhaps later is better?

Back to the cabin for a nap afterwards.

Afternoon and Evening

The main bar (Adventure Hotel) on board seems always packed, perhaps not full but crowded, it is where a lot of events happen, Trivia and the like. Nearby is a smaller bar called the Blue Room which, so far, seems rarely packed, indeed this afternoon I was there mostly by myself or occasionally a couple would wander in for the odd drink. You don’t even have to go to the bar to get your drink, a waiter brings them to you.

Dinner this evening was in the Waterfront Restaurant, it seems to be the largest of the three complimentary restaurants and it was here that I was booked for tonight’s meal. I was actually in a bit of a rush because I wanted to get back to the Blue Room for the music at 6pm. I had an entre of duck and a main course of Scallop and Mussel Pie, the entre was OK but the pie was delicious.

The casino on board seems pretty large but personally I just go through it on my way to somewhere else.

Returned to the Blue Room after dinner to enjoy the band, a girl singer accompanied by a trio of piano, bass guitar and drums which was fine especially accompanied by Victoria Bitter. Actually the VB was in cans, I hate drinking out of cans but they gave me a chilled glass when I asked so all was well.

I attended an adults only “Sit Down Comedy” show in the main theatre (Marquee) after 10.15pm. It was moderately funny but either the PA system was badly set up or I am getting deafer because I couldn’t understand what he was saying half the time. If he was on again I wouldn’t bother.

…and so to bed.

Embarkation Day

Date: 17th December 2022

Why? You may well ask…

A few years ago I went on a cruise, it was not something I had ever thought about doing or was particularly interested in doing but this was a family affair, a celebration of my daughter, her husband and friend’s 30th birthdays. In the event it turned out to be better than I expected but perhaps not good enough for me to want to go again.

A combination of circumstance this year made it look like I would spend Christmas alone, which, after the great debacle of 1971 when, for job related reasons, I spent Christmas Day alone eating a chicken the size of a sparrow and listening to John Lennon’s “So this is Christmas”, was not an event I cared to repeat.

A couple of months ago I started looking for Christmas holiday packages but was quite surprised to discover that they barely exist. I came across a P&O 10 day cruise that left before Christmas and returned after Boxing Day but when I tried to book there were no vacancies so I thought that was that. However a week or so later I received an email from P&O telling me of special cruise offers and to cut a long story short I paid for a balcony cabin with an obstructed view on this Christmas cruise.

I was only advised about a week before sailing of my cabin number together with a note to say that I had been “upgraded”. So here I was on yet another cruise set to sail with only a few weeks notice on Pacific Adventure. I was off to the south Pacific – visiting New Caledonia and Vanuatu on a very large ship indeed!

Getting There

No rush, don’t need to catch the train until after 9.30 so I watered my pot plants in the hope that they will survive until my return.

The train was late arriving at Central but still that is no worry the bus to White Bay didn’t leave until 1pm, there was over an hour to kill so sat down on one of the seats in the Grand Concourse and prepared to wait. Had only been there for five minutes when some fellas in Hi Vis and P&O shirts wandered by asking for people waiting for the shuttle bus. They said there were people waiting at stand 1 just outside the station so I wandered out. In fact there was one couple! But here was as good a place as any to wait.

The bus arrived after about 20 minutes and they loaded my case while I sat on the bus. At least it was comfortable because this turned out to be a long wait of nearly an hour and it was not until after 1.15pm that the bus finally left for the White Bay Terminal.

It got much worse…

On arrival at wharf terminal I dropped my bag at the baggage drop off point and joined the long queue outside the terminal building, this queue was slow but worse was to come.

When I finally arrived inside the building I was asked if I had completed the Verifly app. I had not, in fact I deleted it off my phone because it wouldn’t recognise my vaccination certificate so was useless. Because of this I was directed to a separate queue, this queue moved at a glacial pace and it took over an hour to get to the front, several times I thought of just going home because I was fed up with all this standing which was killing my back and walking was getting painful.

When I did eventually get to the front of the queue I was directed to a lovely lady (no complaints about any of the staff I encountered) who took pity on me, after examining my proof of Covid vaccination and RAT cassette she wrote a big P on my boarding pass. From this moment on I experienced no hold ups at all, every queue was bypassed and within half an hour I was on the ship. (A big Thank You to her)

They really need to do something about this initial queuing it was awful. No seats, no social distancing, just dreadful.

On Board

Once on board it was a matter of finding my cabin and waiting for my bag to arrive – finding a lift was the next challenge, I think the reception was on Deck 7 so I had to get to deck 11, the lifts were in great demand but eventually I did get to my deck and found my cabin. My pass key was waiting in the letter holder outside the door together with my meal times and the ship’s news paper.

I certainly had an unobstructed view of the ANZAC Bridge and the old White Bay Power Station from my balcony.

The cabin was nice enough, the shower was tiny but quite useable so I watched the safety video when I was interrupted by a knock on the door it was my room steward telling me that I had to report to my Muster Station as soon as possible and that food was available at the rear of the ship.

The cabin had a double Australian power point as well as a couple of, what I presumed were US power sockets, so I wouldn’t need the double adapter I had packed just in case.

A hiccup

My bag didn’t arrive, eventually I found a note in the mail holder telling me it had been deemed suspicious and I needed to collect it from the library on deck 7 . After attending my Muster Station (waste of time that was) I went to pick up my bag, the girl asked if I had any alcohol or liquids in it (I hadn’t) and asked if I would open it which I did. She then said all was well and I was allowed to take it back to my cabin. Again a bit of a waste of time but so it goes.

Underway

By the time I got my bag back to my cabin the ship was moving and before I knew it we were travelling under the harbour bridge.

As you can see it was a grey, miserable day and while it didn’t actually rain it always looked like it would.

The Evening

According to the timetable they provided my evening meal was in the Dragon Lady Restaurant. My meals are scheduled at a different restaurant each evening with different cuisine. Dragon Lady is Chinese, Angelo’s Italian and Waterfront is apparently modern Australian. I can change the venues but I will try each first. According to my schedule on Christmas Day I will eat at Angelo’s.

Dragon Lady was a bugger to find, it is on deck 6 at the rear of the boat BUT you cannot reach it directly because the theatre is in the way so you have to go to deck 7 to get past the theatre then down to the restaurant. I had to ask several times to be able to find it.

It was a three course meal and pleasant enough, no complaints there, I had trouble hearing the girl waitress because she was wearing a mask and I am getting deafer but she was very attentive and the courses arrived regularly without any delay.

After the meal I had a look around the bars etc but I was pretty tired after today’s proceedings so I went to bed about 9.30pm.

Wauchope to Wollongong

5th November 2022

Distance: 498 Km
Fuel: 32L

The original intention had been to travel to Newcastle and complete the journey home on the 6th but it was only 11.45am as we approached the Newcastle turn off so decided to press on. In the end arrived home at about 2.50pm.

In the event it would have been perfectly possible to have taken the camper and saved a lot of money on accommodation but the forecast had been bad. You are a bit cut off staying in motels whereas caravan parks are much more sociable.

Statistics

Total Distance: 1126 Km
Total Fuel: 109L
Av Fuel Price: $2.32/L
Motel Costs: $818

I would estimate that the same trip staying in caravan parks would have had accommodation costs of about $200 to $250, while towing would have used marginally more fuel, it is still a big difference.

Travelling up the coast is not my favourite trip normally I would have travelled inland but the flooding made this very difficult and I suspect those communities have enough on their plate without us adding to their problems. It is so long since I went up this route that I don’t think I recognised any of the route because previously it went through every little town north of Newcastle, for example the road around Bulahdelah was particularly dangerous. The road is much better now but the trip has lost something.

We went to see the Jacaranda Festival and Timbertown so it was a successful trip, the weather was particularly kind to us even the forecast showers never eventuated.

Timbertown

4th November 2022

Distance: 13 km
Fuel:

It was so cold last night, no idea why, had to turn the reverse cycle AC on to warm the room up.

Today was a trip to visit Timbertown, somewhere I haven’t been for 35 years. It turned out to be a very enjoyable day, even though it remained overcast the forecast showers never happened.

It has to be said the place is not what it was. However the staff were really nice and all rides were included in the entry fee. There was a terrific steam train which circled the park, every half hour, as well as horse drawn carriage rides and a tractor ride.

I suspect the place is kept going by local school visits because there were three coach loads of children while we were there, they seemed to have a wonderful time with the gold panning and all the rides. Personally I always enjoy watching the the boilers and steam engines in use too.

At lunch time we visited the cafe next door and a had a very good toasted sandwich and coffee. When I was last here there was food served in the restaurant on site but that seems to be defunct now.

For reasons I will blame on my total lack of any sense of direction I left the park travelling west so the satnav guided us back to town using back roads, hence the 13km trip when the park is only 2 km from the motel.

Grafton to Wauchope

3rd November 2022

Distance: 247 Km
Fuel: 27 L

Went for a walk early just for the exercise, it was a lovely sunny morning and there was no need to set off early as we only had about 250km to drive to get to Wauchope.

The drive was mostly back down the route we travelled up on but instead of heading east toward Port Macquarie we drove inland to Wauchope.

Checked into the motel early and went for a walk into the town, quite a nice shopping centre with an IGA where we bought some snacks. It is a fairly typical small Australian town of about 7000 people.

In the evening strolled down to Wauchope Country Club for a meal and a couple of beers.

The town has an RSL Club too but the Country Club was only a few minutes walk away.

Grafton–Day 2

2nd November 2022

Distance: 7 km
Fuel:

At 9am walked to the Post Office to buy some stamps. Was surprised to see it still using the original Post Office building, far too many have been sold off and replaced with a Post Shop in the local shopping mall.

Set off in the car back to See Park but parked on the other side so we could get a better look and walk around the area. Yesterday we were on the side with a steep slope.

Even the colours of the flowers fallen in the pond looked interesting.

Also strolled down to the old Grafton Bridge which is always worth a look it was built in 1932 with a roadway built on top of the railway. Until I actually stopped in Grafton I thought it was the daftest bridge ever built, being very narrow, with steep and badly angled approaches at each end. I never realised there was a railway underneath because you cannot see the line from the road. It also has a pedestrian way each side on the railway level and the road supports have been decorated with modern art.

The new bridge now runs parallel but the old bridge remains in use for road traffic.

After returning to the motel for a very late lunch went for a walk to see all the Op Shops, have a coffee, ice cream and buy more milk in the shopping town.

All in all it was a busy but entertaining day.

Port Macquarie to Grafton

1st November 2022

Distance: 248 Km
Fuel:

The highway has changed a lot since I last drove it maybe 30 years ago. It is a road that I have avoided like the plague preferring to go through New England and the inland routes. Now it bypasses every town on the way so is just like driving on the Hume Highway fast but pretty uninteresting.

Made a stop at a rest area to stretch the legs and have a sandwich.

Arrived in Grafton too early to check in at the motel so went for a walk to the shopping mall which is virtually opposite to stock up with a few odds and ends. By the time the shopping was complete we were able to check in, fortunately have a room on the ground floor coincidentally right where the car was parked. If I stay at motels in future must remember to always ask for a ground floor room when booking, stairs are becoming a bit of an issue. The room was fine but pretty expensive.

After settling in drove to See Park which offers the best view of the Jacarandas in flower. It was just a quick drive round the tree lined streets, will spend more time on it tomorrow.

In the evening discovered a nice looking Indian Restaurant within walking distance of the motel so visited and had a really good meal there.

Wollongong to Port Macquarie

30th & 31st October 2022

Distance: 502 km
Fuel: 42 L

This is just a short trip to revisit the Jacaranda Festival in Grafton and to get out of the house.

Not an exciting start to the journey, have to go through Sydney which is hell at any time. Normally I would avoid the coast road and go inland through Tamworth BUT the floods have made that difficult so for the first time for decades am heading up Highway 1.

The other change also brought about by the flooding I am not taking the camper because mud is no fun so am staying in motels, am already regretting this decision. However it is only for a week so not the end of the world.

Wallsend (Newcastle)

Stayed at the Ibis Budget Motel, very similar to the Tune Hotels in Asia, small rooms – 300mm between the end of the bed and the wall – but perfectly adequate and clean with pleasant staff. Newcastle is so close to the resorts of the central coast, motels generally want an arm and a leg for you to stay but there must be less demand to stay in Wallsend because it was a reasonable price.

It is a few minutes pleasant walk though a park to Wallsend Shopping centre with everything you need.

Port Macquarie

A very uninteresting drive with one stop on the way where we had a sandwich watched by curious birds.

Port Macquarie is a town I last stayed in over 30 years ago, the motel was one near the highway rather than in Port Macquarie itself, it was very quiet and clean but a long way from anything.

Drove into town to get some fuel in the late afternoon.