We had a few changes on our planned cruise so there were no real surprises when there were changes during the cruise. We started out with a planned cruise on Pacific Pearl but a change by P&O saw that ship doing cruises out of NZ when we wanted to cruise. A change was made to Pacific Jewel as it was cruising to two of the best island stops, Ouvea and Champagne Bay, along with Noumea and Vila. About 6 months out from the cruise Ouvea was changed to Lifou, reportedly because the natives were restless. Been to Lifou several times and I can't say it is a standout port.
BOARDING. We were pretty early for boarding so we dropped our bags so we could go for a wander about Darling Harbour. After getting our Health Questionaire I asked if I could get an Immigration Departure form. No, we don't give those out till you have checked in. These must be extremely expensive bits of paper that must be doled out sparingly. So instead of filling out the form at my own leisure in the 3 hours I had spare before boarding, I got to fill it out after checking in before going through Immigration. Luckily they didn't see me purloning another 6 of these valuable pieces of paper otherwise I could have got into serious trouble! Not a big thing, just silly and another reason why P&O stands for 'poorly organized' at times. Other than that the check in was quite fast.
CABIN. Bigger than on Princess, light and airy and our cabin steward, Eric, was good. No problems at all.