Tahiti (Papeete) to the South Pacific Cruise Reviews

We were excited to take this smaller cruise ship in the French Polynesia Islands and had read many reviews indicating what a luxury cruise line this was with excellent cuisine and more intimate since the ship is smaller. The staff working onboard are terrific and attentive to every detail. The ship itself is beautiful with updated decor making this very appealing, especially since this is an ...

Pluses +Very comfortable cabin with plenty of storage room +Great service (except for IT) +Food was excellent, even the buffets +Despite the ship being 25 yrs old it was remodeled well Negatives -Extremely slow wi-fi. We were only using it for work related reasons (no streaming, gaming etc.) but it a took long time for emails to pull up or attachments to open. -We had free ...

This is our third cruise with Oceania and they over-delivered again. Here is what went right: 1) Oceania shore excursions on Bora-Bora/Raietea were on point and cost effective. Recommend: -Vanilla farm/Pearl Farm tour with meal "Tahaa Cultural Experience" (best prices in Tahiti for fresh vanilla beans @ 3800xpf/50grams). Fantastic hula show on same tour with great meal with free rum ...

I am not a fan of big cruise ships..never had much interest in them as I prefer more intimate travel with few people along and more independent sightseeing. I had read about and followed the Aranui for over 40 years and having traveled by freighter as a small child wanted to experience the sea in this way once again. This trip exceeded all my very high expectations. The Marquesas islands are ...

My spouse and I have cruised with 8 different cruise lines and we agree Paul Gauguin has been the most overrated based on critic and passenger reviews we read prior to booking and also the most overpriced. First of all, the ship itself is quite tired/dated looking both inside and out, therefore needs a complete makeover. On a positive note, it’s clearly an older ship thus the rooms and bathrooms ...

The staff on Norwegian Spirit were excellent. Especially the dining waiters and cooks. This was helped being the ship was only half full but they were always smiling and helpful with any requests. The food was always fresh, tasty and plenty of variety. Definitely the highlight of our cruise was the island of Moorea. A short boat cruise from the dock took us to a spot waist deep so ...

Polynesia was on our bucket list and the timing for this cruise worked out. We've sailed on Norwegian before and were generally pleased although those were on larger/newer ships. The itinerary was Tahiti to Sydney with stops in Moorea, Bora Bora, Samoa, and FIJI (two stops here at Lautoka and Dravuni). We were a little surprised to get an text message 2 days before sailing about the need to ...

We have just finished the Paul Gauguin 7 day Society Islands cruise. It was a very disappointing experience for many reasons. Firstly, the ship is old, and although the public areas have had a tasteful refit, the cabins, and specifically the bathrooms are dreadful. Replacing a shower curtain over a bath with a static glass panel, so that you have to lean right in to turn on and adjust the water ...

Seven day French Polynesian cruise with 300+ passengers October 29-November 5, 2022. Be aware the cruise is only six days (seven nights) which is too short for the travel time and expense to French Polynesia. Plan to book island stays for a week before or after the cruise. Our favorite resort was “Le Taha’a” a 50 bungalow resort on a motu accessible only by the resort boat off the west shore of ...

We had picked this cruise for 2020 as a way to see an interesting, somewhat remote part of the world that we only knew about from Melville's book "Typee." Covid had other ideas, requiring rebooking twice. Because of Covid everyone had to be vaccinated and boosted and have an negative antigen test before boarding. There were 30 english speakers out of 180 passengers, ranging in age from 55 to 89. ...