Melanesian Marvels on the Oceania Riviera
2/16/2026 to 3/18/2026
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Page 1 – Bali Pre-Trip - Days 1-3
Page 2 – Bali Pre-Trip - Days 4-5; Embarkation, Ship; Ports of Call: Komodo, Indonesia
Page 3 – Ports of Call: Kupang, West Timor Indonesia; Darwin, Australia; Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea; Alotau, Papua New Guinea
Page 4 – Ports of Call: Honiara, Solomon Islands; Luganville, Vanuatu; Port Vila, Vanuatu; Lautoka, Fiji; Suva, Fiji
Page 5 – Ports of Call: Noumea, New Caledonia; Sydney Post-Trip - Day 1
Page 6 – Sydney Post-Trip - Day 2-4
Ports of Call (Continued)
Noumea, New Caledonia
We visited Noumea, New Caledonia today. It is a French territory. The cruise in was just gorgeous.
We didn’t have a long port stay, 10:00 AM – 4:00 PM. Our tour for the day, Noumea Highlights W/Wine & Cheese, was originally supposed to start at 10:30 AM and end at 1:00 PM. With that timing, we would be able to see more of the city on our own after the tour. But when they changed the start time to 12:30 PM, we wouldn’t be able to see much before the tour since we had to go to lunch. We were disappointed because this port was very nice and modern with several attractions I wanted to see. They had a huge marina.
I was able to go out for about 20 minutes before lunch. For those that didn’t have tours, there was a HOHO bus stop near the dock.
I walked through Peace Park to Peace Square where there is a statue representing a handshake between two leaders in 1988 that ended a civil war.
Close by is Coconut Square with its Heavenly Fountain. The fountain was installed in 1893 to celebrate the 40th anniversary of French presence on the island. Lots of events take place in the square.
At the other end of the park was the central bandstand.
After getting back on the ship, the sun brought out the beauty of harbor water. New Caledonia has the 2nd largest barrier reef in the world after the Great Barrier Reef.
From our balcony, we could look down at the maritime museum. It was a short walk from the ship. If we had more time in port, we would have liked to visit it.
While waiting in front of the terminal for our tour bus, we admired the 52-foot-tall metal flowers in front of a shopping center nearby.
Our tour guide was Greg, another very nice tour guide that provided us with so much information about the lovely island’s history and features.
We began with a drive up to Our Lady of the Pacific, with a large statue of Mary and a nice lookout over the city. Our first view of the statue was from the back. The pedestal/building it was on looked like a Gaudi structure you would see in Barcelona.
With the sun shining brightly on the back of the statue, the front view was in a shadow.
The unique 14 stations of the cross were on the path around the statue.
The main reason we were at this location was for the panoramic view.
We had a partial view of the Riviera.
On the way to our next stop, we passed by the Monument aux Morts. It is a war memorial for those that lost their lives in WW2. The large building behind it is the Gally-Passebosc Barracks.
We continued the drive along the lovely shoreline.
We then drove to the Ouen Toro Lookout. During WW2, US troops stayed in Noumea before going to battle. The large canons were defensive positions but were never needed.
The views over the second largest coral reef system in the world were very nice. The city is surrounded by beautiful beaches.
On the way to our last stop, we drove along the beach we had seen from the lookout.
Our destination was a very nice beach front restaurant, Le Fun, for a wine and cheese tasting.
This was much nicer than the normal wine tastings we have been to before. The three wine portions were almost the size of a normal serving. All of the wines and cheeses were from France and very good.
After enjoying the wine and cheese, I went outside to the beach. Just a great location.
I was fascinated with Duck Island not far away. It is a marine reserve with an underwater trail that is UNESCO listed. The beach looked inviting too.
We got back to the ship close to the onboard time of 3:30 PM. It had been a most enjoyable touring day on an island I would happily return to. This was the last port on the cruise before disembarking in Sydney after two more sea days.
That night we had rough seas from a storm between Australia and New Zealand. You know it’s bad when they put out the barf bags near the elevators. They stayed out for both sea days, but it wasn’t that bad the next days.
Post-Trip in Sydney, Australia – Day 1
We arrived in Sydney before sunrise. We were docking at the White Bay terminal rather than one at Circular Quay that only takes one large ship at a time. We arrived earlier than expected and was only able to get photos once through the bridge. The Harbor Bridge and city looked lovely.
In 2006 we docked at the Circular Quay terminal during sunrise. This was the view from that balcony.
I took more photos before and after breakfast of the area around the terminal.
We were using a transfer company I have used several times before in Europe, Airports Taxi Transfers (https://airportstaxitransfers.com). With our pickup time at 9:00 AM, I requested to leave the ship at 8:30 AM. Once again, there was confusion in disembarking. They were supposed to call out luggage tag color/numbers for us to disembark. They never did. We went to the lobby to see what was happening. Once again there were lots of people waiting to know when they could leave. Some people were asking the agent at the door if their number had been called. They were told no. Even though we were a little early, I asked and was told our luggage was available so we could leave.
Once in the terminal, I could see why they didn’t want anyone to leave the ship until their luggage was available. The place was packed! It isn’t a large terminal, so it was difficult to move to the immigration lines with one narrow opening into and out of the luggage area. We finally got into a pretty long line. As we were waiting, we turned around to see how long the line was. It was much longer and weaving around the terminal. They were holding people on the second level who previously left the ship. They blocked the escalator going down since there wasn’t any place to stand on the ground level.
Finally, through immigration, we waited for our driver who told us through WhatsApp that he would be there shortly. Once he arrived, it was a short ride to our hotel for the next three nights, the Sydney Paradox Hotel (https://www.paradoxhotels.com/sydney).
When I booked the hotel, it was the Radisson Blu, but was purchased by Paradox. We arrived at 9:30 AM. We knew we would have a long wait until the 3:00 PM check in time, so we left our bags. I immediately knew we picked a good hotel with the very sweet check in people who assisted us with several things. They gave us a piece of paper that told us that the streets next to the hotel would be closing due to a St. Patrick’s Day Parade. It was only March 15, but they were doing it on Sunday rather than a workday. They told us when it would start and where to go to watch it. That sounded like an enjoyable activity for while we were waiting to get our room. They also told us that they would put a priority on our room for housekeeping so we might get in early. We appreciated that.
After checking in to the hotel, we walked to Circular Quay to see the opera house. On the way we saw interesting and beautiful buildings.
Once there, we had to take a selfie. Looking the other way, we saw the normal view of the Harbor Bridge and a view of the downtown.
I walked to the other side of the opera house to get a photo with the sun shining on it. It’s an angle of the opera house I hadn’t seen before. I also saw other sides of the building not normally photographed, as well as a close up of the roof material.
On the way back to the hotel, we walked along the route of the St Patrick’s Day parade. The streets were lined with people. It was fun with lots to see.
When we got back to the hotel just after 1:00 PM, we got the message that our room was ready. Perfect timing! It was a nice size room with a very good bed, comfortable seating and adequate storage space for our 3-night stay. If we had been there longer, we would have needed to unpack more and there weren’t enough drawers in the room.
The bathroom was adequate with enough counter space.
Since we still had most of the afternoon available for touring, we decided to walk to the Sydney Tower Eye (https://www.sydneytowereye.com.au). At 1,014 feet, it is the second tallest tower in the southern hemisphere behind Aukland’s Sky Tower. But Sydney’s observation deck is almost 100 feet higher up than Aukland’s. As we got close, we could look up and see it.
After purchasing our tickets, we were directed to the elevator where we quickly went up 820 ft to the 83rd floor. There was a pretty good crowd of people walking around the circular windowed observation deck.
I enjoyed looking down on the buildings and parks. We even had a partial view of the opera house.
With it being a clear day, we could look far away. The brochure says you can look out 50 miles to the Blue Mountains. They are kind of showing in the upper right of the photo.
We looked down toward the White Bay Terminal and saw the Riviera and HAL Noordam taking on passengers.
There is a lot of park area in Sydney.
We, of course, needed a selfie from the tower.
The other attraction I wanted to see that day was the Queen Victoria building, or QVB as it is referred to. It was opened in 1898 and fills an entire city block. It is now a large mall. It was a short walk from the tower. I had to take a photo from across the street since the QVB is quite large.
As we crossed the street to the mall, we got a great view of the tower we just visited.
We were most impressed as we entered the four-floor mall. It is very attractive with lots of natural lighting coming through the glass ceiling. I liked the large clocks.
When we exited the mall on the other side, there was a large statue of Queen Victoria for whom the building was named. The statue was originally in Ireland. It was brought to the current location in the 1980’s. Queen Elizabeth II visited the building in 1988.
We were looking through Google Maps and Yelp trying to find a restaurant for dinner. With it being Sunday, many were closed. Cathy went to the concierge who made an outstanding recommendation for an Asian restaurant named Mu Mu. The interior was very attractive. We liked the orange refrigerators on the wall.
We had an outstanding meal. We started off with two sweet prawn betel leaf appetizers. Cathy had the DIY five spice duck Maryland with bao buns and I had the smoked wagyu pastrami char kway teow. Wow! Everything was so good.
We thoroughly enjoyed our busy first day in Sydney.
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