Here’s the map of our course fron Papeete to Honiara. Those that left the ship were flown to Sidney on a charter plane. Those that rmbarked were flown up from Sidney.
Sunset as we leave Soloman Islands
April 26, 2025
Honiara was the city we were docked at for a day and a half. It was also the end of a segment. So, 165 passengers left us. While 174 joined us. There are now 237 passengers aboard, that’s the most we have had this trip. This group is younger and love to party.
Here is the breakdown from the Tahiti to Soloman Island leg of our trip. Soloman Islands Guadalcanal, Nationality Breakdown; AUSTRIA 1, AUSTRALIA 26 ,BELGIUM 3, BRAZIL 1,CANADA 31, SWITZERLAND 4, GERMANY 10, DENMARK 2, SPAIN 2, UNITED KINGDOM 33, IRELAND 3, ICELAND 3, ITALY 3, JAPAN 1, LUXEMBOURG 1, MEXICO 5, NETHERLANDS 9, NEW ZEALAND 6, SINGAPORE 2. THAILAND 2, UNITED STATES 181
Fuel trucks pumped fuel for over 9 hours. It only took a few minutes to empty a truck. Next gas station is Darwin in 2 weeks.
The town was a disappointment, it was dirty, and poverty was obvious. This is the first time we have seen that on this trip. This area was instrumental in World Was II. The Japanese claimed the Islands and the United States took them back. It’s the sight of many famous Land, Sea and Air Battles.
The Market was quite amazing. It is clear that they can grow things easily.
Today is a sea day and then tomorrow we will be in Paupa New Guinea for a few days. More new places to see. I heard a quote from the stage the other night that went something like this “It is better to see a place once than to read about it a thousand times”. Never a truer statement as we travel to places that few have ever seen. This trip is exactly like and very opposite of our Northwest Passage trip a couple years ago. They are similar in that we stopped in tiny villages or uninhabited Islands and visited with the villagers that only see visiters once or twice a year, opposite in that its 84 degrees here instead of 24 degrees in the north. Both ships are class 5 ice breakers, but we haven’t seen a single iceberg this whole trip, LOL. We also haven’t seen must sea life on this trip either. Kim and I saw that one beak whale in Chile. Some saw a feeding frenzy of tuna a couple of days ago. We see flying fish all the time and a few birds. Oh yes, Kim’s lizard too.
That’s what traveling 17 knots per hour looks like. We are pushing a lot of water.
Is this some sort of I.Q. test? Funny it’s two different people on two different days in that same chair!
I understand the need to be competitive. I used to think I needed to win at everything. I would like to think that I have out grown that, but clearly some people never do. On sea days, there is team trivia. In the first leg, there was one outstanding team. We found out later that the Alpha male couple actually vetted their team members. Well, on the final sea day of that leg of the trip, they lost to the team that Kim was on. They thru a fit, really? It’s a game. Then remember the picture of the chocolote bunny display, it was Belguim chocolate by the way. Lupi, the cruise director, “hid” 100 paper eggs throught the ship on Saturday night. Well, one couple stole one of the big bunnies and told the hotel director they would give it back only if he told them where the eggs were hiden. They ended up finding 41 of the 100 eggs and thus were the winners. I guess they didn’t even consider how they spoiled the game for so many others.
Today is a special day for a special friend of mine, Dr. Paul Boring. When I was a sophomore in high school, Paul (of course he was “Mr. Boring” then) was a first-year teacher. He was my biology teacher. I’ve mentioned before that I was not a good student either academically or citizenship-wise. I got along well with Paul though. It was also the first year for a program called Sesame Street on PBS TV. Paul started every class of every day with a groaner joke. I’m not quite sure how it came about, but a few of us started going to his class during lunchtime and watching Sesame Street. Word got around and soon there were more students joining us for lunch. Well, one day the door opened, and the principal stuck his head in. He looked around, looked at the television, at us and then said to Paul, “I heard about this, but I had to see it for myself”. He then just closed the door and left. Someone asked if we were in trouble and Paul said, “your probably not, but I might be”. Well, nothing more was said about it, so we just kept doing it with what we assumed was the blessing of the principal.
Towards the end of the year, Paul asked me if I would be his lab assistant for the next year. In shock, I suppose, I accepted his offer and for the next two years I helped in the biology room. His fellow science teachers told him that he made a huge mistake, but Paul saw something in me that most missed. We have remained steadfast friends ever since. We often try to out groaner each other on texts, to this day.
Our welcoming commitee
The Dancers
Bungee tower
Meanwhile back in paradise we went to the Vanuatu Islands. In the morning, we watched a dance ceremony and then went to another Island where bungee jumping was first discovered. It was a very interesting day. At the first stop, everything was interrupted by a very large rainstorm. The trail to the bungee jump was muddy and slippery. One guest said, “while we’re taking pictures of the jumpers, they are taking pictures of us falling down”. That got quite the laugh out of everyone. The locals were very friendly and helped those of us that needed help get up and down the trail. It was a great and memorable experience.
The night before at the Briefing, we were warned that there would be nudity on the Islands. Then later he said that if we wanted to go swimming from the beach to please swim in our clothes because our swimsuits would possibly offend our hosts. Of course, and it wasn’t me this time, someone made a comment about they can walk around naked, but we can’t wear swimsuits? I just thought about my earlier comment about speedos and bikinis needing age limits.
The Easter bunny visited the ship and brought us lots of chocolate. He also hid 100 paper bunnies and eggs for those who wanted to search. Kim got up very early and found a few.
The seas are smooth today and it’s 83 degrees and sunny.
We hope whatever your expectations of this day and weekend were filled to the fullest.
After a day at sea, we came into the Islands of Fiji. There are over 500 Islands in the group.
We have entered an area called Melanesia. We will island hop our way over to Papua New Guinea, then down to Darwin, Australia from where we fly home on May 10th.
As you can see from the pictures, these Islands are among the most beautiful in the world. If you have ever visited Fiji on a cruise ship, you probably stopped at one of the 2 largest Islands. 95% on all Fijians live on these 2 Islands, with 74% of those living in the capital city of Sava. Well, we were not stopping at either of those modern cities, we were stopping at 2 very sparsely populated Islands.
The first Island was yesterday, Good Friday. The Islanders had planned for a church service for all of us. Fijians are ultra conservative; we were told we had to cover our shoulders and knees, and we could not wear any head coverings. Our color group, orange, drew the short straw and we were told to board the zodiacs by 7:00 AM. Now, if you know me at all, you know my day doesn’t start that early and there is only one thing I hate more than early starts and that’s long pants. I opted out and stayed in bed.
There was a group singing as the zodiacs arrived.
The church was open air, no air conditioning anywhere on the island. The service was advertised as 1 ½ hours was not even half that long.
Being Good Friday, everything was closed, so, other than walking around town or beach bumming, there wasn’t much to do on that Island.
They did show us the islands first cell phone and told us it could be heard from almost anywhere on the island.
In the afternoon, they took us snorkeling where there was plenty of large coral, doesn’t that picture look like its taken in someones living room aquriam? Coral grows very slowly, less than 1” per year, so some of the stuff we were seeing was over 300 years old.
Today’s Island, Yasawa, had lots to see and do. Again we were greated with song and dance.
The road from the beach to town was lined with women selling everything from baskets to blankets, Kim bought a Pereau from a lady that had come from a nearby island just because our ship was visiting. It had cost her about $50 US for the boat ride. Kim soon found out that most of the women selling things were from other islands and come to this island whenever a cruise ship is scheduled to stop, which is not very often at all. She told Kim that this was her only source of income. All of the people were very friendly and plesant.
Before we were “allowed” to visit the island, the chief had to approve our visit. Last night, 2 men from the island came aboard and explained the ceremony that would take place in the morning. After the explanation, they said we needed to choose a captain from the guests. George (seated in the chair with Jill beside him) volunteered to be our captain. We had met George and Jill about a week ago. We had booked a polar bear excursion in Churchill Canada after hearing about it from an expedition leader. When the paperwork was emailed to us, there were several questions about our general health and mobility issues. Since I do have mobility issues, we started getting concerned about if I could manage this trip. We started asking the expedition team if they knew anyone that had done this trip, well, we found out that Jill had done it a few years ago with her mother. She was happy to answer our questions and described the experience to us and said her mother was much more mobility challenged than I was. Last night, we had been invited by the cruise director, Lupi to join him for dinner. We were the first to be seated at the table for 5. Shortly after we arrived, the other couple arrived, you guested it, it was George and Jill. We had a great time visiting with them and Lupi.
At the ceremony, Captain Geoge would sit facing the chief. After exchanging greetings, one of the elders made a bowl of Cava, the root of the Cava plant is dried and pounded into a powder, the powder is put into a mesh bag and placed into a bowl. Water is then poured over the bag and the elder with his hands works the bag by squeezing it. Once he is satisfied that all the good stuff is mixed into the water. He scoops out a bowl (coconut shell) and presents it to the chief. The chief then drinks it, emptying the bowl. Then Captain George was given a bowl of Cava and drinks it, he was instructed to empty the bowl, or the chief would be disappointed and may not allow us access to the Island. He did a good job and we were allowed access to the island. Cava has special “powers” and some mind altering effects. It also makes your mouth feel like you just came from the dentist, numb.
Today was the first day that the heat was too much for me, so after about 2 hours I retreated to our cabin Again this afternoon, Kim went snorkeling. It was mostly a good swim.
Okay, still not worthy of pool cronicles, but close. At the briefing, we were told that the landing would be wet, meaning there was no dock to let us off. So, they basically run the zodiacs aground on the beach and we get off in very shallow water. When he asked for questions, a lady asked if we would be allowed in church with wet shoes, really? Then came the great one. How wet is the landing? Well, my mouth works way faster than my brain most of the time, so I said in my best indoor voice, “how wet is water?”. I can’t imagine how anyone could ask such a question. The speaker answered nicely and finished with “not even going to ask for any more questions”.
Again, thanks for your comments, I like to hear from all of you. For the grammer and spelling notzies, thanks for over looking my less than perfect writing.
This is the first stop that we have duplicated on last years cruise. We did the Island tour and Kim complained that she didn’t have time to climb to the tomb of Robert Lewis Stevenson. This time it was offered as an excursion, and she did it. I stayed aboard as the other tour was exactly what we did last year. Kim climbed through a rain forest and the ground was uneven and slippery. It took over an hour longer than was advertised. She loved it and was glad she did it. Once back aboard, a fantastic hamburger on the pool deck revived her.
We are now headed south to Tonga. We will follow the Tonga trench, the second deepest water in the world, almost 7 miles of water beneath our keel, the deepest is the Mariana Trench, but only by 400 feet. With that comes the opportunity for us to see ocean mammals. The depths of the ocean create updrafts that bring nutrients to the surface, this brings fish that feed on them, that brings bigger fish, and even bigger fish, even mammals. We saw flying fish tonight, I hope we see more. This trip has been pretty fish free so far. (sadly, no joy).
The chef sat down with me at lunch today and told me he went to the market and bought several fresh fruits and fish, he said he found one fresh caught ahi tuna for our special ceviche lunch tomorrow. Wow! On the sea day between Samoa and Tonga, we had our ceviche lunch. We found out after we ate it, that the chef himself prepared it for us. Kim said to me after he told us that, “ I didn’t think he actually did any cooking himself”, we feel very special. Kim enjoyed the Pico de Gallo. Yes, that’s cavier on top of the ceviche.
On Tonga, we signed up for a 3-hour excursion that included a botanical garden tour, a traditional Polynesian tradition demonstration, and a free time at a beach. First, I’ll tell you that in the end we really did enjoy it. The botanical experience turned out to be a 1,5-mile hike through the jungle. At times, we were wondering if we would ever find out way back to the buses. I of course said I wish we had brought breadcrumbs…. The description said that we would walk through the garden and and end up at the beach. We were all questioning if this was some kind of trap in which one of us would be sacrificed in some sort of religious ceremony. Someone said, “I hear the ocean, so I think we are going in the right direction”. I of course stated that we were on an island, no matter which direction we go we are walking toward the ocean. It all ended well and no one was lost.
We moved the ship to another place in Tonga and went snorkeling. Kim saw some stuff we have never seen before, including some blur starfish, giant sea cumbers, and someone saw an eel.
Tonight was Indian food night in the dining room, so that meant I had sushi!
For whatever reason, my last 2 published blogs did not go out. Thanks to my webmaster, Steve Carson, he was able to fix whatever it was. Sorry for the long wait, I hope I didn’t lose too many of you.
We are seeing more and more of the China influence as we sail further west. I’m not going there so far. Please keep me silent on that front.
Tonight, we had dinner with the expedition photographer. He stated again that we were in an area that almost no one had seen on a cruise ship, including him. We are going where cruise ships have seldom been. Even the captain has never been here. We have two submarines on board, and they will explore the depths of the oceans when we stop at the islands, for the first time ever. In the past, they discovered a sunken warship that had never been recorded, what lies in these new waters?
Our stop at the Cook Islands was totally beyond anything you can imagine. The beautiful water hues, the pure white sandy beaches were unimaginable. We did a 6-hour lagoon tour, our first stop was snorkeling, then we went to Honeymoon Island, where we swam and walked on beaches that are hardly ever visited and were littered with hermit crabs, the final stop was on One Foot Island where we had lunch, swam and snorkeled. Getting to the Island was challenging, the Zodiacs had to surf the waves into a channel that was dredged by American troops in the World War 2 era. Our boat driver and tour guide “Uncle Bob”, said we got the channel and a lot of war babies from the American military. On the way out of the lagoon, we had to try to not get soaked by the huge waves that were coming towards us. Our driver told us to duck and hold on as a big wave was about to break over the top of us. It didn’t and we stayed dry. A fantastic day for sure. Uncle Bob said they get about 2 cruise ships (all small) a month visiting the Island and that really helps their economy. On the way back, our guide showed the 2 Islands that will be used in 2026 for Survivor.
At the Captains reception, croissant wrapped hot dogs were served as appetizers right along with caviar. My children will tell you, that was their favorite dinner, the hotdogs, not the caviar.
It’s April 12th now and when we wake up tomorrow it will be April 14th. There is no April 13th on this cruise because of the International Date Line. One lady on board who was born on April 13th will not have a birthday this year. Wait, have we found the real “time machine”?
So, I told you that in Tahiti we pretty much unloaded all the passengers except 70 of us and loaded on a whole new bunch of cruisers, well, the vibe has totally changed. People do not acknowledge each other in the halls, In the seminars, everyone is 2,2,2, and there is not a community feeling on board. I suspect that most guests do not have a passport that says “United States of America” on the cover. But among other changes, the sushi bar is packed each night, not normal, Kim gets little egg salad sandwiches in the afternoons when she is going on an excursion the next day, they are all gone when she gets there, We asked several crew and expedition leaders if they noticed a difference and the roaring answer was “yes this is weird”.
So, last year I stated that one can order Caviar anytime you want on Seabourn, and someone challenged that statement, well you can, anytime, anywhere. I have had a graving for Ceviche ever since the Easter Island restaurant experience, so I asked if I could arrange for Ceviche for lunch tomorrow. They said they would consult the chef and came back to me with this answer. “You can have ceviche tomorrow, but the chef said if you wait one day, he will go to the fish market tomorrow on Samoa and get fresh fish from the market for me”. That’s what cruising at this level is all about.
Sea mammals have been pretty nonexistent this trip so far, I hope that will change. But we did see that very elusive beak whale, that explores would kill to see, I guess that was our pearl for this trip.
Yes, the picture was a mirror, Kim missed it, Kip and Sheila got it right.
Tomorrow Kim is hiking to some mountain top, and I am sleeping in.
We have booked the first half of the world cruise for 2027, so, there will be season 4 of Sailwast.net. We also booked a Polar Bear Adventure in Churchill, Canada for October 2026, it’s just a week, but it is an amazing experience.
In memory of Steve McDowell and Tom Sutinem, rest in peace.
More from the other side on the international date line……..
