Cruising from Bali to Irian Jaya and down to Cairns

[RooFlyer]

In a week's time I set off for my final trip of the year, A Ponant cruise from Bali, east along the Indonesian archipelago, touching on a couple of places in Irian Jaya / Western New Guinea then south to Cape York, Lizard Island and Cairns.

https://au.ponant.com/asia-tropical-odyssey-between-indonesia-and-north-east-australia-so051225-10

I assure you that I'm not paying those current prices!



Flights:



When I was looking for flights to DPS, I naturally started with Qantas, but my travel agent reported that they had not released any of the lower fare bucket business fares after Dec 1. I wasn't going to pay over the odds, so I simply booked an Aeroplan award flight in SQ business up to Singapore and back down to Denpasar. SImples!

Two A350-9s and SQ catering Vs B737 and Neil's leaves. What's not to like?

On the way back, QF business (crediting to QR), a couple of days in Brisbane seeing family then back in Hobart on the 23rd, to start Christmas shopping.

In Bali, staying at the airport Novotel on arrival then shifting over to the Sofitel Nusa Dua on the recommendation of @Daver6 .

15 nights on Le Soléal - 264 max guests, 164 crew. I have 200 euro ship-board credit courtesy of my travel agent and Virtuoso.



The weather may be a bit stormy but hopefully not too bad.

Hoping this trip will be totally relaxing. No time zone change to speak of, no 'add on' travel for me, no history to explore every inch of ... I have a large book to read which I will be reviewing for a journal so that will hopefully enforce some downtime.

 

[drron]

Just make sure they don't leave you at Lizard Island.

 

[bPeteb]

You get around don't you

You might come across The World while you're up there RF. She's on a West Papua expedition at the moment

 

[RooFlyer]

HBA-MEL today on Virgin, 1C. A nice flight preceded by the usual carp at Hobart terminal.

They are expanding the terminal (or at least the commercial outlet footprint ) and we have 3 new security points with the latest whizz-bang. But as others have mentioned, whiz-bang doesn't necessarily equate to faster.

One of the longest security queues I've ever experienced at HBA:



To be fair, the delays seemed to be down to the punters as much as the machines. Pax would be pointed forward to the next machine and there they would just stand, not knowing what to do. I went over to one setup, went around the couple just gaping and was the only one actually putting stuff in the tubs. But of course the delay is on the other side. The operators still not experienced enough and look forever at the images and send many to secondary. I could see the guy looking at mine. 3D image, he was flipping it around, flipping it around, again etc. I was tempted to call out "I'll open it up - it'll be quicker!". Many bags going to secondary.

Terminal packed, as usual.



Boarding called and was moderately orderly at the gate. Wheelchair pax collected and goes out. Five mins later Biz let through, only to discover that the wheelchair pax and party were waiting at the bottom of the boarding ramp, so we were stopped at the end of the cattle-run.



Boarding, with the queue behind.



Lunch was a pasta with ham and pretty nice.



Overnight at the airport Parkroyal. Really good early check-in; guy saw my room request and hunted around for one available that met it and off I went.

 

[Quickstatus]

How far ahead did you book Ponant?

 

[RooFlyer]

How far ahead did you book Ponant?

October last year for this one.

It’s about usual for me these days, although I do have one in June 2027, that I booked a couple of months ago. . Even on that one there were only a few cabins left on the deck ( price) I wanted.