Charles Mason

We've done a cruise with Coral Expeditions on the GBR from Cairns - four days - its a small ship of about 50 and a great experience. Lots of snorkelling up around the ribbon reefs and we also went to Cooktown and Lizard Island as well, so not just reef. Food was great, cabins cosy and the crew great. We also went in the summer - January - and although there was some cloud cover the conditions were good for cruising, that's variable though of course.

Western Australia's Kimberley Coast has one of the world's largest humpback migrations each August / September, something like 30,000 whales. Lots of small ship expedition cruises of several nights in length, so not cheap, but excellent trips. Here's a website with a few different ships featured: https://www.kimberleycruisespecialists.com.au . Also in Western Australia you can do Whale Shark cruises during May/June at Ningaloo Reef, where you can swim with them, and also the same is offered on cruises in Cenderawasih Bay in West Papua. Again smaller ships, I know True North the expedition ship does trips there.

There's also the gold superior cabin which has more space than the normal gold, along with an oversized lower bunk which could almost sleep two smaller guests together (still has the upper bunk as well though as a back up). Re Senior's Discounts, I don't think they are offering them anymore from 2018 (maybe April onwards), that's what they told me anyway. Prices are also going up quite bit so they must be doing really well!

We've done thew Ghan which is the north-south version (Adelaide to Darwin) of the Indian Pacific and absolutely loved it. So whilst the route is not the same, the service is. We had the gold cabin which has the upper and lower bunk for sleeping and a small bathroom - more than adequate. There's also the Platinum cars which look great (proper double bed), albeit a bit pricey for us. The food in the dining car was really quite good considering and the off train excursions were well organised. It was quite a relaxing trip and nice to sit back and watch the passing scenery.

Ningaloo Reef in WA is certainly quite good -and they also have whale sharks to swim with (although March might be a tad early in the year). For something different, Abrolhos islands about 70 kilometres off the coast of Western Australia has good snorkelling (ship wrecks and Coral) but you need to do a short three or four day cruise.. This video makes it look great:

Thank you. I wondered if there was a way to the airport by public transport. Would this be more suitable if you had hand luggage, rather than larger suitcases?

No worries, hand luggage would certainly be fine, and even a suitcase each (on wheels preferably). Just if you have a few cases it might be irksome to have to change from the train to bus at Broadmeadows.

Totally untrue. A number of the small boat AK cruises do Glacier Bay and in a much better way than the large behemoth ship. They actually dock at the National Park Headquarters instead of just going in and out. We have done an AK cruise on the Admiralty Dream - http://www.alaskandreamcruises.com/fleet/alaskan-dream. Beats any large ship AK cruise we have ever taken. One of their cruises even spends 2 days in Glacier Bay.

Agree Don about the small ships, this one looks fantastic too - 6 days just cruising around Glacier Bay on a historic little boat. http://www.seawolfadventures.net - It's on the bucket list for sure.

Although the Skybus is an easy solution to the airport (particularly if you have a lot of luggage), it is possible, and considerably cheaper, to reach the airport using MYKI. From Southern Cross Station (same place Skybus leaves from) you can catch a metro train to Broadmeadows and from there switch straight to the 901 bus which drops you right at the airport. Probably will take an hour from the city (compared to 20-30 minutes on Skybus) but if you're not in a hurry and can manage your luggage the savings may be worth it.

I second the comments about Lindblad - small ships and their expedition team really is second to none. Kayaking, hikes ashore, ruining about on zodiacs - a great way to experience Alaska in a small group/

Thanks loeb and BruceMuzz for your responses - appreciated... We've decided to put off the Japanese cruising for now (still visit by land) and perhaps look at doing a little cruise in iceland for our cruising trip next year.

Hello,

We're fans of small ship cruising and currently looking at a trip to Japan. We will do most of the trip independently, travelling by train, but interested to know if anyone knows of any local three or four day small ship cruises in Japan? Perhaps around the Osaka region. We're not looking for Ponant or Silverseas, just a short, local cruise on a comfortable little boat (preferably 50 passengers or less with some English speaking guides).. Checked google but can't seem to find anything..

If anyone is aware of such as cruise I would love to hear more about it!

Thanks in advance

Thanks for sharing your photos, we're considering one of the One Ocean voyages, amongst others, so pleased to know you had a nice time!(y)

Hello, with regards to the windows on Coral Expeditions II, the two rear Deluxe Staterooms have windows side and back, whereas obviously the next ones along only have a side window. You wont spend a lot of time in your room so probably doesn't matter greatly, and perhaps you will draw the back rear curtains anyway if you are in the room as the rear windows are straight onto the rear deck with people going up and down the stairs..

Nice cruise though!

Here's another option (we have travelled with this line before - they are great) we received from Coral Princess Cruises in Australia for their cruise to see the eclipse. We've been up through PNG on this ship before, so wont do it again this time, but imagine it will be a fantastic trip.

Coral Princess Cruises Solar Eclipse Expedition 2016

Happy NYE to all...

Great review! We've done this trip too and it brought back some great memories.

Thanks very much Michael - sounds like Ponant warrants some extra research, particularly as they are doing more in our region in the South Pacific soon. thanks agan

Thanks Michael, soudns like some great trips you've had. Quesiton, on Ponant what was the mix of travellers, mainly French? Was English widely used on board (our high school French is a bit rusty). Thanks or your response.

Thanks for your tips! the Galapagos ones sound great, although its pretty time consuming to get there from Australia - we should have done it when we did the Delfin on the Amazon but we were a bit short of time then.

The PNG one we did was great too, highly recommended. That ship was a bit smaller then some of the other cruises in PNG, only around 70 passengers on board - it definitely wasn't the big ship they have in the photo in the mens Journal article (I presume that is the "big" Coral Princess). Being on the smaller ship we were able to cruise up the Sepik River which was a big highlight, but I think only a couple of operators with the smaller ships can do that.

Hope to hear some more tips, recommendations, suggestions for luxury adventure cruising!

Found a nice little article on mensjournal.com ranking the 6 best small ship adventure cruises in the world! Anyone done any of these? I've done the PNG one, and also a cruise on Delfin II on Amazon which was great. What about you - what are your favourite small ship adventure cruises? Looking for recommendations of what to do next. :)

LINK

1. Marquesas - Aranui Cruises

2. Tierra De Fuego - Australis

3. Spitsbergen - Hurtigruten

4. Galapogas - Andean Discovery

5. Antarctica - Compagnie Du Ponant

6. Papua New Guinea - Coral Princess Cruises

Charles

We saw the Solar Eclipse on Coral Princess II, had a great unobstructed view from Sudbury Cay off Cairns, right in the centreline. Hadnt really been interested in seeing an eclipse before but we got a newsletter from the Cruiseline (we have done a few cruises with them, Coral Princess Cruises are a great outfit) mentioning a 6 night cruise for the eclipse so we thought we would give it a go. It was a wonderful experience, and I can firmly say I "understand" eclipse chasers now.:D The cruise also went to various reefs for snorkelling, Lizard Island, Cooktown and a few other places as well. Nice to travel on a small ship, it was full - but thats only 50 odd people. They have some pictures up on their facebook page.