ReneeFLL’s Semi-Live Review B2B Ovation TP & NZ Oct 9th - Nov 9th

[ReneeFLL]

Love the open air lobby.

 

Check-in is at the far end.

 

Looking down from the lobby. Our room was over on the left side of this picture. We were in a garden view room. I think I called it a partial ocean view before. It overlook te courtyard which is lovely.

 

Again looking down from the lobby.

 

 

Edited October 15, 2022 by ReneeFLL

[ReneeFLL]

A few pictures taken from the Hale Kao website because theirs are better. 😁

 

 

 

 

 

 

[ReneeFLL]

8 minutes ago, Coralc said:

The military member hotel is beautiful!  What a nice benefit for current and retired veterans. 

Yes it is. They have made some really nice changes in the last 10 or so years. I unfortunately didn't get very many pictures of the grounds which are beautiful.

 

Edited October 15, 2022 by ReneeFLL

[BecAus]

31 minutes ago, ReneeFLL said:

This will be our first time doing the NZ Sounds. What ports are you stopping at in NZ? We are in a jr suite on both so we have only had dinner in CK so far. Remind me about the entertainment schedule for the NZ cruise and I'll post.

Thanks Renee - I'd appreciate it!  : )

 

We have two seas days each side going across and 6 straight port days.

Auckland - * Bay of Islands - Tauranga - * Napier - Wellington - Picton (* not done before)

 

They've made some time changes to the port stops and still haven't updated their own website / cruise planner excursion tour pages weeks and months later which is annoying.

The biggest change was arriving in Napier at 1pm instead of 9am.

I've actually booked excursions solely through RCI this time - when I booked a year ago it was suggested excursions might only be available via ship's tour, which hasn't turned out to be the case.

 

So, I'm not worried about the changes.  It's only a slight adjustment to most tours so I'm sure that will be done without a hitch.

The Napier stop I have a winery tour booked at 10.15am (the other option at the time was 12.15pm).

That's the one I've been waiting to see what they are planning to do.

I booked the excursions last Black Friday sales and they have literally doubled in price - I can't believe what they've got them priced at now.  I basically got 2 for 1 buying a year ago.

Knowing RCI, I wouldn't put it past them to cancel the excursion and tell people they'll have to rebook, at current prices of course!, so I've been waiting impatiently to see what they do.

If that's the case we'll just do our own thing on that one.

 

You will love the sounds, it's really beautiful but then the whole of the NZ cruise is really - enjoy! 

 

[kernow]

Very excited to see this review as we are on Ovation from 16th Nov for a South Pacific cruise and then the next cruise to NZ, same one as @BecAus.First time for us to this part of the world. I've been tracking Ovation on Cruisemapper everyday so know exactly where you are😄.

 

How is the internet onboard? I was thinking of doing a semi live myself when the time comes.

[ReneeFLL]

42 minutes ago, kernow said:

Very excited to see this review as we are on Ovation from 16th Nov for a South Pacific cruise and then the next cruise to NZ, same one as @BecAus.First time for us to this part of the world. I've been tracking Ovation on Cruisemapper everyday so know exactly where you are😄.

 

How is the internet onboard? I was thinking of doing a semi live myself when the time comes.

So far the internet has been fine except for this morning I had trouble loading pictures so I quit. This evening it's been fine with loading them. There might be a time when I don't respond for a day or so if the internet decides to give me grief. On one of our other TP I remember there was a time when it wasn't working for a day or two. It was very annoying. We were in the middle of nowhere. Oh wait, we are now. 😀  I'm kind of expecting to have issues, but hope I don't.

[ReneeFLL]

1 hour ago, BecAus said:

Thanks Renee - I'd appreciate it!  : )

 

We have two seas days each side going across and 6 straight port days.

Auckland - * Bay of Islands - Tauranga - * Napier - Wellington - Picton (* not done before)

 

They've made some time changes to the port stops and still haven't updated their own website / cruise planner excursion tour pages weeks and months later which is annoying.

The biggest change was arriving in Napier at 1pm instead of 9am.

I've actually booked excursions solely through RCI this time - when I booked a year ago it was suggested excursions might only be available via ship's tour, which hasn't turned out to be the case.

 

So, I'm not worried about the changes.  It's only a slight adjustment to most tours so I'm sure that will be done without a hitch.

The Napier stop I have a winery tour booked at 10.15am (the other option at the time was 12.15pm).

That's the one I've been waiting to see what they are planning to do.

I booked the excursions last Black Friday sales and they have literally doubled in price - I can't believe what they've got them priced at now.  I basically got 2 for 1 buying a year ago.

Knowing RCI, I wouldn't put it past them to cancel the excursion and tell people they'll have to rebook, at current prices of course!, so I've been waiting impatiently to see what they do.

If that's the case we'll just do our own thing on that one.

 

You will love the sounds, it's really beautiful but then the whole of the NZ cruise is really - enjoy! 

 

The tours I booked I booked them privately. The only thing I bought last year on Black Friday was the internet. I think I got it for about 50% off. 

[dani negreanu]

Yay, Renee, what a feast we'll have with all the semi- and live reviews!! (along with Greg @Sea Dog, John @Ozark_Kid, and lastly with Crystal @singinalot, Bob @bobmacliberty, Andrew @A&L_Ont.... and Greg 😉 @Sea Dog)

 

 

Hats off for taking time from your cruise to do this, a big thank you 😘

 

[ReneeFLL]

3 minutes ago, dani negreanu said:

Yay, Renee, what a feast we'll have with all the semi- and live reviews!! (along with Greg @Sea Dog, John @Ozark_Kid, and lastly with Crystal @singinalot, Bob @bobmacliberty, Andrew @A&L_Ont.... and Greg 😉 @Sea Dog)

 

 

Hats off for taking time from your cruise to do this, a big thank you 😘

 

Thanks, looking forward to doing it.

[Missusdubbya]

So looking forward to this! Love a trans Pacific!

enjoy Waikiki

[ReneeFLL]

13 minutes ago, Missusdubbya said:

So looking forward to this! Love a trans Pacific!

enjoy Waikiki

Thanks, this is our third TP. Love coming over here, but the flights are a killer to get home. 14 hours from Sydney to LAX and then 5 hours to FLL.

[h20skibum]

Will be following this with interest.  I had been looking at doing either these two cruises, or just flying to Hawaii for a week, then on to Australia for a NZ cruise.

 

Enjoy

[lovesthebeach2]

Thanks for this live review. We’ve done 2 cruises from Hawaii to Vancouver, but adding a TP for the first leg has always been on our bucket list and your review may move it to the top!

[Missusdubbya]

1 hour ago, ReneeFLL said:

Thanks, this is our third TP. Love coming over here, but the flights are a killer to get home. 14 hours from Sydney to LAX and then 5 hours to FLL.

I hear you 😁

[grapau27]

9 hours ago, ReneeFLL said:

This will be my first review so hopefully it won’t be to bad. We are sailing on the Ovation Of The Seas. This will be a b2b with the first cruise being a 19 day TP and then an 11 day New Zealand cruise. This is our first time on Ovation and our third time doing a TP since 2017. We originally wanted to do a Northern European cruise, but there wasn’t anything that interested us at the time so we booked this one.

Here is our schedule for the 2 cruises. Any questions regarding the second - New Zealand cruise I will answer them when that cruise starts.

 

Honolulu Oct 5 - 9 Wed - Sun

Honolulu Oct 9 Sun board Ovation 🍹 💃🏼 🍹

Cruising Oct 10 Mon

Cruising Oct 11 Tues

Cruising Oct 12 Wed

Cruising Oct 13 Thur

Cruising Oct 14 Fri

Moorea  Oct 15 Sat 8:00am overnight   

Moorea Oct 16 Sun till 8:00pm

Papeete  Oct 17 Mon 7:00 - 11:59pm

Cruising Oct 18 Tues

Cruising Oct 19 Wed

Cruising Oct 20 Thur

International Date Line Oct 21 Fri

Cruising Oct 22 Sat

Cruising Oct 23 Sun

Napier  Oct 24  Mon 8:00 - 6:00

Wellington  Oct 25  Tues 8:00 - 7:00

Picton  Oct 26  Wed 7:00 - 4:00  

Cruising Oct 27 Thur

Cruising Oct 28 Fri

Sydney Oct 29 Sat

 

B2B   Any questions regarding this cruise I’ll be happy to answer when this one starts.

Sydney Oct 29 Sat

Cruising Oct 30 Sun

Cruising Oct 31 Mon

Milford Sound Nov. 1  Tues 8 - 9   

Doubtful Sound Nov. 1  Tues 1 - 2   

Dusky Sound Nov. 1  Tues 4 - 5   

Dunedin  Nov 2   Wed 12:45 - 9  

Christchurch Lyttelton  Nov. 3  Thur 9:30 - 7  

Wellington  Nov 4   Fri 8 - 6  

Napier  Nov  5   Sat 8 - 5  

Picton  Nov 6   Sun 8 - 5  

Cruising Nov 7 Mon

Cruising Nov 8 Tues

Sydney Nov 9 Wed end of cruise 😭😭😭

Sydney fly back on the 15th

 

On Wednesday Oct 5th we flew to Hawaii. We were originally scheduled to fly from FLL to LAX then to HNL. American Airlines decided to change the flights to FLL to DFW to HNL which left us only 61 min to change aircraft in DFW.  If you have ever passed through DFW, an hour is barely enough time to get from one aircraft to another, likely in different terminals. True to form, we arrived at C22 and were departing from A34.  We made it just as our seating group was being called. Whew!

 

After arriving in Honolulu we took an Uber to the hotel. We stayed at the Hale Koa on Waikiki Beach for 4 days. It’s next door to the Hilton Hawaiian Village.  As usual the check in time took a while. It always seems to there and not sure why. Our room was a partial ocean view this time. As you can see in the pictures it’s a very small ocean view, but we were fine with it. It had a king size bed and a balcony which is nice to sit out there and enjoy coffee, food and drinks.

Following along Renee.

Sounds like awesome cruises you are doing.

Hope you have a wonderful time.

[Ocean Boy]

6 hours ago, ReneeFLL said:

You mean like this one? How could I not take it? 😁

 

Must not have been any picnic getting those tatoos.

[John&LaLa]

2 hours ago, ReneeFLL said:

Thanks, this is our third TP. Love coming over here, but the flights are a killer to get home. 14 hours from Sydney to LAX and then 5 hours to FLL.

 

I think my trip home from Sydney will take about 2000 hours.🤣

[Momof3gurlz]

Just found this and I’m following along. What an amazing trip, I can’t wait for the rest.  

[crzndeb]

Have a great time. I love the Ovation, and will bring her back next March on a B5B. It will be my longest cruise yet. I have done Patrick’s twice, and he still remains one of my top excursions. It’s to bad about the rules now.

Thank you for doing the review. 

[DaniDanielle]

Enjoy!

[A&L_Ont]

I’m here for the slow ride to paradise. 

[Sunshine3601]

Me too!

[bobmacliberty]

Me three!

[Lionesss]

Uno

Dos

Tres

 

 

quatro---------------------- I am here too

[DaniDanielle]

Me five😁

Edited October 15, 2022 by DaniDanielle