Today I woke up at my latest time yet, at 6:30am!  Progress!! Over 600 days after booking our cruise, it was finally embarkation day!!!!

We had to check out of the hotel by 10am so we spent the morning packing.  Now I remember why I love cruising so much… you only have to unpack/pack one time!  We ate our last breakfast of coconut bread, brie cheese, and pineapple jam on the porch, and took advantage of the free wifi for the last time.  I probably should have posted this photo earlier on, but this was the coconut bread we ate each day.  It doesn’t look that exciting, but it was a great consistency (similar to challah) and slightly sweet, so it paired really well with the cheese and jam.

Once all our bags were packed (at least we didn’t have to worry much about the weight of the bags for this leg of the journey!) and loaded into the car, we went up to the office to turn in our keys and settle up our breakfast tab with Faby.  She gave us each a necklace made of small shells as a parting gift, and wished us a great rest of our honeymoon.  We went back to the bungalow as our car was still parked behind it.  This was our view out the back window as we drove away…

A few final thoughts about Moorea Fare Miti:

1) There is something to be said for “you get what you pay for”.  We knew going in that this hotel is not on the same level as this bigger resorts in Moorea, but we also knew that it would cost us approximately the same amount to stay in our beachfront bungalow for 5 nights as it would cost to stay in those other hotels for just one night.  With that in mind, we accepted that we would not have air conditioning in our bungalow.  There was a ceiling fan in the living room and another fan in the bedroom, but it does still get hot at night.  Since there were no screens on the windows, we did not have the option to open the windows at night to get a breeze flowing through the unit.  I think that would make a huge difference if they did install screens.  

2)   I already mentioned it briefly, but the stray dogs really were an issue at this hotel.  I don’t know if they have this many stray dogs roaming around other hotels, but it got annoying that we had to be on the look out for a stray dog every time we stepped off our porch.  There was one night when we actually heard the dogs barking at 2am and it woke us up!  The good news is that this only happened one time, and the barking stopped after a few minutes.  One morning when I was walking along the beach alone taking photos (DH was still sleeping) and 3 of the dogs approached me and started closing in around me from 3 sides.  I felt very threatened and did not feel comfortable because if they chose to attack me, there wouldn’t have been much I could do to defend myself.  Luckily, I was able to slowly walk between them and make a safe escape, but I just wish there was something the hotel could do to get rid of the dogs.  

3) These bungalows have a thatch roof, meaning there is no solid lining or anything to completely keep the elements out.  We frequently saw little pieces of straw on our floor, which likely dropped down from the roof, but that felt like part of the charm.  Little bugs did get inside the bungalow through the small spaces between the straw on the roof.  I have heard from people who stayed in the fancier hotels that there are also bugs inside their $500/night over water bungalows, so I think that is just how life is in FP.  Let’s just say we were glad we packed a fly swatter from home!  I will note that it rained nearly every afternoon/evening while we were inside the bungalow and we never once saw any leeks!  We even spent some time on the porch during windy rain storms.  Between the thatch roof and the straw overhang, we stayed totally dry!

4) It was really convenient to have a kitchen with a full-sided fridge/freezer, and we took advantage of that to make breakfast daily and lunch a few times too.  The down side was that we had to do our own dishes and take out the trash.  There is no dishwasher, but they do provide sponges and dish soap to use.  Make sure to stay on top of the dishes though… DH reported that the one morning we didn’t have time to do the breakfast dishes before leaving for an early tour, he found some bugs in the sink when he went to wash the dishes that afternoon!  There is a large dumpster at the front of the property, so it wasn’t a big deal for me to take out the trash in the morning on my way to pick up our bread for breakfast.

5) You will need to make your own bed each morning and hang up your towels after you use them since Elvis only comes in every 3 days to
make up the room.  This wasn’t an issue for us because we do that every day at home anyway, but some people might prefer to not do chores when they are on vacation, so it is something to keep in mind.

6) There is a coffee pot and a kettle in the bungalow, but you need to provide your own coffee.  We bought a small jar at one of the local supermarkets for about $3 and had enough left over when we checked out that we left it behind for the next person to use.  Faby has a few 1 liter cartons of milk in her fridge in the office that you can purchase, but that was way more milk than we needed for 5 days so we just drank the coffee black.

7) I thought the bedroom would have a queen-sized bed, but it was actually just a full-sized bed. We usually have trouble sleeping together in a bed that small, but we were so tired after our action-packed days touring Moorea that we slept soundly every night.  There was a mosquito net hanging above the bed, but I am not convinced it is very effective considering when I woke up each morning, it was split open, hanging off either side of the bed lol  Maybe I should have used some tape or binder clips to hold it together (we always pack both of these items in our vacation emergency kit), but since we left the windows closed and never saw any mosquitoes inside the bungalow, we didn’t bother.

8) The hotel includes free wifi during your stay.  I had read comments online that said the wifi was not very strong down at the beachfront bungalow because it is based from the lobby and our bungalow was the furthest one from the lobby.  When I tried to use the wifi at night, I sometimes had trouble loading pages and uploading photos to my social media accounts.  I have a feeling this was more because other guests at the hotel were also using their devices on wifi at this time more than because of our bungalow’s location.  I never had any problems when I used the wifi on my iPad in the early morning when everyone else was likely still asleep.  

9) The beach at the hotel has 2 covered picnic tables and an outdoor shower.  There is a good amount of shade provided by the big tree outside our bungalow.  I had read a lot of comments online prior to our stay which said there was never anyone on the beach, but this was not our experience.  Maybe it was just the guests who happened to be staying at our hotel when we were there, but we always saw people using the beach.  There were 2 bungalows with a large group vacationing together, and they seemed to do nothing for their 3 days in Moorea besides hang out on this beach!  We weren’t too upset when they checked out and things got quieter.  Just be aware that while the view is the best at the beachfront bungalow, it can be the bungalow with the least privacy if people are using the beach.

Ok, I think that’s all that I wanted to mention about Moorea Fare Miti.  DH and I talked about it a few days after we checked out and we had some time to let the experience sink in.  I think a good test of how much you like a hotel is if you would stay there again if you repeat a vacation in that location.  We both agreed that we would definitely stay here again!  While it had a few negatives (as most things in life do have), it had many more positives and you just can’t beat that price point! The staff was friendly and attentive, there was free parking, free wifi, free use of kayaks, a full kitchen, easy access to fresh breads every day (as opposed to paying upwards of $50 per person for breakfast at the fancier hotels), and the bungalow was quite spacious both inside and out on the porch.  I don’t know if or when we will have an opportunity to return to Moorea, but we will definitely stay here again if we can.

Anyway, back to the story… now where were we…  Oh right, we had just checked out of our hotel.

We really had no plans at all for this morning. We were essentially homeless until it was time to return the rental car at 1:30pm, and since we had all of our luggage piled up in the back seat (no chance the big suitcases would fit in that tiny trunk!), there wasn’t a ton we could do.  I guess we could have hung out at one of the public beaches for the day, but we didn’t want to get all sandy with no where to get cleaned up before boarding the ship that afternoon.  

There is a Tiki Village about 10 minutes south of Moorea Fare Miti and we had yet to check it out, so we thought that might be a fun way to pass the time.  They have exhibits about different parts of Polynesian culture, like how to tie a pareo, how to open a coconut, how to do a Polynesian dance, how to play a ukulele, and information about black pearls.  They also have a buffet dinner followed by a big show with Polynesian dancing 3 nights per week, for around $110 per person. We arrived by 10:15am but they don’t open until 11am.  Bummer! We didn’t feel like sitting around for 45 minutes, so we left.  The good news was that we knew that Les Gauguines would teach us about most of those things during the cruise (and that wouldn’t cost any extra money… added bonus!).

Still being homeless for a few more hours, we decided to go to the Intercontinental and hang out there for a few hours.  We already saw the hotel grounds and knew that our luggage would be safe in the back of our car in their parking lot, and we knew we could find a place to hang out for a while where we wouldn’t be bothering anyone.  Plus, we knew they’d be happy to have us if we bought a drink or lunch or something from the bar.  We found a table in the shade near the pool and set up camp.  We would have moved along if anyone needed our space, and we even asked the hotel staff if it was okay to sit there, and sure enough, no one minded at all.  

Here we are near the pool at the Intercontinental, sporting the shell necklaces Faby gave us

There are 2 pools in this area, and many hotel guests were enjoying them on this beautiful Wednesday in paradise.

The Intercontinental is home to a sea turtle rescue center where they care for wounded turtles until they are strong and healthy enough to be released back into the ocean.  

There is also a section where they had 3 dolphins swimming around.  I don’t know the details because there wasn’t anyone working there when we walked by, but I do know you can book an excursion through PG to swim with the dolphins.  We were happy to just observe from the walkways above.

We left the Intercontinental around 1pm to drive back to Albert’s office to return our rental car.  When we arrived around 1:30pm, one of the employees (I did not get his name) did a 5 second walk around the car to inspect for any damage.  We knew we didn’t cause any damage to the vehicle, but found it really funny that he barely looked at it and had we accidentally scratched or banged it up, he probably wouldn’t have noticed.  We were told to return the car with as much gas as it had when we picked it up, which was somewhere around ¾ of a tank.  With Moorea being a small island, we only needed to fill up one time (insider tip: you need to spend at least 2500 XPF on gas to be allowed to use a credit card) and knew we had more than enough gas in the tank when we returned the car.  Of course, I doubt he ever checked the gauge.  He told us we needed to wait for 2 other groups to return their cars, and then he would take us all to the ferry terminal in their big van.  He did not know when those people planned to arrive, and we did not want to risk missing the ferry, so he offered to drive us to the terminal in our rental car to drop us off, and then he would drive it back to the office.  That sounded good to us!  The ride to the terminal was around 10 minutes, and we pulled up just as the ferry was arriving from Tahiti.  We unloaded our bags from the rental car, and then took a few minutes to watch as they unloaded the ferry.  It is amazing how many cars and trucks can fit on the lower level of the ferry! They even had an oil tanker and a Rotui fruit truck mixed in amongst the cars.  We had assumed most goods were brought to Moorea on smaller boats and then transferred to delivery trucks that stayed on Moorea, but apparently not!

We used our credit card to purchase 2 tickets for the 2:45pm Aremiti ferry for 1500xpf each, then we handed over our big suitcases to the porters who placed them in the large bins that would be loaded into the bottom of the ferry.  We waited a few minutes, and then we were able to board at 2:15pm.  We had to walk up about 3 flights of stairs to get to the seating level.  I do not know if there is an elevator, but I was very happy not to be carrying my suitcase up all these stairs!  Keep this in mind if you have a heavy carry on bag with you (luckily our carry ons were lighter than normal because we stuffed most of our belongings into the big suitcases haha)

This ferry was considerably larger than the Terevau ferry we were on a few days ago.  There was a place to buy some food, and the bathrooms were large with 4 or 5 stalls each.  There is free wifi on the ferry, but to access it, you need to register with your email address.  We walked all the way through the seating section to the front of the ferry and sat in the seats right at the windows looking out the front so we would have a great view as we approached Tahiti.  I did not notice an outdoor seating section on this ferry, but maybe we just missed it?

The ferry left promptly at 2:45pm and the journey lasted 45 minutes.  We spent most of that time playing on the free wifi, knowing this was our last chance at social media for 10 days (we did not have the wifi package on the PG and did not plan to pay for internet access… it’s not the worst thing to unplug for a few days when on vacation!).  Soon enough, we saw Tahiti in the window in front of us!

Is it just me, or are there always clouds over Tahiti??  I never once saw Tahiti with clear skies.

The excitement really set in when we turned into the marina and saw the PG docked right ahead of us!

This was by far the longest I have stayed somewhere pre-cruise, and after 5.5 days in Moorea, that felt like a vacation in itself. It felt a little weird to just be starting our cruise today when technically our vacation was one third over!

At exactly 3:30pm, the ferry pulled into it’s dock, immediately next to
the PG!  Our commute from the ferry to the cruise ship would be very convenient haha

Once they finished docking the ferry, we walked down the ramps and stairs to ground level and waited for them to unload the crate holding our suitcases.

The walk from the ferry to the boarding area on the far side of the PG took
literally 5 minutes!  It could not have been any easier, and we were glad we timed our ferry to arrive after they started boarding the PG.  

The next photo was taken at 3:45pm.  PG starts embarkation at 3pm, and I believe that around that time, several bus loads of people arrive from their pre-cruise hotels and day rooms.  By the time we arrived, there was no one else around and we had no wait at all. When we walked up to the entrance gate to the pier, we were greeted by a porter who took our big suitcases and labeled them with luggage tags (I had our luggage tags in my purse because I didn’t want to put earlier in case they fell off in the ferry.  He was able to make us a new tag faster than I could pull the tags from my purse!).  The cruise director Claudine was standing nearby and she handed us health screening forms.  We checked all the boxes to tell PG that we are healthy and don’t have ebola, the guards checked our passports against the cruise passenger manifest to make sure we were actually supposed to board the ship today, and we were on our way!  We walked down a long sidewalk towards the back of the ship where we were greeted with flowers from one of the Gauguines.

These two were serenading us with traditional Polynesian music

And then it was official… we were on a cruise!

We walked up the ramp onto the ship and were escorted to the Grand Salon where we took our embarkation photo.

We were then handed a glass of champagne and directed to a table at the front of the theater where someone was waiting to check us in right away. No waiting at all!  Since we had already filled out the pre-check in forms online, the only thing they needed was a signature for the credit card linked to our onboard account and to take our security mug shots…. I mean photos.  The lady handed us each a small leather wallet sized folder which contained our ship cards and muster station assignment.  As we walked away, another lady came over and said she would walk us to our cabin. When we arrived, our big suitcases were already sitting outside our door even though it was not even 10 minutes since we handed them to the porter outside (actually, it was 9 minutes based on the file info on my photos lol)  

I want to take a brief aside here to talk about our cabin.

On our last 2 cruises, we have grown to love having a balcony cabin.  We like having the extra space outside of the main cabin area where one of us can go while the other is getting ready, or while the other is asleep so we don’t disturb them, or even just to eat room service breakfast in the morning with a beautiful view.  When we researched this cruise on PG, and saw that balcony cabins cost $2000 PER PERSON more than non-balcony cabins, it was an easy choice to forgo the balcony and use that $4000 towards excursions, airfare, and other expenses on the trip. Every cabin on the PG has at least a porthole to let light in, and there are no inside cabins on the ship.  Deck 3 has only 14 cabins and they are all designated as Category F, which means they have 2 portholes.  Deck 4 is a full deck of cabins in Category E, which have a window. The opening in the wall for the window is basically the same size as for the 2 portholes, so really the only difference is that the portholes have a little space between them versus the window is wider across and offers a slightly better view.  Realistically, if we wanted a “better view” we would walk upstairs to one of the outer decks anyway, so we saw no value in paying a little more money for a cabin on Deck 4.  Also of note, the staterooms in Category F (porthole), Category E (window), and Category D and C (both balcony) are all 200 sq. ft. so the cabins and the bathrooms are all identical and there is equal inside space no matter which category you choose.

This photo was taken the first morning when we were anchored in Huahine.  I thought the view was just fine!

We were very happy with our porthole cabin, number 318 in case you were curious.  The bed was very comfortable, and we liked that there were small nightstands on both sides of the bed (but we found the narrow pull-out draw underneath to be too small to hold anything, especially with the open sides.  Maybe it’s meant to hold a book, but we don’t read in bed so this was one of the few spaces we did not utilize.)  There was lots of space under the bed to store our luggage after we unpacked. I apologize that I did not get to take photos of the cabin before all of our belongings were unpacked.  I suppose that is the downside to our luggage being delivered before we even arrived at our cabin, since I usually take photos immediately before our luggage arrives on embarkation day!  Oops!

To the right of the bed, there were 2 separate closets, both with hanging bars and shelves, but the configurations were slightly different.  I liked that we had our own space to stash our belongings and both closets were more than large enough for our needs.  It worked well that I took the closet towards the head of the bed because I sleep on that side of the bed.  DH took the closet towards the foot of the bed because he sleeps on the side of the bed closer to the couch and this way he did not have to walk past me when he needed to get dressed.  The closets are also fairly deep so we had lots of space on the floor to store our shoes.

I can’t believe I never got a photo of it, but in between the two closets is a vanity area.  There is a desk space with a mirror above it, a long desk drawer, plus 2 very small drawers (good for holding make up and battery chargers!). This area also has 2 outlets- one American and one European with 2 prongs.  The cabin has a hairdryer which uses a European outlet.  I always travel with my own hair dryer because cruise ship hair dryers are not usually very strong.  Since we were so tight on weight in our luggage, I did not bring my own hair dryer on this trip, but I was thrilled to see the hair dryer that PG provides is a normal, full strength hair dryer!  This thing was possibly even more powerful than the one I use at home!  And an added bonus to it using the European outlet was that I could heat up my flat iron at the same time as I blew dry my hair to make the getting-ready process that much faster each evening.

The back half of the cabin features a large wall unit.  The TV set sits on top, then there are 4 cubbies underneath that to store wine glasses, small dishes, cloth napkins, and a few other odds and ends.  The bottom of the cabinet juts out providing a table/desk surface, and behind the bottom doors is a small fridge.  Everything stocked in that fridge is complimentary, and when you board, there are bottles of water, cans of soda, and cans of beer (Budweiser and Coors Light, I believe?).  We asked our stewardess to remove the varieties we did not like, and to only restock us with water, Diet Coke, and Hinano, and she was happy to oblige. To the right of the fridge, on the outside of the cabinet, there is another set of 2 outlets (one American, one European), and you can also access an American outlet if you want to unplug your TV set.  On either side of the wall unit, there are 2 open shelves on top (great for storing bottles of sunscreen, snack food, and room temperature bottles of water!), and 2 doors hiding 2 shelves each on the bottom.  Our one complaint about this wall unit was that the shelves were all very shallow.  We stored our dirty clothing in the lower cabinets.  We find it faster to pack at the end of the trip if we fold our dirty clothes each night, but we ended up rolling our clothes to make them fit in the narrow spaces.  You can also see in this photo that there was an alarm clock in the cabin.

Behind me when I took this photo, there was a love seat couch and a coffee table, and you can see there is an ottoman in the bottom corner of the photo.  I again apologize for not being more thorough with these photos.  I thought I took photos of every inch of our cabin, but apparently not!

Anyway, back at the front of the cabin are a few things I missed.  When you first walk in, the bathroom is immediately on the right.  Just beyond the bathroom door is a small 4-drawer dresser. This worked well for storing our socks, underwear, and bathing suits.  I will warn you that these drawers are not very big, so most of our folded clothing went on the shelves in the closets.

Just above this dresser sits a stone tiki statue. He is purely there for decoration, but he always made me smile!

Ok, now let’s talk a bit about the bathroom.  We had so much storage space in this bathroom that most of it went unused!  Above the sink, there is a long open shelf.  On either side of that are 2 tall cabinets so we could store our toiletries separately.  Underneath the sink, there was a pull out cabinet holding the trash can on the left side, and lots of storage space on the shelves behind the cabinet directly below the sink and to the right side (which we did not end up needing… maybe THAT is where we should have kept our dirty clothing??)

Unlike most cruise ships which seem to pride themselves on installing the smallest shower stalls possible, PG managed to provide a bathtub in even the lowest cabin category!  It was long enough that an adult could comfortably sit down with legs stretched out straight in front, but it was probably only ¾ of the width of a standard bathtub.  There were 2 grab bars on either side of the tub, plus another 2 vertical bars higher up on the wall.  The shower also has a small triangular shelf to place your shampoo bottles, and there is a big shelf at the back of the shower (high enough up that it does not get splashed with water).  We used that shelf to hang our water shoes and snorkels after we rinsed them off. There is also a retractable clothing line that you can pull out across the entire length of the tub, offering plenty of space to hang wet bathing suits.

PG provides pretty much everything you may need in terms of toiletries.  Beside the sink, there is a shower cap, manicure set including a nail file and cuticle stick, a vanity kit with cotton rounds and q-tips, a large container of lotion, and a bar of hand soap.  Inside the shower, there are 3 pumps containing shampoo, conditioner, and body wash. Our stewardess replenished our supply as we used any of these items.

I want to take a moment to talk about the fixture in this shower.  You seriously need a PhD in Showerology to get hot water!  This was by far the most complicated shower I have ever tried to operate.  In the photo above, you will notice that there are color-coded knobs on either end of the silver fixture just above the tub.  The one on the right is red, and the one on the left is blue.  Ok, so red is hot water and blue is cold water, right? WRONG!  After days of trying to understand the intricacies of this fixture, we figured out that one of the knobs controls temperature and the other controls water pressure.  No idea which is which- your guess is as good as ours!  We came up with a setting that worked for us, but we are not really sure how we got there and we likely couldn’t repeat it if we tried.

So anyway… Like I said, we were very happy with our cabin on Deck 3.  The location proved very convenient as this is also the deck where you get on and off the tender to shore each day.  While everyone else waited for the elevators to arrive, we could just go straight to our cabin.  By the time we dropped off our bags and got back to the elevator bank, everyone else from our tender was gone and we rode the elevator alone up to the pool or to get lunch or wherever we were going.  

There is one negative that I do want to mention about having a cabin on deck 3.  It is very minor, but just something to think about, especially if you have any mobility issues.  The PG has 2 sets of elevators on either end of the ship, but only the forward elevators reach deck 3.  This elevator can take you to 6 passenger decks on the ship (decks 3 through 8). There is no elevator access to the Sun Deck on Deck 9.  There are 2 side by side elevators at the back of the ship- one which stops at deck 5 and the other at deck 4.  (Side note: there was no way to know which of these elevators would arrive, so if we wanted to get to deck 4 but the elevator that only covers decks 5-8 arrived, we could either take one flight of stairs down a deck or wait for the other elevator to arrive.)  Neither of these aft elevators has access to deck 3.  If we were at La Palette (aft deck 8), we had to walk all the way forward, passing through Le Grill, passing the pool with all the lounger chairs, and go back inside to reach the forward elevators to get back to our cabin.  This did get a little inconvenient at times, mostly because I did not realize it in advance.  This factor alone might be reason to pay slightly more for a window cabin. I joked to DH that we were staying in steerage and that’s why we had limited access to our cabin haha  At the aft end of our hallway, down by cabin 328, there was a small staircase that accessed decks 3, 4, and 5, letting you out right next to the piano bar.  I guess that was our consolation prize since we did not have aft elevator access!

Ok, enough chat about the cabin, now let’s get back to embarkation day…

When we walked into our cabin, the first thing we noticed was all the goodies on our coffee table.  There was a bowl of fresh fruit which was replenished daily by our stewardess.  There were 2 bottles of champagne, one of which was already chilled on ice, which were part of the honeymoon package and the Valentine’s Day promotion we had added to our account.  The little gold box was the box of chocolates that went with the Valentine’s Day promotion. We expected to get a small box with maybe 5 chocolates in it, so this was a huge surprise when we saw it was a box of 20 assorted Godiva truffles!  We couldn’t finish them all over the course of the cruise, so we actually brought them home and finished them off in the week after the cruise. The envelopes sitting on the left side of the table contained a coupon for a complimentary 8×10 print from the photo gallery (part of the honeymoon package), a card from my parents to DH with his OBC (which was already applied to our account), and an invitation to a private party for honeymooners.  

When we booked the cruise and learned about the honeymoon package, we were told this party would be held on the second day we were in Bora Bora as we sailed away that evening.  We were very disappointed to see that the party was in fact held on our first day in Bora Bora at 5pm, smack in the middle of our sunset catamaran cruise.  Why would they schedule this event, which probably involves many of the guests onboard considering it also includes couples celebrating milestone anniversaries, at a time when many people are not on the ship?? Between our sunset catamaran cruise, the sunset cruise on an outrigger canoe, and any people staying overnight in one of the hotels in Bora Bora (both through PG excursions and booked privately with hotel rewards points- we met another honeymooning couple who did this in both Bora Bora and Moorea because they both travel a lot for work and have tons of points accrued), I think a lot of people missed out on this party and would have appreciated if they scheduled it at a time when everyone was on board.

Also sitting in our cabin was the daily schedule for today, and a few papers with information about the entertainers who would perform and the movies to be shown on TV throughout the cruise.

The breakfast room service menu:

We didn’t spend too long in the cabin because we had a long list of errands to take care of! We dropped off our carry on bags, put our ship cards in our pockets, I grabbed my camera, and we were off!  Wow, it felt great to travel so light after schlepping our bags around all day haha  Our first stop was the reception desk on deck 4 as we had a few things to discuss with them.  There were no passengers ahead of us so we were helped immediately.  We verified that all of our OBC was applied to our account, confirmed the hours when we could pick up or snorkel kit at the marina, and confirmed when we could make reservations for the specialty restaurants. We signed up for the bridge tour and the galley tour, both held on the afternoon of day 2 in Bora Bora.  I think there was also a tour of the engine room but we did not ask about that and I don’t know when it was held.  If you have interest in any of these tours, definitely try to sign up ASAP because the slots do fill up and there was a wait list for both tours.  I have taken a galley tour before on the Celebrity Equinox, but this would be my first tour of the bridge and I was very excited about it.  Thank you to PG for giving us this opportunity, free of charge! We also asked about our excursions, but were directed to a separate desk a few steps away.

At the excursion desk, there was just one person ahead of us in line.  I could really get used to sailing on a smaller ship like this… no waiting in line is a wonderful perk!  We asked to confirm that we were both registered for the 4 tours we selected online, and the lady asked for my cabin number and then handed me an envelope with 8 paper tickets!  That was easy!  They had everything organized, pre-printed and ready to distribute.  Each ticket had our name, the tour name, time and location where we should meet, and a list of things we might want to bring with us. She told us that if we wanted to cancel any of our tours, that we should do so at least 24 hours in advance, except for our tour tomorrow in Huahine which had a cancellation deadline of 6pm tonight.  No worries, we didn’t plan to make any changes.

Our next errand was booking specialty restaurant reservations.  The maitre’d Randy was stationed at the podium in La Veranda, and we were able to make reservations for both of the specialty restaurants.  PG has 3 restaurants for dinner: 1) L’Etoile is the main dining room, with open seating from 6:30-9:30pm.  Each night, you can either request a table for 2 or to sit with other guests, whichever you prefer.  2) Le Grill is a specialty restaurant with outdoor seating around the pool.  3) La Veranda is the fine French dining restaurant on board.  All 3 restaurants are included in your cruise fare, but Le Grill and La Veranda require reservations, and they only allow you to make reservations for one night in each restaurant to start (later in the cruise, you can return to a restaurant if there is space available, but they want to give everyone an opportunity to try both specialty restaurants).  Also note that while L’Etoile’s menu changes nightly, Le Grill and La Veranda each keep their own same menu for every night until the midway point of the cruise, and then change to a second menu.  Based on our excursions, I had planned for us to eat at Le Grill on night 1 in Bora Bora because the ship wouldn’t be sailing that night and it would be less windy on the outside deck.  I wanted to eat in La Veranda on the day we were in Rangiroa because we planned to treat this as “formal night” (we love getting dressed up on cruises and PG does not have any specific formal nights, so we thought it would be nice to dress up on the night we ate at the fanciest restaurant on the ship) and this was one of the few port days when we didn’t have a long, tiring excursion planned so that would leave us more time to get ready in the evening.  Unfortunately, Rangiroa was the day La Veranda switched to the second menu, so we never got to try the first menu (although as it turns out, we probably made the right choice because the options on that second menu better suited our personal taste).  

Once our reservations were all set, we stepped into La Veranda as they were holding afternoon tea and we were starving!  PG serves afternoon tea every day, usually around 4-5pm (today it was from 3:30-4:30pm and we arrived just minutes before they closed).  They serve lots of pastries, cakes, and cookies, little finger sandwiches, and there is usually a station set up to make something special. Today’s station was a made-to-order pasta bar, which sounded perfect to me because we never really ate lunch.  

We also ordered Mai Tais from the bar waiter, but when we took our first sip, we learned a lesson:  cocktails on the PG are VERRRRY strong!  Whoa!  I could barely get through this drink!  They are definitely not stingy on the alcohol here haha  

Bellys full and heads a little blurry, we went back to the cabin to unpack a little bit before the Muster Drill.  While we were here, our stewardess, Jo Fe, came by to introduce herself.  She gave us a little tour of the cabin, pointing out where to find the fridge (we had already found it!), how to send out our laundry if we wanted it cleaned, and how to adjust the thermostat in the cabin.  She said she would make up our cabin every morning and provide turn down service each night, and asked us to let her know if there was anything else we needed.  DH requested a champagne stopper so we could close up the bottle when we didn’t finish it in one sitting, and she said she would need to request that from the bartenders and would bring it later today (which she did!).  

Muster drill is held at 5:30pm outside on deck 5 near the life boats.  While Muster is possibly the least exciting part of embarkation day, it is a necessary evil so we stood outside for about 20 minutes and listened to the drill in both English and French.  Immediately after it ended, we went straight to the Marina in the aft of Deck 4 and we were the first guests to arrive!  We walked down the narrow spiral staircase and were quickly fitted for fins and given a bag with a snorkel, mask, and life vest.  By the time we turned around and headed back up the stairs, the line extended halfway across deck 4!  Definitely try to get down there as fast as you can, the second they release you from your muster station, because it was very hot down at the Marina (too bad they couldn’t have the giant door lowered down to let in some air!) and I imagine it was quite uncomfortable to stand there in line waiting for your turn.

We went back to the cabin to drop off our snorkel kits and get showered and changed for dinner.  PG has a dress code policy after 6pm which states that men must wear long pants and closed toed shoes, so DH needed to change out of the shorts and flip flops he was wearing all day.  

At around 7:15pm, we went upstairs to aft Deck 5 to eat dinner at L’Etoile.  There was no line at all and we were promptly seated at a table for 8. We enjoy eating dinner with others when we take cruises as it’s a great way to get to know the other passengers and make some new friends.  We were very fortunate with our random table assignment tonight as the 8 of us got along really well, had wonderful conversation throughout dinner, and we ended up hanging out with all of these people many times over the next 10 days.

Not long after we were seated, our waiter came over to introduce himself and to hand us our menus.  He explained that each night, the menu in L’Etoile would change, but there was also a section at the bottom of the page with options that were always available every night.  I never ordered from that part of the menu because I always found at least one appetizer and entrée to order from the rotating menus (usually more than one of each!).

Next, the bar waiter came over to show us tonight’s selections of wine.  Each night, he came over to show us one red and one white wine that had been chosen to pair well with the evening’s menu.  Of course, if you did not like either of those options, you could have any other wine you wanted from their menu (or any cocktail too for that matter!). I prefer white wines, and I always found the nightly selection to be of my liking.

The whole meal lasted about 2 hours from start to finish, but with so many courses being served, we thought the pacing was appropriate and we were never sitting around too long without a dish in front of us. Here is what I ordered tonight…

Mahi Mahi and Tuna Sashimi

Crisp Vegetable Spring Rolls

Rice Noodle Salad

Local Yellow Fin Tuna Grilled with Diced Vegetables in Sherry

Dessert Menu

Pineapple Cake

**Baked Chocolate Marquise

After dinner, we headed up to deck 8 for the Welcome Aboard Party around the pool.  PG has a house band called Santa Rosa and they were performing a fun medley of current and not-so-current pop songs. Les Gauguines were also on hand to get the crowd out of their seats and having a fun time (although as it turned out, there was only a small group of us who actually got up to dance haha)

Keeping in mind that not everyone has boarded the ship yet, there was a pretty good turn out at the party.  

There were still some people on our cruise who were on the airplane and had yet to land in Tahiti!  I can’t imagine not boarding my cruise until late at night, especially if you think of all the things we had done on the ship since boarding at 3pm!  In fact, while we were dancing out on the deck, we saw a big airplane approaching the Tahiti airport for landing, and we had a hunch that the rest of the passengers were on that plane!

Each day, the pool bar offers a different ‘drink of the day.’  It is usually a colorful, fruity concoction, and I tried to taste it every day.  About halfway through the cruise, I noticed that they actually print the drink and it’s ingredients on the back page of the daily schedule in the bottom right corner!  

I’m not sure if it was the excitement of embarkation day or what, but I thought this was the best drink of the day that I had on the cruise!

We stayed at the party until about 10pm, and then headed back to the cabin for a very comfortable night’s rest!