Return to Papeete and the end of our journey

Day 10 --  Papeete

We arrived  in Papeete after sailing overnight.  We had to be out of our cabins by 8 am.  Since we booked our airport transfer through the ship, we are able to store our baggage and hang out and eat on the ship, and use the facilities - pool, lounges, bars, spa, showers, etc.  Booking our airport transfer through the Princess was a great deal. $29 for everything.  Much cheaper than getting a day room.

We left our cabin right at 8 am, and headed up to the buffet breakfast.  It was packed today!  Lots of guests trying to grab a bite to eat before heading out to their next destination, catching flights or getting a room for a day or two at one of the beautiful hotels on the island.  And of course there are many guests doing the same thing as our group.

After breakfast we headed out for a bit of last minute shopping.  Ann, from our sail yesterday had
giving us a name of a jewelry designer that she uses, so we set out to find his shop.  Cathy ended up buying a beautiful green pearl there.  Then we headed over to the Municipal Market.
This market has vendors that sell everything from fish to clothing to pearls.  Andrea & I each purchased a pearl necklace at Hanatea Creations by Sylvana Deane.  After looking at tons of pearls all along our trip, I found this designer to have very unique designs that I really liked.  I fell in love with one and bought it.

You see pearls of all colors in French Polynesia.  At first you think you won't buy one, but you see so many beautiful pearls, that it is hard to resist.  The only advise I have for you here, is to not get overwhelmed.  Figure out in advance what you would like to spend.  You can find pearls in many different grades - 'A' being the top.  On the docks when you come in by tender, you can usually find locals selling less expensive pearls.  Or you can find many, many fancy shops selling perfect expensive pearls -- and moderately priced pearls too!  If nothing else, get yourself a small pearl from a local for $25 -30.  It will be a nice memory that will remind you of your visit to paradise.

After our shopping excursion we returned to the ship for lunch.  Then it was in to the most cool place on the ship (the Cabaret Lounge) to wait for our transfer.

A few notes about the Pacific Princess:  this is a smaller cruise ship than what you will typically book.  It was formerly part of the Renaissance fleet, but that cruise line did not survive the drop in tourism after 9/11 and Princess bought two of the ships.  It is nice to be on a smaller ship, it is very easy to find your way around the ship after your first day.  Since most of the ports are Tender ports, it's easier and faster to get off a small ship.

The service on the ship is very good, but not excellent. A few areas need improvement.  There are some excellent staff members on this ship, my favorite was a waiter from India, named Frances.  We saw him most mornings when we had breakfast in the Panorama Buffet.  He was pleasant, efficient and funny.  It made our breakfast more enjoyable to sit in his station each day and chat with him.  He always had a kind word, a nice smile and a great sense of humor.  We wish he was our assigned waiter for dinner, unfortunately, we were seated one table out of his dinner station in the main dinning room.  Since there were 8 of us, there was no changing tables.  Our waiter for dinner, while friendly and pleasant, was slow & not attentive to our needs.  Each night he took our order last of all the tables in his station, thus we were always one of the last tables to exit the restaurant each night.  After a while, that starts to get old.  I think it was a matter of our waiter being less experienced and not rotating his stations service.

hangin' with Cathy by Patricks boat

Overall I would give the Pacific Princess a 'Very Good' rating.  Since our goal was to see the French Polynesian/Society Islands, it was just fine.   If I ever have the opportunity to go back again, I would love to stay on Moorea in one of the over the water bungelows like Edward & Rhonda did on the front end of our trip.  They were celebrating their 25th Wedding anniversary, so they had added on to the front end of the trip with this stay in Moorea before meeting us at the Princess.

So - you might be thinking --
'what were Susan's top 5 events' on this 10 day cruise?
Well, I did mention that Patricks Bora Bora
all day trip was one of them.
The drift snorkel at the Coral Gardens was in there.

Ann what a great hostess!

I would also include sailing with Ann & Alex on the Tahiti Liberty -- what gracious hosts they were and I loved their beautiful Catamaran!
Sailing with Claude & Martine was particularly wonderful, especially the snorkel with Rhonda being surrounded by fish checking out her fingernails!
And finally, I would say meeting and becoming good friends with Dave & Kelly.  You can meet some wonderful people on Cruise Critic if you are open to it.  Over the years of traveling, I have met many people on CC some have
become long distance friends (see my posts of our 2012 cruise with Alvin & Sheila - two CC friends).  Dave & Kelly - this shout out is for you!

Kelly, Susan, Dave & Andrea

Be well, travel safe and Mauruuru (thank you in Tahitian) for reading my adventure in Tahiti 
Susan