Nine nights round trip from Sydney aboard Carnival Splendor, calling at Mystery Island, Lifou and Noumea. Five days at sea.
Every time on this page is ship’s time. It is set by the captain and does not always match the local clock — or your phone.
Three ports, and five days at sea. You end where you started.
Sydney is where you board and where you return. The line on the map is indicative; the course a ship actually steers is set on the day for weather and traffic.
Times are the ship’s scheduled arrival and departure and can move for weather or port traffic. All-aboard is normally 30 minutes before sailing.
The Overseas Passenger Terminal is at Circular Quay, a few minutes' walk from the Opera House and the Rocks; ships too tall to pass under the Harbour Bridge berth at White Bay instead, which needs a taxi or a shuttle. She sails at 15:30, so the first evening is aboard. Which terminal you get is decided by your ship's height rather than your fare, and it changes every transfer for the day.
The first of five days at sea. She is running for Mystery Island. Everything on board is open and the day is yours to spend on it.
The second of five days at sea. She is running for Mystery Island. Everything on board is open and the day is yours to spend on it.
The third of five days at sea. She is running for Mystery Island. Everything on board is open and the day is yours to spend on it.
Mystery Island is a sand cay with a grass airstrip down the middle and nobody living on it. Islanders come across from Aneityum by boat for the day to run market stalls and cook, and go home again in the evening. You can walk the whole island in half an hour. The snorkelling straight off the beach is the day. There are no shops, no cafes and very little shade, so bring water and cover from the ship. There is no wharf; the ship anchors off and tenders onto the beach of a small uninhabited cay. A tender-only island with no infrastructure and no shelter, so wind or swell cancels the call outright rather than shortening it.
Lifou is a raised coral island in the Loyalty group and the day is snorkelling and walking. Jinek Bay is the snorkelling, over a shallow coral shelf, run by the local tribe with a small charge and a limit on numbers. The chapel on the headland above Easo is a short climb with the view back over the anchorage. Beyond that there are vanilla plantations, cliffs at Jokin, and almost no commercial infrastructure at all. The ship anchors off and tenders into Easo, which is a jetty, a beach and a small settlement rather than a town. A tender call with no wharf and very little ashore, so swell can cancel it and there is nowhere to shelter if the weather turns.
Noumea is French and behaves like it, down to the bakeries and the lunch hours. The central square and the market by the harbour are the walkable part. Anse Vata and Baie des Citrons are the swimming beaches a short ride out, with the aquarium between them. The Tjibaou Cultural Centre, built for Kanak culture and worth seeing for the architecture alone, is the one thing here that is not a beach or a shop. Ships tie up at the maritime station in the middle of Noumea, with the town centre and the main square a few minutes on foot. Shops and restaurants keep French hours, so a Sunday call or a long lunchtime finds much of the town shut.
The fourth of five days at sea. She is running for Sydney. Everything on board is open and the day is yours to spend on it.
The fifth of five days at sea. She is running for Sydney. Everything on board is open and the day is yours to spend on it.
The cruise ends here and you disembark in the morning. The Overseas Passenger Terminal is at Circular Quay, a few minutes' walk from the Opera House and the Rocks; ships too tall to pass under the Harbour Bridge berth at White Bay instead, which needs a taxi or a shuttle. Which terminal you get is decided by your ship's height rather than your fare, and it changes every transfer for the day.
Seven grades on this ship. The gap between the cheapest and the dearest is wider than most people expect, and so is the difference in what you get.
No window, around seventeen square metres, and the cheapest way onto the ship. Completely dark with the lights off. Carnival's interior cabins are no smaller than its balcony cabins - the balcony is added outside the room rather than taken out of it - so what you give up here is light, not floor area.
A cabin on decks one and two with a real porthole in the hull. It costs less than an ocean-view cabin and still gives you daylight and some sense of the weather. The window is small, you are close to the waterline, and low forward cabins are where the ship's movement and its noise are both most obvious.
A sealed picture window. The cheapest grade with a proper horizon, and that horizon does more for seasickness than any amount of floor area. Note that the twin beds in some cabins in this grade will not convert to a queen once the upper berths are in use, which catches out four-person bookings.
Private outdoor space at about the same interior floor area as an inside cabin - roughly seventeen square metres with the balcony outside it. The grade most people are glad of on the South Pacific sailings this ship runs. Balcony sizes vary a great deal within the one grade, so ask about the position.
Sold as Aft-View Extended Balcony and Premium Vista Balcony: the same cabin with an outdoor space roughly twice the standard, sometimes wrapping around the corner of the ship. Much the best outdoor space short of a suite. Aft cabins sit over the engines and propellers and carry noticeably more vibration.
Junior, Ocean, Grand and Captain's suites: a separate sitting area, a bath, a walk-in wardrobe and a substantially larger balcony, with priority boarding. There are only about fifty on a ship carrying three thousand, so they go early. Suites are charged the higher daily gratuity rate.
Not a rung on the ladder so much as a location: spa cabins exist as interior, ocean view, balcony and suite, all of them on decks ten and eleven with direct private access to the spa, and treatment and thermal-suite privileges included. Worth it only if you will actually use the spa; otherwise you are paying for a door.
Midship and low is the calmest ride. A ship pitches around its middle and rolls around its centreline, so the middle of the ship low down moves least. Forward and high is the worst combination.
A “guarantee” fare is a category, not a room. It saves real money and the line assigns your actual cabin whenever it likes — sometimes days before departure, sometimes with an obstructed view. Fine for a couple who do not mind. A poor choice if you are travelling with children, need a specific location, or are prone to seasickness. On some lines a family of four booked this way can be split across two cabins.
The fare you compare online rarely covers everything. Tick anything you want priced with the cruise — bought with the booking it is usually cheaper than on board, and you know the total before you go.
Australia. Cambodian passport: Visitor visa (subclass 600), Tourist stream, applied for from outside Australia. Not eligible for the ETA (subclass 601), whose eligible passports are Brunei, Canada, Hong Kong SAR, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan and the United States; not eligible for eVisitor (subclass 651), which is for European passports. Home Affairs states the subclass 600 Tourist stream covers going on a cruise. Australian passport: Australian citizens have a right of entry to Australia and hold no visa. Home Affairs states that Australian citizens are ineligible to apply for an ETA and directs them to Entering Australia instead.
Vanuatu. Cambodian passport: A visa obtained in advance. Two relevant classes are published: a Tourist Visa (maximum 120 days, not extendable) and a Visitor Visa (up to 30 days, application charge 7,420 VUV, applicant must be outside Vanuatu when applying). Both are applied for through the Vanuatu eVisa portal. Australian passport: Same instrument as shore leave -- tourist visa on arrival, maximum stay 120 days, not extendable. No advance application.
New Caledonia. Cambodian passport: A visa is required. Cambodia is ABSENT from the Annex II point 1 exemption table, which was read in full -- 99 country entries, including Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei and Timor-Leste, but not Cambodia. The visa needed is one valid for New Caledonia, applied for through the French authorities; New Caledonia is a French overseas collectivity outside the Schengen area and runs this separate regime. Australian passport: Visa-free for a stay not exceeding three months in any six-month period, under the Arrete of 22 July 2011 as amended (current version in force since 19 June 2025).
Checked 2026-08-12. Immigration rules move, so we re-check yours when you book — and we arrange the visas ourselves.
The fares above include taxes, fees and port expenses. The line charges an automatic daily gratuity to your onboard account, and drinks, specialty dining and shore excursions are extra. We set the whole total out for you before you pay a deposit.
Many standard travel policies exclude medical treatment beyond a set distance from land — which is exactly where you are on a sea day — and cap or exclude evacuation from a vessel. Helicopter evacuation from a ship runs into six figures.
Buy a policy with explicit cruise cover, and buy it on the day you pay the deposit, not before you fly. Cancellation cover only works if the policy is already in force when the thing that cancels your trip happens — and cancellation penalties on a cruise typically begin months before departure, not days.
Check the evacuation limit as a number. “Unlimited medical” does not always mean unlimited evacuation.
Seasickness is a smaller problem than most people expect — about one in ten visits to a ship’s medical centre. Slips and falls, and ordinary coughs and colds, are both more common.
If you are susceptible: take something before you sail rather than after symptoms start, pick a cabin midship and low, and get where you can see the horizon. This route is sheltered by comparison with open ocean, and a ship this size moves very little.
The medical centre is an urgent-care clinic, not a hospital, and it is not free — consultations and medicines are charged. Bring your own of anything you take regularly.
Tell us how many of you there are. We will come back with the cabin grades, the total including gratuities, and what the flights and any visas will take — before you commit to anything.
Enquire about this sailing→Tell us who is travelling and we will come back with the cabin grades in US dollars, the total including gratuities, and what the visas will take — before you commit to anything.
If you do not hear from us, email info@dltravel.net and we will pick it up.