Rock the Boat 6 (2016) Diary

6-11-2016 Sunday Day 1 6-11-2016 Sunday Day 1
We'd booked a taxi for 11am to the Hamilton cruise terminal where we were to start our 7 night Rock The Boat 6 Cruise to New Caledonia and back, on the The Legend of The Seas boat, one of the Royal Caribbean Line fleet. We were through all the check-in, scanners and on board having lunch about 12.15pm in the buffet of the Windjammer Cafe. Afterwards we went to our room on the 3rd deck, left our hand luggage and went to explore the boat. It's not a big boat, walking around the joggers' path on Deck 10 was fairly quick - 1 lap is 400 metres and that goes from one end of the boat to the other. There was a compulsory muster drill at 4pm which didn't take long, and then we watched as they cast off the large ropes holding the boat to the wharf and departed at 4.30pm. We made our way to the bow (the front, the pointy end) and watched as the boat made its way down the Brisbane River and under the Gateway Bridge, which was exciting as we hadn't left on a cruise from here before - we had done it in our own boat but not on a cruise boat.

After that we went back to our cabin and our one big bag hadn't yet arrived (for 1 week we decided we only needed one bag to share). We had to go down to where they keep bags that they've scanned and found there's a problem. Dave had his Leatherman (multi-tool) in there and they don't allow that. We'd been on other cruises and planes and he's always taken it but this time it wasn't allowed so they confiscated it and will return it when we depart. After that we went to the That's Entertainment Theatre to see the first show at 6pm which was the lively British band The Troggs who weren't too bad and very loud. They wrote 'Wild Thing' which most people are familiar with, and some others are 'With A Girl Like You', 'Anyway That You Want Me', 'Give It To Me' and 'Love Is All Around'. Never strangers to controversy, many of their records were considered by the 'powers that be' too suggestive for the masses, and they consequently banned them.

Glenn A. Baker introduced them, giving some background on them. Glenn, in his unusual tell-tale head covering, is a nationally syndicated radio and television presenter of long standing, a world class rock journalist, a three time winner of the BBC's Rock Brain Of The Universe title, and was once the agent for the Australian band Ol' 55 with Frankie J. Holden. The show went for 1 hour after which we went to dinner. We have been scheduled in the official dining room (called Romeo and Juliette) for the 8.30pm second seating where you are served by waiters, but that's too late for us to eat. It's good there is alternative casual dining. After dinner we retired to our room - no night life for us tonight!

7-11-2016 Monday Day 2 Cruising
We had a late start this morning, waking at 9.15am, so dressed quickly and went to breakfast. We then looked through the shopping area and the Rock The Boat memorabilia where Dave bought a shirt. At noon we enjoyed the performance of one of the UK's premier harmony bands called The Fortunes and they were very good. They told us stories and interacted with the audience. The keyboard player, Bob Jackson, had been a member of the band Badfinger and they played a few of their hit songs. When I heard them I was surprised that I knew these songs so well after thinking I didn't really know much of Badfinger's music. Some of The Fortunes hit records were 'You've Got Your Troubles', 'Here It Comes Again', 'Storm In A Teacup' and 'Freedom Come, Freedom Go'. The nostalgia of hearing all these old songs has been wonderful.

After the show we met up with (prearranged) Bob, a guy Dave had worked with in Telecom, and his lovely wife Gabie. We chatted to them for a while and then we went off to lunch and by chance, ended up sitting with them for lunch. They have been on many cruises and love dancing. Unlike us they dance well into the evening and early morning. After lunch we went to the poolside just outside the restaurant, where a dance and party band, the Rock n Roll Radio Hits waas playing. They played 50's, 60's and 70's music, were very good and had everybody up and dancing. At the end the lead singer had lost some bet it seems, and had to jump into the pool, fully cothed!

There are performers all over the boat, playing in different bars and venues, and at different times, right into the early hours of the morning, so there's something going on nearly all the time if you want to keep up with them all. After the poolside band finished we went to the Centrum in the atrium of the boat, to watch a guy called Paul Fenech, one of Australia's most experienced Elvis Tribute performers. He was very good too. He had 15 years of international and domestic experience including regular performances in Memphis, New Zealand and Asia.

After that we went to our room to freshen up before we attended the 6pm show in the Entertainment Theatre. The first one was Wilbur Wilde, of Hey Hey It's Saturday show fame (I remember him as mostly the saxophonist in the show) and he also played in the bands Ol' 55 and also Jo Jo Zep and The Falcons. He sang and played his saxophone with this back up band and was quite good. He was followed by a guy called Barry Ryan of whom I hadn't heard, but I had heard of his hit song 'Eloise' that he sang and that was written by his twin brother Paul. Unfortunately we didn't think he was as good a performer as the others had been so far.

After that we got in the lift to go up to dinner and who should we be in there with! - king of the dance The Twist, Chubby Checker! He was with his lady and what should I say when I saw him but 'It's Chubby Checker!' and that's it. He just gave a smile and just then the doors opened and we all got out. They were going to dinner too. We didn't think quickly enough to get a photo with him. He was probably relieved that he wasn't asked to do that or sign an autograph.

Had to put the clock forward 1 hour tonight.

8-11-2016 Wednesday Day 3 Cruising
Woke again about 9.15am so quickly dressed and breakfast. At 11.30am I watched an Australian vocal duo (2 older vintage guys) called Shelley and Robertson (Mark & John). They were quite good, more listening music, not too many where people got up to dance. When they finished at 1pm I brought some light lunch back to our room where Dave was taking a nap. Around 2pm we made our way to Centrum to see a very good Aussie (Adelaide) band called Clearway which was formed back in 1987. The 3 guys in this band though weren't the original ones. They had the place up dancing with their worship of old school Rock'N'Roll. The band has supported many national and international acts such as Status Quo, INXS, The Sweet, Jimmy Barnes and John Farnham.

Then we went up to the poolside (Deck 9) where the Vogue Duo (man and lady) were performing, singing any and everything from Phantom of The Opera to Neil Diamond. They had everybody up and jiving too until 4pm. After that we rested back in our room until it was time to go to our 6pm 1 hour show in the Theatre, UK's The Searchers. They were fantastic! They sang some of their hits 'Sweets For My Sweet', Needles And Pins', 'Love Potion No 9', 'Don't Throw Your Love Away', 'Sugar And Spice' and 'When You Walk In The Room'. They were major contributors to the amazing 60s music revolution. They tour the globe as much today as they have done throughout a fantastic career spanning 6 decades.

At 10.30pm I went up to the Anchors Aweigh Bar to see The Stomping Ivories who were really good! They consisted of 2 amazing piano players and an equally good drummer. They took requests and could play just about anything, even the Game of Thrones theme music. They all sang up a storm, picking tunes ranging across 8 decades of popular music. A lady went up and spoke to the younger pianist and said she nearly cried when he'd sung the sad song 'Halleluia' the other day. Over the microphone he related this to the audience and then said 'Sorry about that - I am getting better though.....' They certainly had quite a sense of humour. About an hour in, this same guy said they normally have a break in their 2 and a half hour session but decided they'd keep going as they were afraid that we'd go off to bed! He probably wasn't wrong! By the time they finished at 12.45am the crowd had thinned out a lot, but not due to lack of quality of the entertainers.

9-11-2016 Thursday Day 4 Isle of Pines (Kunie), New Caledonia
I got to bed around 1am and probably didn't get to sleep for about an hour. Up at 6am as the boat was to dock at 7am and clearance to go ashore about 7.30am, so we went up for an early breakfast before taking the short trip ashore on the tender. The water was so lovely and light blue/green, like you see in Hawaii, along with beautiful white sandy beaches. In the distance you could see why it was called the Isle of Pines - you could see all the tall pine trees. The Isle is French in territory but its culture is very much Melanesian, with a population of around 2,000. As we came ashore we were greeted with a complimentary headdress crown made from a woven coconut(?) leaf and bouganvillia petals adorning it. There were also natives in traditional dress doing a traditional dance, accompanied by ladies singing.

We intentionally did not book an excursion because we felt it would be easy, and a lot cheaper, to get one of the local tour businesses. We did this but the guy spoke only a little English but it was ok. Of course that's where the higher cost comes with the excursions as you get an English speaking tour guide with it. We did ok though, along with 5 other people who had the same idea as us. The roads were well bitumened and we saw plenty of vehicles. Our 2 hour tour (AUD$25 ea) took us to the following places:-

- St. Maurice Bay - where huge wood carvings surround a religious monument commemorating the arrival of the island's founding Marist brothers.
- Notre Dame de L'Assomption Church (the Lady of Assumption) at the village of Vao - a white quite simple and not very ornate church. Apparently there is only the one Catholic religion on the island.
- Traditional dug out canoe outriggers - our driver stopped to show us a couple of these dug out canoes on the beach.
- Queen Hortense's Cave - a giant limestone cave where (many moons ago) a future queen of the Isle of Pines sought refuge from intertribal conflict. The stalactites (hanging down from the cave roof) were enormous and there were small birds, maybe swallows, quickly darting about the ceiling, grabbing a drink at the end of the dripping stalactite. It was quite cool in there as we've experienced at other similar caves. Halfway up the wall was a grotto with a statue of the Virgin Mary and offerings at her feet.
- The Penitentiary - old overgrown dilapidated prison shell. There were 2 buildings with a couple big rooms and then there was a block with small individual cells. In the late 1800s the Isle of Pines was largely used as a land of deportation.

At the end of our tour we walked a short way to where people were swimming and snorkelling in the beautiful blue water, near a what appeared to be a small vegetation-covered limestone island. The water was cool when you first got in but lovely after that. Dave tried out his snorkelling and his new underwater camera. He said it was a bit murky to see the fish well. I just enjoyed being in the water for a while until it was time to pack up and go back. There was an aluminium boat which must've been glass bottomed, because they were picking people up from the beach and just driving around in the water.

As we were walking to catch the tender back to the big boat, we saw all the cruise performers just coming on to the island for the afternoon shift - they would've worked late and slept through the morning. When we got back around 12.30pm we put our gear in our room and went up for lunch. Then back to our room, had a shower to wash off the salt and then a 2 hour nap, especially as I'd only had about 4 hours last night. We got up at 4pm and had our afternoon drinkies of rum and coke before making our way to the Theatre at 6pm to see The Pacemakers and PJ Proby. The Pacemakers didn't have Gerry with them as although he still performs with them, he has some issues and doesn't fly long distances anymore. We were expecting them to sing more songs that we knew but they only had half an hour before PJ came on to do his half hour and they were his backing group. He was good too especially seeing as he's 78 years old and also had some virus, sniffling and blowing his nose between songs (glad we weren't in the front row!). He still performed all his songs well and forcefully. Many years ago he was the one famous for crouching down very low in tight pants (not sure if it was the splits), and ended up splitting his pants.

10-11-2016 Thursday Day 5 Lifou, Loyalty Island, New Caledonia
The boat docked earlier than expected, about 9am at Lifou. This is the largest of the Loyalty Islands and was created out of fossil coral. The natives on these islands are of the Kanak culture and are known for their warm hospitality. It was a short trip to the island and our tender dropped us at the pier near the village of Easo. The water, as we got near the shore was again beautiful, green and blue with white sandy beaches. There were much more markets here in the thatched huts with more extensive products, carved wooden items, baskets, handwoven items, clothes, etc. We saw a couple gendarme (police) vehicles which they also have on Pines. We walked through the markets and then up a steep hill to one of the churches which was perched up on one of the limestone cliffs - it was a great view looking back out over the water and our anchored boat.

The Notre Dame De Lourde church, at the end of an 800 metre rough coral stepped pathway, was again quite simple with a colourful material over the altar but we noticed there were no seats at all inside(?) Maybe the people just stand for the mass. Walking down a different path we came to a lovely bay with plenty of coral formations in the clear inviting water. It cost $15AUD for each person to go down the platform and steps to the water's edge to snorkel, but Dave (who did snorkel) said it was well worth the money. There were many different types of fish and coral. The idea of the steps and cost was apparently the result of locals' upset at too many tourists causing environmental damage to the remaining small beach entry. The surrounding areas where the normal land met the sand have been slowly eroded away by the waves, leaving coral outcrops and quite a jump down to the sand, and not really accessible.

Back over the other side where we came ashore, there were lovely sandy beaches either side of the pier. One side of the pier in particular had some coral formations and fish were there too but not as many as the first spot. We had heard that turtles come to this spot but we didn't see any. It was a little overcast at times which was good as it seemed a hot day. I had a swim here and Dave did a bit more snorkelling before we packed up and got in line for the next tender back to the boat. Quite a few of performers also took advantage of the lovely day and beautiful water. We had lunch and rested up for the show.

At 6pm Gary Puckett and the Union Gap (although it wasn't his original band) was the show which went for about 1 hour and 20 min, and was very good. He's 74 years old and still going strong. Seeing as it's Rembrance Day tomorrow (11th of the 11th) he made an acknowledgement to our war veterans and sang a song for all veterans of the conflicts in which all countries have fought. At 10pm (while Dave was sleeping) I went up to the poolside on Deck 9 where The Fortunes were doing a gig. They really had the place jumping. It was a 60's theme night, and there were some good outfits. After that show finished at 12am I went down to Centrum where the John Bettison Band were playing and a lot of people were up and dancing. They do all sort of songs and were very good (the lead singer is bald and reminds me of the swimmer Michael Klim). They were actually the backing band for Wilbur Wilde the other night. A few of the performers attended this session as well. They finished up at 1am so time to go to bed.

11-11-2016 Friday Day 6 Rembrance Day Cruising
Dave was up early and was gone when I got up at 9am. I was on my way up to breakfast and met him coming back from there as he thought I'd want to sleep a fair bit longer, so he came up with me while I had mine. We came back to our room and my first priority was to type my diary as I didn't have any time last night. Then we went up to poolside where it was quite windy and had a couple drinks while we listened to the music of the line dancing attendees. At 12.30pm I wandered to the Theatre where Glenn A. Baker was to have a conversation on stage with 7 of the performers - Chubby Checker, Gary Puckett, Barry Ryan, Chris Britton (The Troggs), Frank Allen and ????????????(The Searchers), and Wilbur Wilde. They talked about the music scene in their era and how they got started and picked their names or group names. It was good.

I went to lunch on my own and then to Centrum to see the last bit of the Clearway Band which I'd seen before but were worth aother look/listen. At 3.30pm the Rock n Roll Radio Hits band came on so I stayed as I hadn't seen them properly before - they were also very good. Our 6pm show was Chubby Checker and The Wild Cats. He's 75 years old and is still very good - seems to have all his faculties about him and was so energetic. He even came down in the audience and was dancing with different people. I was watching the guy who does the Elvis tribute and he was saying how good Chubby was, and that he was performing better this trip than he was a few years ago on another Rock The Boat cruise. A guy in the lift said he'd like to have a little of whatever Chubby is on! (wouldn't we all)

I went to the 10pm show in the Anchors Aweigh bar, the UK Blitz band from Adelaide, formed only 5 years ago in 2011. They Pay tribute to the British rock/pop music scene and of course, were quite good too, and everybody got up to dance.

12-11-2016 Saturday Day 7 Cruising
Had breakfast this morning about 8.30 and back to our room to read all the stuff for our disembarkation tomorrow morning. After lunch I caught the last half hour of the Elvis tribute show and back to the room to rest up for the show. After arvo drinks in our room we to the 6pm show tonight called Rock The Boat 6 Artists. This was a line up of all the Rock The Boat 6 - Artists. They came out one after the other, all introduced by Glenn A. Baker, and sang a couple songs. Chubby was last and then they all came out on stage, joining in the last song. It was great!

After the show we had dinner, taking notice for the first time as we were facing one of the doors of the dining room, all the performers coming in at different times, for dinner. Came back to our room and packed up our one big bag with our joint things in, and put it outside our door for collection later on tonight. I went to one last show that was on at 10.30pm tonight, the Stomping Ivories. They are worth the late 1am night, especially as we have to get up early tomorrow morning, but at least we gain an hour tonight with the clock change. The Stomping Ivories (Huey and Greg) got 4 other piano players up from the audience for an impromptu jam session which was terrific. Bob Jackson (from the Fortunes), the guy from the Pacemakers and 2 others sat with them and played up a storm, so there were 3 players on each piano - squeezy. After that they got the drummer from Chubby's band up to do a duo frenetic session with the Ivories drummer, Murray, which was also great.

It has been a really good music cruise and we felt most of the performers were great. We hope to do another one and maybe even the Country one too, possibly next year.

Had to put the clock back 1 hour tonight.

13-11-2016 Sunday Day 8 Home
We docked as expected at around 6am. We got dressed and finished our last minute packing and went to breakfast. Our time slot to wait for exiting the boat was 8.50am and that was thankfully fairly quick. There was a long line for taxis but that wasn't for lack of taxi numbers - it was because there were only 3 spots at the port where they could load passengers, due to space restriction. The rest of the cabs had to line up on the street and come in when notified. Most of the delay was loading passengers bags into the taxi. This would appear bad for the taxi industry but it was not the taxis fault. There was also a marshall there from the taxi industry, who runs things, making sure the right vehicle fits the number of people, and there's no line jumping. We got home mid morning and felt for any people who had evening flights and might've been delayed due to the damaging storm.