These are pictures from a cruise I took on the Pacific Sky cruise line in May 2003. The 8 day tour included 3 stopovers, the first one at Port Vila, Vanuatu, the second on Lifou Island North of New Caledonia and the last at Noumea.
After a memorable trip across Sydney Harbour it was three days before we sighted land again, in the form of the Boulari Passage, a narrow reef rimmed gully that rounds the southern tip of New Caledonia.

The passage way is a natural shortcut for ships crossing New Caledonia, but a potentially hazardous one.. so much so that by 1861, after many ships were lost entering the harbour, Paris was asked to build a lighthouse to help cut down on the Sea Toll. The lighthouse, one of the worlds tallest at 56 metres tall, was assembled in Paris and shipped out to Noumea a few years later.

The next day after Boulari we landed at Port Vila, Vanuatu. We took a helicopter ride over the harbour (and the cruise ship) then fooled around in town for a bit before catching the ferry out to Irirki Island.. a small tourist orientated area close to Vila.

In the picture below you can see the clouds beginning to role in.. by the time we got back to the boat the downside of tropical life had begun to pour from the sky... it kept up for most of our next day on Lifou island, and worse yet I broke my first digital camera on the beach in an unfortunate seating mishap... (happily this meant I had to buy another, much better camera!)

So, with no digital camera and no more velvia film left for my Nikon N80 I was content to put my camera away for the rest of the trip, that is, until the sun setting as we were leaving Noumea had me scrambling down the deck stairs to the boat's camera store to buy some print film. (bottom Picture)

The cruise line (Princess cruise line) we travelled on treated us very well, so far its the best cruise line I've been on!
To anyone who has not been on a cruise ship before, and is considering it.. jump in, it's likely the only regret you will have is when the voyage is over. I'm already planning my next cruise from Vancouver up to Alaska.