My wife and me (late 40's early 50's) just returned from our first cruise just a 4 night cruise from Sydney to Tangalooma island and return,we had our 2 adult children and their partner's for a total of 6 of us in 3 sea view rooms on P and O's pacific Jewell which i believe was partially refurbished in early 2015.

After paying our deposit i started to do a bit of research and found a lot of negative reviews especially regarding the food so i was not expecting to much but i was pleasantly surprised.

Boarding the Pacific jewell was a breeze because it was not leaving Australia their was no customs hassles,they still x-rayed our carry on and put us thru the metal detectors but from the time of arrival at the White Bay cruise terminal ($ 75.00 for a maxi taxi from central train station for 6 of us) to the time we were in our rooms would have been 30 minutes max,15 minutes later we were having lunch in the Pantry with a selection of Australian food roast beef and vegies today,Fish and chips,Chinese,Indian curries,fruit,and of course dessert. their were 6 different counters arranged in a semi circle and you joined the que at whichever counter you wanted, picked out what you wanted and they dished it up on a plate for you, you could go to as many different serverys as you wanted even eat dessert first.Their was also a pizza bar $9.00 and a burger bar not sure of the Price.. The quality of the food ranged from so-so to quite good, if you got something that you did not like you just left in on the table for the friendly staff to pick up and went and tried something else,because the pantry is open from 0630 to about 9.30am for breakfast and 11.30 to 2.30 for lunch and 5.30 to 8.30 the ques are not to long maybe 4 or 5 mins. Breakfast was really good,coffee,tea,fruit juice, scrambled eggs.omlette,poached eggs,fried eggs bacon pancakes,pastries,fruit etc etc. Read more