Bay couple relive cruise from hell

By VICKI WATERHOUSE
"I thought 'the boat's going to cut in half or it's going to flip to the side or the water's going to come rushing through it'."
These were the words of a terrified Anne Price, who recalled her time on the P&O; cruise that went horribly wrong.
Mrs Price and her family are back in Tauranga, having returned from Vanuatu via an airline flight yesterday afternoon.
The trip of a lifetime turned into the holiday from hell for the Prices when 10m swells and gale-force winds hammered the cruise ship for the first few nights of the trip.
The ship, the Pacific Star, set out on Tuesday last week but a stopover in New Caledonia was cancelled because of the severe weather conditions and damage on the ship.
The ship berthed in Vanuatu instead and passengers were flown home.
Mrs Price said she steeled herself for the worst as the weather became extreme.
"The first two days were a nightmare," she said. "Everybody was scared."
Mrs Price was on her way to her niece's wedding in Vanuatu with husband Dave, and their two children, daughter Renee and son Adam.
Mrs Price said she and other passengers were so terrified they kept their clothes on when sleeping in case they had to abandon ship.
She said the noise the boat was making, the creaking and the waves crashing made the trip feel like a scene out of The Perfect Storm. Luckily for the family and the 1200 other people aboard, the trip did not end like the movie and everybody survived the bad weather.
The boat was shaken and tossed about during the first few days, making it difficult to get around.
"You couldn't walk properly and pictures on the walls were going from side to side," Mrs Price said. "Probably halfway through the first night I'm thinking 'why don't we just turn back?"'
A full refund will be given to the ship's passengers as well as a 25 per cent credit on their next cruising holiday in recognition of the difficult circumstances.
Mrs Price said they may well take P&O; up on their offer but not on the Pacific Star next time around. "You've got to give it to P&O; at the end of the day, they were the best," she said. "You couldn't fault them."
She said the family did attend the wedding in the end and as that was the point of the trip, she was happy.
"The wedding did go ahead and it was beautiful and [the bride] was beautiful," she said.