Fred and I booked B2B on the PG beginning 5/21. We were PIPsters the first week. Had a fabulous time. (Will post a review later.) On Saturday afternoon, 5/28, we stood on our balcony and sadly watched all the PIPsters but David and Wendy board the bus. But we also congratulated ourselves on booking B2B. Second best cruise decision we've made. (The first was signing up with Ngaire.) And we still believe that to be true. We had a wonderful leisurely day looking forward to our second exciting luxurious sailaway dinner on PG. We planned to dine with David and Wendy.

Early in the day we learned that a group of 166 would board the ship. When we saw the Saturday schedule, we noted that L'Etoile was posted closed. Dinner was to be in La Veranda. We assumed that L'Etoile was reserved for the group of 166 and that was, indeed, the case.

We entered La Veranda in high spirits and went directly to the table where David and Wendy were seated. And that's when the shoe fell. David leaned in my direction and said "Pat, it's a buffet." The PIPsters would have recognized it well. It was essentially the same lunch buffet we had eaten seven hours earlier in the day. RSSC had created two classes of passengers for the remainder of the cruise. Those in first class were the group of 166 who were dining in L'Etoile in the grand style they had anticipated and paid for. They had the standard sailaway menu, snappy service, and were dining on what the PG calls "the finest food ever served in the South Seas." The rest of us, numbering 130, were seated in coach eating a very ordinary weakly presented buffet lunch. We were denied the dinner we had anticipated and paid for.

I was livid. So much so that I spoiled any chance David and Wendy would have at enjoying their second lunch of the day and to them I apologize. I made my feelings known to the Maitre D and sulked off. Fred was angry but more calm. After "lunch" he headed directly to the Internet Cafe to punch out a massage of protest to Mark Conroy.

What a way to start a cruise! That evening was, of course, ruined for us. And the experience colored the remainder of the trip.

As you would expect, word of this outrage spread quickly among the 130 who had been, to use a gentle word, slighted. It seemed to skew their response to the inevitable inconveniences posed by a large group on a small cruise ship. The group was programmed and therefore out-of-the-way a lot of the time. But when they were free they congregated at the small pool on deck 8 rendering the entire deck off limits to the rest of the passengers. There was no "off limits" sign posted of course, but if you weren't part of the group trying to swim there or read a book lounging in the sun was like attending the wrong wedding.

There was an ugly incident involving the group on one of our days in Moorea. It was mid-day. It was hot. About a dozen passengers were waiting for the tender to take them back to the ship. The tender was late because it was bringing a full load of groupies to shore to participate in some kind of organized event. When the tender finally landed and offloaded the groupies, the crew informed the waiting passengers they would be picked up on the next round trip because the tender had to rush back to the ship to fetch the remaining groupies. A mini-mutiny insued. The waiting passengers defied the crew and boarded the tender anyway. They weren't happy campers.

You should know that there were no additional major outrages after Saturday night. The next morning, the Hotel Director sought me out on deck, addressed me by name, and said "I know you are upset and I am very sorry about that. I want you to know that the decision to do this was made at corporate headquarters, not by the crew of this ship." When I got back to the cabin, a note of apology awaited me. And the Hotel Director had upgraded our cognac order to XO. From Sunday morning on, both David and Wendy and Fred and I noticed an increase in the quality of service. It had been great before, but now it literally shined. No doubt the "damage control" order had been given. My coffee cup was never empty at breakfast. I ordered a breakfast steak and the serving they brought was almost as large as the plate. Monday on the motu I order gin and tonic for the two of us. I collected our drinks and when I looked back a minute later I noticed the bartender had lined up three more drinks for each of us. While we appreciated the extra attention from this already excellent crew, we felt they were as much the victims of Saturday's outrage as we were. They work so hard and so well they just don't deserve the added burden of damage control.

But for six of us, the ordeal wasn't quite over yet. We were booked on the 8:20 a.m. Air France flight back to LA. We had purchased our direct transfer from RSSC at a cost that exceeded that of the short cab ride from the ship to the airport. We were scheduled to leave the ship at 5:40 a.m. We noticed a large number of the groupies were scheduled to leave at 6:00 a.m. to catch the same flight. We were pleased to see that for once we'd be in line at the airport AHEAD of the groupies. But that was not to be. The "direct transfer" we had purchased from RSSC was not a direct transfer at all. The bus we boarded at 5:40 a.m. then stopped at three other hotels loading passengers and luggage. When we arrived at the crowded airport the groupies were already standing in line.

What a way to begin and end a cruise!

Only questions remain. Why did this happen? No one at RSSC has offered an explanation. Was it an isolated incident or does this happen frequently on the PG? Did Grand Circle have a role in this? The lady coordinating the groupies was stationed at the Grand Circle table in the Reception area. Does this incident presage bad things to come for the PG? Given the fact that the eyes of the luxury cruise world and on the PG, how in heaven's name could Radisson let this happen? Finally, do I recommend the PG to friends? I've done so in the past. But I would never never do it if I suspected there was a good chance their sailaway night would be like ours on 5/28.

Pat