Floating hotels come to town

The gaping expressions say it all. As the Fullers ferries glide into downtown Auckland, passengers' awed gazes slide up the shiny white side of the cruise ship Seven Seas Voyager.

It is one of a stream of floating hotels Princes Wharf is hosting this summer. Even at 206m long - twice the length of a rugby field - and sitting 50m above sea level, Voyager isn't the biggest liner we'll see. In fact, she isn't even in the top 70 by weight.

But like all the others, Voyager, on the round-the-world trip with 700 passengers and 447 crew (40 nationalities, but just one New Zealander) encapsulates a certain lifestyle - calm, moneyed, mostly retired, and mostly North American.

Life is leisurely and the clock almost meaningless. In one of the glass lifts that service nine guest decks, the Herald overheard one perfectly coiffed, white-trousered matron ask another for the time. "I don't know," came the reply. "But what more do we have than time?"

To help fill it, she could avail herself of "gentleman dance hosts on most sailings" besides four restaurants and activities ranging from shuffleboard, sunning, swilling and swimming, Las Vegas-style shows and internet surfing.

The ship feels like a blandly inoffensive upmarket hotel, the canned music low and the engines a faint vibration a long way beneath your feet. But yesterday, before the ship sailed for Picton, on-board serenity belied the activity portside as the ship disgorged its waste oil - it took four tankers - and loaded local produce.

The day-long provisioning included 50 tonnes of vegetables (just 14 days' worth), 2000 bottles of wine, 453kg of lamb racks, and 10,000 bottles of water, according to hotel director Lars Olsson. He'll pick up strawberries in Lyttelton.

Voyager's 19-day leg to Auckland started in Los Angeles, with stops at islands of French Polynesia, Rarotonga, the Cook Islands and the Bay of Islands.

The cheapest ticket is $7893, or $415 a day, to share the plainest ocean-view and balcony suite. The priciest: $28,412, or $1495 a day, to share a two-bedroom floating apartment. It might seem pricey but it includes a third person: a butler.

Tourist ships docking at Auckland for the rest of the summer and arrival times:

Clipper Odyssey Jan 28 6.30am

Sapphire Princess Jan 30 3.30am

QE II Feb 2 6.30am

Crystal Serenity Feb 6 6.30am

Oriana Feb 11 5.30am

Asuka Feb 14 6.30am

Prinsendam Feb 17 5.30am

Maxim Gorkiy Feb 20 6.30am

Sapphire Princess Feb 23 3.30am

Saga Rose Feb 28