And that was just the social toning. Statendam attended with equal zeal to our physical advancement. We could walk a mile at 7am, stretch and relax at 7.30, do aerobics at 8 or yoga at 9, discover younger-looking skin at 10.30 and hear about “inch loss made easy” at 11 – which competed, in every sense, with the kitchen tour at 10.30 and the executive chef’s cooking secrets at 11.30. At Melbourne, I needed a breather, so I went to the You Yangs hills to watch koalas asleep in gum trees.

The next day, we reached Tasmania. Almost 40% of the island is protected, Cradle Mountain doubly so: it’s both a national park and part of the Unesco Wilderness World Heritage area. A few years back, I hiked the Overland Track; this time, I did no more than look.

Even that was rewarding enough: the button-grass was in flower, the King Billy pines stood around, docile in the sunshine, and the jagged alp of Cradle Mountain itself posed in reflection in the dark water of Dove Lake. ONE OF the arguments for cruising is that it allows you to sample places that might tempt you to return. With seven ports in eight days, that ought to be true for New Zealand, assuming that the ports give a fair glimpse of the country.

They do. With relatively few ships calling, these are places that still have day jobs, unlike those Caribbean ports that have been so cruisified, they have become little more than extensions of the ships themselves. With the exceptions of Wellington and Auckland, the towns were low-rise, low-pressure, low-key, with wide streets and unbroken parades of solid, century-old architecture.

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BACKGROUND

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• Playground Med on a family cruise

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They were constructed by confidence and painted in optimism, bygone buildings accommodating bygone courtesies that in most parts of the world now have to be taught as customer relations. They are other-worldly, like an earthly version of a distant planet, where it has taken 50 years for light to arrive with news that life is now conducted in colour.

We made landfall at Milford Sound, in Fiordland National Park. Through a gap of interlocking hills, the ship entered a great cleft of granite, nine miles long, with walls rising to more than 4,000ft. Trees green the sides like lichen, waterfalls spout from rock so sheer, it might have been split with an axe. Kipling called the Sound the eighth wonder of the world. He, like us, must have been lucky enough to see it. Many don’t. It gets up to 22ft of rain a year.

Rural New Zealand seems to run on beta-blockers. At the Rainbow Springs Nature Park in Rotorua, it came as no surprise to learn that the tuatara, an endemic species of lizard, has a heart-beat of 10 to the minute, takes one breath an hour and is as old as the dinosaurs. A taxi driver in Wellington, surveying an old waterside building undergoing a makeover, remarked wryly: “That’ll be new soon.” Our comedienne, Geraldine Doyle, spent a morning in Timaru. “All those coffee shops and nothing to stay awake for,” she quipped.

In Napier, women on the quayside handed out buttonholes and the tour-bus drivers wore bow ties and boaters. Barry could have stepped from an Edwardian chorus line. “Excillint, excillint,” he enthused as we hurried round a trio of Hawkes Bay vineyards. “Ebso-lutely gorgeous,” he said, admiring the corduroy of vines on a passing hillside.

Local pride is irresistible. Picton has “the ninth oldest ship in the world”: the Edwin Fox carried troops to the Crimea, convicts to Australia and immigrants to New Zealand. And in Dunedin we were solemnly informed that the station, built in 1904, had been listed as one of the world’s top “must-see places”. I wouldn’t have missed it just for that. + Peter Hughes was a guest of Holland America Line. This winter, the Statendam is replaced by the almost identical (though slightly larger and newer) Volendam. Holland America (0845 351 0557, www. hollandamerica.co.uk) has 14-day cruises tracing this route between Sydney and Auckland from £2,569pp, including flights

FIVE MORE AUSTRALASIAN CRUISES

Orion

With just 106 passengers, the dinky Orion sneaks into harbours and inlets larger vessels can’t access. She specialises in expedition cruises to remote areas of Australia’s Northern Territory, as well as Papua New Guinea and Melanesia. Shore excursions, in Zodiac inflatables, are organised in cooperation with local leaders. You spenddays exploring and getting grubby,nights in champagne-fuelled luxury. A 10-night voyage from Darwin to Broome, departing on May 12, starts at £3,260, excluding flights; www.orionexpeditions.com.

Rhapsody of the Seas

This mid-market titan is based in Sydney until April, with room for more than 2,000 passengers, and an “action-packed” approach: that means a rock-climbing wall, two pools, kids’ programmes, casino, spa – the lot. Sedate she ain’t, but if the diversions appeal, she’s offering a wide variety of routes, including New Zealand, New Caledonia and the Great Barrier Reef. A voyage to Tasmania, departing on January 6 and calling at Melbourne, Burnie, Port Arthur and Hobart, starts at £2,285 for nine days, including flights; www.royalcaribbean.co.uk.

Nautica

Nautica manages to be both posh and laid-back (gourmet food but no black tie, for instance). Her December 20 sailing from Singapore to Sydney takes in Bali, Komodo (for the dragons), Thursday Island, the Great Barrier Reef and the lovely Whitsunday Islands, off Queensland. The 18-day voyage starts at £2,799, excluding flights; 01344 772344.

Seven Seas Mariner

Like the Nautica, the Mariner is medium-sized (700 passengers), upmarket (balconies with every cabin) and has a voyage from Singapore to Sydney – but she charts the opposite course, visiting the down under of down under: Fremantle (for Perth), then Australia’s south coast, taking in Adelaide and Melbourne. This winter is heavily booked and pricey, but there are deals on for next – 17 nights, departing on November 1, 2009, starts at £3,685, including flights; www.rssc.co.uk.

Oriana

For a bit of British, P&O has three ships visiting Australia this winter. Oriana is the most traditional, with teak decks and art-deco interiors, a Gary Rhodes restaurant and musicals in the Theatre Royal. Her 20-night Auckland-Hong Kong voyage takes in Sydney, the Whitsundays and Papua New Guinea, with prices starting at £2,799, including flights; www.pocruises.com . +

Prices are per person, full-board

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