We were passengers evacuated from the failed 10 night cruise around the islands of Tahiti on Variety’s Panorama II that departed Papeete on the afternoon of Friday 3rd November due to an electrical failure on board. After setting sail from Papeete and mooring overnight at Moorea we, personally, were looking forward to a cruise we had planned and booked 15 months earlier to reunite with friends from across the globe we rarely see. We did not envisage our long anticipated cruise would last less than 24hrs and we’d be dumped back in Papeete and left to scramble to sort out our own accommodation paying inflated prices for what few vacancy options were available. We understand sometimes things go wrong but we were disappointed with the actions of variety cruises for a number of reasons. 1. Setting sail with a vessel that was inadequately equipped for the safety of passengers having no electrical system backup or emergency lighting - some life jackets were faulty and there was no notification by the crew to passengers of the situation. We were forced to navigate dark passageways before we reached crew who could enlighten us to the situation on the Saturday morning. 2. Being disembarked with the advice we would have two full board nights provided while we made alternate arrangements to accommodate ourselves only to be told a few hours later that it was only going to be one night. We all lost the opportunity of beginning our search for a solution to our accommodation dilemma much earlier. This also created a problem for those of us who booked privately or through travel agents in our home countries where it was a weekend and access to assistance was therefore limited. There was limited care for our situations other than the suggestion of finding ourselves a room for the following night urgently due to limited vacancies. 3. Not being provided with suggested alternative itineraries and pricing - most holidays are planned by passengers well in advance and being given only hours to find solutions for ourselves was daunting when we were not familiar with possible alternatives for our holidays. We were familiar with the cruise itinerary and excursions, not accommodation opportunities on the islands included in our itinerary and transport options on how to get to them. 4. Promising our refund would be processed first thing Monday morning and not receiving it until nearly a month later - meanwhile having to fund our accommodations until we were able to fly home. 5. Watching the captain stand speechless on the aft deck “vaping” whilst we digested our dilemma. At least that could have been done more discreetly out of the vision of passengers whose dream holidays were just swept from under them. 6. Continuing to post images and videos on social media of cruising in Tahiti knowing the vessel was docked for repairs and there were 30+ devastated disembarked passengers spending a fortune on last minute accommodations in a very expensive location. Talk about rubbing salt into wounds! 7. The offer of a 20% discount on a future cruise taken in the next 12 months when up to 60% discounts were then advertised to the general public! Given there are no cruise destinations with this company close to Australia, any offer is mute as it involves significant cost to travel to a cruise location. NO consideration was given to us from variety cruises of those significant travel costs we are now out of pocket to get to Tahiti in the first place. We cannot afford to risk that again. We understood Tahiti was a fairly new destination for this Greek cruise company who have been around for 75 years, but it seems that they are not adequately equipped with the type of vessel required for all seasons. Every passenger on our cruise had a story behind why they’d chosen that cruise and destination. For us it was a reunion with friends from the USA who we aren’t see and a celebration of retirement after years of working up to 50 hrs a week in a highly stressful job. What better way to start retirement than cruising the islands of French Polynesia! Fifteen months of planning and waiting for a dream destination holiday snatched away in less than 24hrs. We are thoroughly disappointed.