Passengers aboard a cruise ship that booted off a large "violent" family have described three days of mayhem during what was supposed to be an ideal holiday through the South Pacific.
The Carnival Legend arrived at its home port in Melbourne on Saturday, following an unscheduled stop to offload the 23-member family at Eden on the NSW south coast.
Days of onboard fighting preceded a major brawl at the ship's nightclub during the early hours of Friday morning.
Passenger Lisa Bolitho said the "big Italian family" spent the past few days attacking "Aussies", with people "getting strangled and punched up".
"Very violent, they were full-on attacks," she told reporters on Saturday.
Ms Bolitho questioned management's handling of the incident.
"The captain said 'What do you want me to do about it - throw them overboard?'" she said.
"We dropped them off at Eden yesterday, but that was after three days of violence."
She said security staff ended up "jumping" the family, and had no choice but to do so.
"They deserved everything they got - they were the aggressors."
Ms Bolitho's son Jarrah was targeted by the family, with the pair fleeing and locking themselves in their cabin.
"I was watching the fight and one guy came up to me and said 'Do you want to go too bro?'" Jarrah said, adding the offenders were in their late teens and early 20s.
"My mum had to drag me away from it all. They were trying to pick on any Aussie they could find."
Jacob Summers also questioned the security team's response to the violence.
"I think the security made it worse. The security, I saw them hit a younger girl who saw her mum getting hit. It's not good," he told reporters.
His sister Naomi said security confiscated phones from passengers who were filming the mayhem.
"If you had your phone out like that they'd snatch it straight out of your hand," she said.
Other passengers remained blissfully unaware of the violence, describing their trip as "fantastic".
A NSW Police investigation is now underway into the brawl aboard the ship, which was well into its 10-day cruise.
Carnival Cruise Line said it was offering guests a 25 per cent future cruise credit as a "goodwill gesture".
But some passengers slammed the offer as "unacceptable".
"I won't be travelling Carnival ever again so a 25 per cent off a future cruise in my eyes is unacceptable," Mark Morrison said.
"To add insult to injury ... they charged us a $19.54 credit card convenience fee to settle accounts before disembarkation this morning."
Carnival general manager Jennifer Vandekreek says there were "limited and isolated events with the family in question" in the lead-up to the brawl.
"We sincerely apologise to our guests who were impacted by the disruptive behaviour of the group removed from the ship by the NSW Police in Eden yesterday.," she said in a statement.
The group was taken ashore and then to Canberra where they made other travel arrangements, according to police.
Carnival Cruise Line has launched an internal investigation into the incident.
