New Cruisier Needs Help

The last cruise I went on was back in the early 70's and that was was on a big gray USN ship so I'm really new to this. We are booked for Carnvial out of N.O.La. for the 10/24. The first itinerary was Motego Bay 9am-530pm, then Grand Cayman 7am-4pm, then Cozomel 1030am-600pm.

Now its M/B 9am-7pm.then Coz 7am-6pm.

1 port canceled , you pick up about 5 hrs of port time for the 2 remaining ports, not the best times.

Would you look at reschuleding, no offer of a price break, or up grade yet?

What would you do?

If you cancel the cruise now you are going to lose money. You will not get all your money back. All ports and times and subject to change, you could even miss all the ports because of weather and just sail no where for 7 days and they wouldn't owe you anything, read your ticket(contract). It says all that on there and in the back of the brochure booklet.

Jimbo:)

Jimbo's right, you won't get much money back if you cancel your cruise now. In fact, you are so close to your sailing date that they would probably keep most of it. And that's not just with Carnival, most cruise lines would do the same thing. You can cancel with 100% refund when you're 70 days or more away from your cruise date. The closer you get to the sailing date the more money they keep since it is much harder at that point to find someone to replace you.:(

On a brighter note, if I were you I wouldn't think about canceling. On our first cruise we had Grand Cayman as one of our ports. But we had to skip it because of rough seas. It's a tender port where you can't dock at the pier but have to use a tender to get to the dock. If the seas are very rough at all you can't go there. Even though we missed our Grand Cayman port, we had a blast and were hooked on cruising.:) There are a lot of things to do on the ship with lots of good food, nightlife, and shows. Though we were sad because we didn't get to swim with the stingrays in Grand Cayman, we had so much fun on our cruise that we immediately booked another one. I wouldn't skip out on the cruise just because of one missed port. Chances are that you may have missed it anyway due to rough seas. That happens very often with tender ports like Grand Cayman.

There is more to cruising than just the ports. These ships are like floating cities with lots of entertainment to offer. I would give the cruise a chance, you might be pleasantly surprised at how much fun you have. And this is coming from someone who is booked on the same cruise as you are. I have the same itinerary and am sailing out of N.O.L.A. So I am assuming you are talking about the Conquest (we leave on 10/31.) Just be glad that you weren't booked on one of the ships that had to change from 7 day cruises to 5 day cruises due to hurricanes. Some cruisers not only missed a port but had their cruises shortened by a day or two. It's just something that can happen when you book a cruise during hurricane season - anything can happen. You just have to roll with the punches and try to deal with it the best you can.

None of the cruise lines are offering price breaks or upgrades because of missing Grand Cayman. And they probably won't either, so I wouldn't get my hopes up there. All that any cruise line is offering at this point is the $25 port charges. Some cruise lines like HAL are offering another port to replace Grand Cayman. But Princess, Carnival, and RCI are just having another "fun day at sea" and refunding you the port charges of $25. If I were you, I would go ahead and go on the cruise and have fun. Like I said, if you haven't cruised in a while then you will be pleasantly surprised. They are like floating cities with tons of entertainment to offer. Some cruisers actually prefer to stay on the ship while in port because they like the ship so much. :)

I agree - it makes no sense to cancel now. Take a look at the shore excursions being offered in MoBay and Cozumel, or at some of the other excursion providers in those ports - you may find that the longer time in port allows you to take an excursion that you otherwise never would have had to consider. (I'm on Conquest next July, and the port time in Cozumel for which we're scheduled doesn't permit an excursion to Chichen Itza:( - but a longer port time might permit such an excusion.) There are message boards for both Jamaica and Cozumel, listing other cruisers' experiences with shore excursions and outside providers.

Since you are staying longer in these two ports, look at it this way, you can now do two or three excursions instead of one or two. You can take in Carlos and Charlie too. There will be exdtra excursions or longer ones offered. ie See the Churches/ruins in the morning, swim/snorkle in afternon and C&C at night.

Some people lose a port day and dont get extra time in those ports. Feel lucky. Grand Cayman is cancelled some because it is a tendered port and if the water was ruff it got canceled. Those people only got a sea day added. The port that was cancelled is not the cruiselines fault. There is nothing that can be done as this place is totally shut down. (for now)

Don't cancel your cruise because of a missed port. Last Oct (2004) we had a total change of itinerary because of hurricanes on the west coast of Mexico. Instead of Cabo San Lucas, Mazatlan and Puerto Vallarta, we went to Catalina Island, Ensenada and spent two great days in San Francisco. Always wondered how I was going to sail under the Golden Gate Bridge.Had been on it, over it, but not under. What a wonderful time with a cruise ship full of people on the top deck, guests and crew alike, whooping and hollering as we sailed under the Golden Gate early in the AM,and again when we left the next day. San Francisco is a wonderful city to visit, but always a pain and expensive to park, then finding the right hotel. With the cruise ship we basically had no cares and no worries.

All said and done, don't cancel your cruise. Go and have a great time. You could hit every port on your original itinerary and still not have a good time. Only you can make your cruise a fun one. Happy Sailing!

Grand Cayman was cancelled due to severe damage from Hurricane Charley/Frances/Ivan/Jeanne.