Freckles1983

Not even nearly the most selfish of behaviours I saw both on the ship and on land. We are on our second last night of our trip and it has been a good trip but I will never do another land tour again (for more than just covid reasons). And we probably won’t be cruising/vacationing again any time soon just due to the increased unpredictability now. I know that travel always comes with risk but it’s gonna be a bit before I’m willing to put up with all the extra BS that goes along with it nowadays. again sending well wishes for a speedy recovery of health and money to CafeBruno

I was on this exact same trip as you and I’m so sorry to hear you’ve been left in the lurch like that. Our tour continues to dwindle as more people who tested positive today (on their home brought testing kits) just decided to leave early and fly home. We are about to head to the airport for our flight to Whitehorse so I’m curious about how many more we lost. Yes cruising and travelling is a choice associated with risks but a little bit of concern for your fellow travellers goes a long way. Sorry again to hear your trip ended this way and I hope HAL comes right for you even if it’s a bit late.

That was exactly my thought. Maybe to some it’s just another affordable vacation but for my husband and I it was a considerable amount of money and quite a splurge for us that would have been really upsetting if we lost that money over something we could prevent. After talking to many of the people on our tour group we did seem to be less well off than most financially. We did our cruise first. another update, I spoke with a couple last night that had said a family on the parallel tour to us said that (the mother was on the trip but her daughter and their family tested positive and she didn’t) HAL was giving each person a $100 a day to pay for food etc. putting them up in a hotel and paying for flights home as well as refunding the money for the days missed on their trip due to having to quarantine. Now that’s just hearsay from one person to another but If HAL is doing that I’m glad to hear so. I feel for the tour director who lost 29 out of her 32 person group because I imagine she won’t be getting her gratuity from those people. I realize gratuity isn’t guaranteed but I imagine they rely on that much like other people working in the service industry. I’m glad to hear most people on your trip were masking. I was shocked at the lack of it even from the get go on the ship to start and then on the land tour. As time went on less and less seemed to bother wearing them. HAL supplied 2 n95 masks in our stateroom upon embarking and I imagine they would have resupplied them if asked. I brought packs of my own masks though. Also they were available for free at the denali lodge in almost every shop and in the main lobby.

Still completing the tail end of our Alaska / Yukon land tour and most windows of stores had “hiring now” signs in place. So there is a ton of work available. It has impacted service and timing but you can tell everyone is working hard and trying their best. Our tour director on our trip told us that the rest of June land tours had been cancelled.

I personally would recommend masking after seeing how many people didn’t and ended up being removed from the rest of the tour. We all spend so much money and time on these vacations that it’s better safe than sorry. I am still shocked at the amount of people that were left behind on our tour. Safe travels to you

Also to vent further.. there was one woman on our trip who was clearly very ill and not wearing a mask at all coughing up a storm on the bus yesterday afternoon. She could barely stand and was blaming it on allergies and then used COPD as a reason when talking to someone else. Another lady on our tour was very upset and agitated about the testing and was almost in tears during the waiting up until the swabbing. Both were gone today along with their travel companions. Do what you need to do to keep yourself healthy because you would think people who are not well would at least have the courtesy to cover up and protect their fellow travellers but they don’t. People are selfish and as much as I dislike wearing a mask I’m glad I did now. For all I know I still might test positive in the coming days regardless of how careful I’ve tried to be. But to think one tour dwindled down to 3 people out of 32 .. that’s crazy to me. I realize not necessarily all 32 ppl tested positive but 32 peoples vacations were affected by it

We have no idea because they just weren’t in the lobby this morning to go to the airport. Our tour director who has been awesome btw, said that once you test positive the company (Beacon I think it was called) took over and it was out of HALs hands. I’m really curious what happened to all those guests though and how they will get home. one odd thing I will mention was that yesterday morning we did the riverboat tour and gold dredge which was included in our vacation when we booked it. Well after the boat ride they had a lunch that was included that was served family style at long bench/picnic style seating. Literally crammed in there side by side like prisoners in a mess hall. I sat down and kept my mask on and didn’t eat at all cause it seemed like a recipe for disaster. I made a comment that I thought it was gross and my husband shhhd me but how do you stuff ppl in like that?! Well 7 of the people directly surrounding us were not with us this morning so I wouldn’t be surprised if more people turn up sick in the following days (myself and husband included). anyway just seemed irresponsible to feed a group like that but I’m a germaphobe so you can take my opinion as you like. I personally found it a bad idea. I’ll post more info as I get it

Just flew into Canada (Yukon) from Fairbanks and two groups tested last night. Our group started with 36 people and we lost between 8-10 people. The second group had 32 people and they lost 29 people.

Got to Fairbanks yesterday afternoon from denali (on the Y1 HAL land cruise tour) and they required us to have a covid test with a negative result to board our flight to Yukon tomorrow. Even though us/Canada testing requirements have been lifted HAL is requiring it. Also told masking is no longer optional on HAL travel (bus/plane/train etc) thankfully we tested negative but a lot of very nervous people in our group today during the testing

On the nieuw Amsterdam rn and hardly anyone wearing masks. I’m not sure how strictly they will enforce that on your cruise but it doesn’t seem like anyone cares here. We are still masking but seem to be the minority

What a relief, Enjoy ☺️

Locoloco1 & Gray Lady i will keep you all posted. Just at the airport now waiting for our flight to Vancouver. Got our covid negative test results 5 mins before we left our house. airport service at west jet has been trash so far. Rude and not helpful. hopefully it’s all up from here but I won’t lie, I’m not feeling too positive at the moment. again so sorry to hear about all the terrible situations with peoples trips getting canceled/rescheduled over and over again. I can’t imagine the stress that would cause and vacations are supposed to be a time to destress. My heart really goes out to you all I’ll update as I can.

Wow we are supposed to be sailing out on Sunday on the nieuw Amsterdam to Alaska Yukon and triple Denali. They offered us a lot to voluntarily drop out. I’m so sorry you’re going thru this and I would be devastated if the same thing happened to us. But now I’m wondering if I should have just taken the offer after reading this post. Good luck on your future trip planning and again I’m sorry for the cancellation 😔

Thanks for all the responses. I just always like to make sure I cross all my t’s and dot all the i’s 🙂

Thanks for all the responses. I always get nervous when a “you may be denied boarding” msg pops up. I appreciate the help