dmwnc1959

Just now, schmoopie17 said:

But yet they'll still go on cruises knowing full well there are no hash browns or cookies.

What are those people thinking?

 

The horror! 🤣

8 minutes ago, DCGuy64 said:

Perception becomes reality.

What an excellent way of putting it. Can’t begin to tell you how many people I’ve talked to that won’t go on a cruise because they don’t want their ship to sink like Costa did in Italy. Or have my ship catch on fire like that one Carnival did the other day. Or get Norovirus like that news report said the other week. Or get abandoned on some African island like what I heard on the news last night. Or, or, or. It becomes an echo chamber of perception becoming reality. 

17 minutes ago, WonderMan3 said:

Alexa, play “Let It Go” from the movie “Frozen”

Which is exactly what’s happening at someone’s house right now. But not mine.

🤣 🤣 🤣

Just now, WonderMan3 said:

Yes, because we are here daily reading about cruise passengers in Egypt and Morocco being kidnapped and killed. 🙄🙄

In 2024 I wouldn’t put it past them to give them that chance. Which is why I’m safer in New York City. But you go ahead and go to Egypt and Morocco this year, I’ve already been there - when it was safer. Glad I got my world traveling out-of-the-way when the world was a better place. Didn’t have to worry about being stuck in some Third World country.

Just now, WonderMan3 said:

The United States was much safer back in the 80’s too with much lower gun violence. Will you be exiting the U.S. in addition to avoiding African countries?

I’ve walked down the streets of Manhattan, visited Philadelphia and Cleveland, and been to a lot of cities in the past few years that get a bad rap for high crime. I don’t think I’ve visited any countries lately where some fringe group will kidnap you and kill you. Just saying.

9 minutes ago, ssawjo said:

There is also an US Embassy in downtown Sao Tome.  If things were that bad, they should have gone there for assistance…

From the US State Department website

7 minutes ago, yakcruiser said:

I will admit I've been guilty of thinking this way. But after seeing how the people in this part of Africa helped this rag tag group of folks that includes a paraplegic negotiate their way through 7 countries in 48 hours to catch up to their ship makes me seriously consider doing a land trip there some day.

Keep in mind that this is a very tiny island off the western coast of Gabon and Equatorial Guinea, roughly the same square mileage as Key West. It would most definitely be different than doing a land trip through Egypt, Kenya, or Morocco. I’ve been to all of those places, but in the 80s when it was much safer. Don’t think I’d go back there again these days.

3 minutes ago, Capitan Obvious said:

 

It is interesting how the media frames this as "the cruise line left them" instead of the more truthful "they didn't return to the ship on time" angle.

 

When the bell for class rings, Mr Hand locks the door and leaves Spicoli in the hall.

 

Life lessons from Ridgemont High my friends . . . life lessons.

‘ABANDONED’ sells better. And didn’t Spicolli get back in that class, invited back in by the mean old teacher, even had a pizza delivered? Some people always have their cake and eat it too. Except everyone shared in that pizza! 

2 minutes ago, cltnccruisers said:

Have a great trip.  We start a 10 day on Celebrity Silhouette this Saturday, then Sun Princess on 10/24, Majestic Princess in 2/25 and Enchanted Princess in 10/25.  That might be all she wrote, but we'll see.

Despite all the bumps and bruises the cruise line has gone through in the last several years, this recent indecent not withstanding, we will all continue to cruise until they can spread our ashes off of the stern into the churning ocean. As an old Navy guy, that’s my wish. 

1 minute ago, cltnccruisers said:

You from PGH?  Bethel Park and Ross Twp for my wife and I.  Left for NC in 2001 'cuz we hate snow.  😀  So you'll be transiting the canal.  Been on my bucket list for years, but all DW thinks about are the bugs.

Funny thing is, I don’t even live in Pennsylvania but the closest big airport to me is Pittsburgh 🤣. NC happens to be an old stomping ground. I was actually booked first on the Coral Princess doing the Panama Canal, and after a very long time of weighing all of the information kept Norwegian Jade. 

18 minutes ago, Tyler414 said:

Enjoy, my first ever cruise was on NCL, and I really enjoyed it!!

Meant to say as a first time with NCL. This will be like cruise #54 or something, I started decades and decades ago on Carnival and worked my way around most the entire rodeo. Have another cruise booked in the Spring of 2026 with Holland-America doing Alaska again (this will be Alaska cruises #8 and #9), and looking at doing a 14-night B2B cruise on Carnival Celebration in December 2026. 
 

NCL will always be on the back-burner for me, not because of what happened here in this recent incident. And not because of the bad reputation NCL gets sometimes as a nickel and dime operation. I’ve just really enjoyed the Royal-class of Princess a lot. Plan on getting back there eventually. Maybe this next cruise on NCL will change my mind. 
 

2 minutes ago, DCGuy64 said:

If I have the choice to believe a multibillion dollar company that ferries 1,000s of passengers all over the world every single day and has to abide by multiple sets of maritime and landbased laws and regulations, and a group of irresponsible adults who are trying to have their 15 minutes of fame, I'll choose the corporation Every. Single. Time. Others are free to do differently.

Enough said. 😎

7 minutes ago, Tyler414 said:

One more, of many reason's I will never step foot on another NCL ship.

Yet despite all of this, my 😢 ‘reputation’ here of being 😉 ‘the agitator’, and the countless threads I’ve started and posted in questioning NCL, I’m still booked on a 32-night cruise from Florida to Alaska, already have my pre-flight hotel booked in Pittsburgh, already have six shore excisions booked, and will be booking my pre-cruise hotels this Friday. For a cruise that’s still a year away. 
 

Despite all of the appearances on how this was handled by both sides, I’m still going on my cruise as a first-timer. And I’m pretty damned excited about that. 

Just now, graphicguy said:

Huh?  Goodwill gesture!

 

Pretty much run its course.  

 

This time next week this will be a "remember the time those people in Africa missed the ship?"

It won’t even be a week. Once we all let this thread die it’ll be a matter of days. There will always be some other NCL controversy that will take precedent! 

Just now, DCGuy64 said:

If NCL elects to reimburse passengers, even though it has no liability whatsoever and is in no way required to, I'm sure that won't stop the haters on here who will still somehow say NCL is evil and should be boycotted, sued or burned at the stake. 🤣🤣

… or the NCL cheerleaders, or the stockholders who think they have a financial obligation to protect NCL, or the people that have traveled NCL all of their life and think it’s the best cruise line ever and the NCL can do no wrong. Those shoes fit on both feet.

2 minutes ago, beastlet said:

 

You overestimate the attention span of the public. In 5 minutes there will be another story and everyone except cruisegeeks like us will have forgotten this.

Remember a few years ago, a family all over the news because they hadn't bought the cruise insurance and their kid was diagnosed with leukemia and they couldn't make the cruise and wanted their money back or a credit? All over the news. I bet very few people remember it now., And same situation. Family thinks they're special and should get a special exemption when they chose not to buy the insurance and instead took the risk. Their child being diagnosed with leukemia was sad and tragic,  but isn't different than if their child had gotten appendicitis which is less sad, less tragic, but also would have made them miss the cruise. 

Sort of like the very recent news story of a travel agent who stiffed 50 people (?) Then boarded the ship, leaving them on the pier. That news story is pretty much forgotten. 

1 minute ago, thedarklord said:

 

No, I don't think there's any admission of guilt by NCL with that.  NCL told them to get to Gambia at their own cost to rejoin the ship there which they did.  When it turned out the ship couldn't dock at Gambia due to weather, NCL has covered the cost from Gambia to the next port - that feels reasonable, as that isn't down to the individuals being late, that's down to a decision by NCL, the passengers have done their part.

Still, not the hardline abandonment NCL would like to think by saying it all falls back on the passenger at their expense. 

19 minutes ago, Ashlynkat said:

Or take extra security precautions like NCL did and stay on schedule so the ship doesn’t stay in a high piracy zone any longer than it needs to? 

I find it extremely reckless that any cruise line would schedule a ship through a high piracy zone. There are plenty of other places in the world that will not put your passengers at risk, or require a military escort and the onboarding of extra security and ammunition. Sounds like a money grab by NCL. 

1 minute ago, Boatdrill said:

 

 

NCL is reimbursing them only for the Gambia to Senegal portion, not their entire "adventure" which began in Sao Tome. 

So, there is some ‘admission of guilt’ by NCL. 

13 minutes ago, WonderMan3 said:

If a port was not safe for passengers to debark then the cruise line would not go there.

So, the blanketed warning statistics and quoting of safety levels in Caribbean and Mexican ports, those are seemingly worthless based on the fact that cruise lines go there ALL the time. 🤔

3 minutes ago, DCGuy64 said:

100% agree. Typically entitled, "I'm the victim," 0% responsibility passengers. NCL did nothing wrong and I hope those people get zilch.

It has already been reported at NCL plans on reimbursing these passengers for all of their expensive getting back to the ship. 
 

‘Norwegian noted the passengers were responsible for making their own travel arrangements to rejoin the ship.’
 

“Despite the series of unfortunate events outside of our control, we will be reimbursing these eight guests for their travel costs from Banjur, Gambia to Dakar, Senegal," a cruise line spokesperson said. "We remain in communication with the guests and are providing additional information as it becomes available."

17 minutes ago, Two Wheels Only said:

 

I'm not denying anything. I've booked independent excursions, too.

 

My point is that whatever negative publicity this will generate, NCL will continue to fill their ships and as a possible side effect, people might be less likely to book the independent excursion if (in the back of their mind) people remember this story. 

People have short attention spans, and this news story will be forgotten the next time there’s another bomb dropped or massive snow storm in April. Climate change and war have that effect on news.
 

Yes, NCL will continue to fill their ships, and cancel ports of call that they never had any intention of going to, and people will continue to experience poor Haven experiences, and complain about bad food, and all of the other threads that happen on cruise critic, 

And NCL will continue to fill their ships.

😎

8 minutes ago, Kortehgehn said:

I must have missed this... I wasn't aware that NCL was reimbursing any of the passengers costs in this situation.

It’s been reported by several news outlets today. 

1 minute ago, blackwing said:

I disagree.  There are some things that are out of control, like weather and car issues.  But there are plenty of things that ARE within a passenger's control.  Such as gauging whether it is a good idea to take a tour of say, 6 hours roundtrip, when there are only 8 hours on shore.  Booking the dolphin swim at the place 15 minutes from the dock on your own instead of doing it through the cruise line?  Almost certainly safe.  Booking a private tour with a guy who will show you around and there's not a definite itinerary or absolute timeframe?  Risky.

 

I think the thing you keep ignoring in your repeated defense of these passengers is that the lead couple are supposedly very experienced cruisers.  They should have known all of this.  And yet when they made a colossal mistake, they are trying to act like the cruise line did them wrong.

It was a posted earlier someone booking a six hour, round-trip train excursion to Berlin, and that there was no way they weren’t booking it through the cruise line to avoid such an incident. Now, imagine that there had been a train derailment, or some factor that delayed a train full of people getting back to the ship. And wasn’t there relatively safe boat excursion in the Bahamas recently when it sank out from underneath them? Good thing it was close by. 

5 minutes ago, Woofbite said:

Sorry, don't know the details and don't really need to know.  I do know that anyone taking an independent tour has to realize that things can always go wrong and they may have to plan for the unexpected.  Traffic accidents being the most common.  Judgment matters in life.  Travelers should be expected to use some.

 

Had this happened to a bus load of ship-sponsored shore excursion passengers in the Caribbean or Alaska would you still be defending the cruise line? I guess in your eyes - and the eyes are so many people here - the cruise line can do no role.