Wehwalt

Indeed. I agree wholeheartedly. I would not say anything to the individual. At all.

There is endless stuff available on Amazon. Official looking service dog ID cards, harnesses with tags that say "PROTECTED BY FEDERAL LAW" and "DO NOT SEPARATE FROM HANDLER" and similar things that enable the fraudster. Some of them have a Department of Justice seal on them which does well to intimidate anyone who might question it. https://www.amazon.com/s?k=service+dog&crid=2E4G27AM1PDTX&sprefix=%2Caps%2C422&ref=nb_sb_ss_recent_1_0_recent

You haven't met my service boa constrictor, Squeeze? All he wants to do is hug.

I judge. Sorry. It's been too widely abused. There, I said it.

We took the Coffee and it was not good. The vehicle they take you in leaves you exposed to the wind as it drives, which distressed DW. At the farm, you never move more than 100 feet from where the bus parks, you go down and put dirt into little sacks with a seedling if you like. Then on the top level of the same platform, you pound beans to get the fruity part off the beans. Then they take you a short distance away for lunch. DW ordered a beer for me but they did not tell her it was charged for until after they opened it. Restroom facilities are inadequate as well. It was ... disappointing.

I'm onboard, as I said, and clocks go forward at 2 am. Last night and also tonight, then two nights off, and two more following to bring us even with the Azores. Below is tomorrow's schedule.

We are on board. We also watched the safety video after boarding and went to the muster station when instructed. The morning after embarkation, we got a letter informing us that we had either failed to watch the safety video or visit our muster station and setting forth safety procedures. And we found that they had reset the safety video sometime after we had watched it and so it played again before we could go to other TV. We concur that the ship's a bit run down. Now back to your regularly scheduled LIVE.

I don't think either the Campbells or the media are interested in further exploration of the circumstances of what happened. Both got what they wanted out of there being a story. The Campbells got pressure on NCL to make a full reimbursement, which either will work, or it will not (right now it's the latter) and since no one is ever the villain in their own head, they are happy to have dinged the cruise line. The media filled a few minutes or webpages, and they aren't totally unhappy to ding the cruise industry, with its "privilege" and it's (in their minds) environmentally questionable way of travel. As for the cruise line, it gets free publicity that it goes to exotic ports and people who would take NCL on an African cruise are going to be understanding that the cruise line is not going to wait.

Regarding whether the company would have a "get you to next port" guarantee. I doubt that catering to cruise passengers is a huge part of the company's business. I see there are only eight more days on which a cruise ship is scheduled to dock in Principe in 2024, and only five in 2025. Most likely the greater part of their business is people who fly in, for example from Portugal.

If all they had was a credit card, then most likely they flew. Overland travel in Africa is gonna require cash. Senegal pictures? Here's one from my visit on the Amsterdam in 2018. You know how they call a speed bump a sleeping policeman in some countries?

Mike, thanks for taking us along. Quick question for you. Is the Explorations Cafe the only place you can get specialty coffees in the morning?

Even though the island is only thirty miles long, the fact that you're dealing with a not-very-developed African country screams for allowing ample time. The up side is that the island is getting lots of publicity. Readership of the Wikipedia articles has tripled. Perhaps that will translate into increased tourism. https://pageviews.wmcloud.org/?project=en.wikipedia.org&platform=all-access&agent=user&redirects=0&range=latest-20&pages=São_Tomé_and_Príncipe|São_Tomé

That is what happened when I broke my arm in Tahiti. The port agent came to my hospital room with my passport and baggage and was helpful in getting me a hotel room and a medical service to assist me for a week until the bone had knit enough for me to fly back to the States.

There is a rather lengthy discussion on the NCL board that seems to be generating as much heat as light.

I got my platinum on the Noordam in July, which I finished with 702 nights. On our next cruise guest services got in touch to ask if I had gotten mine on my previous cruise, and I assured them that I had.

The HAL GWV last year left a passenger in hospital in Angola, who later died. At least this passenger was well enough to fly home. It is regrettably the nature of cruising that there are medical issues and sometimes the ship does not feel they can treat aboard.

I think all Princess ships are Medallion class and have been for some time. Platinum is 700. I got mine on the Noordam last summer. DW got her medallion too. I'm not sure I could put my hands on all four that I've been given.

I bought daffodil bulbs in Holland and England, they had certificates, I declared them, the customs officer didn't want to see them, they were still blooming as of the time I sold the house two years ago.

I believe there is a special price for the package on Grand Voyage segments of 50 or more days. That may be what is being described in post #21.

Baltimore is an attractive cruise port despite being relatively far from open ocean because it is very drivable. If you are going to fly then for an hour or at most two more you can be in FLL and take a cheaper ship that leaves from a port much closer to the action. Norfolk is less attractive not because of flight connections but because it is further from DC and other cities within a hour or so drive of the Baltimore cruise port.

I would suspect that the cruise lines do not want to be in the business of busing people from Baltimore to Norfolk. I anticipate generous cancellation policies, but it won't be their job to bus passengers except for returning from the voyages that have already started.

Far off-site parking, such as at MetLife, is certainly not going to attract people to keep the cruise even though it's not in Baltimore anymore. The bags are going to be another issue. And I probably left my car in a Meadowlands parking lot overnight sometime in my New Jersey career, I would not have liked to do it if people could tell no one's coming back for the car for ten or twelve days ...

Somewhere upthread it was mentioned that the Chesapeake Bay Bridge (U.S.-50), under which cruise vessels leaving Baltimore must pass before reaching the open sea, has clearance of 186 feet. There was some discussion that this might be replaced in the future, though. Today won't speed that up, I'd guess. First things first.

Agreed. The question is, is it worth putting an additional RCCI ship in there if it's going to be months or longer, say if it's going to be all summer, or is there somewhere else it could more profitably go?

Major problem I see is that if they are both in Bayonne for any length of time, they're going to compete with each other. If RCCI felt it was worth having another ship there, they already would. But I would think immense resources are going to be devoted to getting a channel open to reopen the Port of Baltimore. Once it is, the problem goes away.