What a Mess

[LindaandJeff]

To the OP, I hope your vacation gets better and that you have a wonderful time. The Mercury crew is fantastic - we had freinds on last week's cruise - and they had a great experience despite the noro.

 

Reminder that if you have travel insurance you can just get in a cab and save your receipt. Quite possibly, Celebrity would have reimbursed you.. If not, your travel insurance would take over. When we had a cruise delayed by a day, the cruiseline (Regent) picked up all of our expenses (hotel, dinner, breakfast, transfers to the hotel, - but not the one to the ship becasue we would have had to pay that anyway, etc.).

 

To the person who said why not just cancel - not everyone can just change the date of their vacation. Even if all of the expenses are covered, if you work somewhere that requires you to give several months notice of a vacation, then you are pretty much stuck with the date you picked.

[Papa T]

I have experienced 8 wonderful Celebrity cruises, but my experience has consistently been that Celebrity fails to provide timely information to cruisers about issues or changes during a cruise and that the shore support staff can be shorthanded and sometimes clueless in dealing with difficult but predicable operations.

[JEDIKNIGHT]

It's miserable I'm sure and you're right, it's EASY for us to say "oh, well, it happens" and "Celeb did so well". We're not there. We're not in the middle of a cluster-frack, an unexpected major disappointment, lugging baggage in substandard hotels with service that is 'confused' or lacking in existence.

 

I am in no way saying "I understand what you're feeling" but I'd like you remember ONE THING: Your hellish day WILL come to and end. In the end you'll be on the ship enjoying a nice meal, or you'll be back home safe and sound, planning your next cruise which will be grand.

 

You'll get thru this. You will. Just hang in there.

[JEDIKNIGHT]

I guess I'm too much of a wuss but if it were me, I'd have cancelled 1st thing, taken my 15%, and my fat yet cute backside would've been the heck out of town as quick as possible. I'd rather take my remaining days off and be at home, relaxing, going out to eat, fooling around with DW (if the lights are off, this way she can't see me) and just vegging out. I'd not want to be around hotels in Charleston getting Noro because a few geniuses can't be bothered to wash their hands. Sure, it's possible the upcoming partially bleached cruise would be fun, but I'd take my 15% and have a great cruise in the future.

[mechcc]

. I'd not want to be around hotels in Charleston getting Noro because a few geniuses can't be bothered to wash their hands. quote]

 

You do have a point - South Carolina is having a major outbreak of noro right now so it may not matter how much cleaning the Mercury does, this next cruise may also suffer a major outbreak. It does take about 48 hours from once exposed to getting sick. Thus seemingly healthy people can get on the ship but actually spread the disease. And regardless of how careful everyone on the ship is about personal hygine, it can still spread quickly. So if it does, is Celebrity going to take the blame?

[JEDIKNIGHT]

In all fairness I can't blame Celebrity for an illness made by God or Mother Nature, take your pick. 1st and foremost I blame people who are careless about hygene, handwashing, etc.

 

In the future though, I'd be elated to see MANDATORY sanitizing of pax hands, and anything else they can do to police this Noro thing. If I were hungry and waiting to get to lunch and they made me wait in the sanitizer lines, I'd thank them.

[80sramfan]

I think its unfortunate that the OP had such a terrible experience however I'm not sure I would have let my fate be in someone else's hands if I didn't like the way things were going.

 

A cab would have gotten you to the suggested hotel with little damage except to your wallet. Once the situation seemed like boarding might not happen, I would have been on my phone making my own reservation. If I was in Charleston, wanted a good meal and it was not available close to my hotel, I would have again called a cab.

 

Sometimes you have to take charge of your own situation. Insurance would reimburse you for these expenses if X wouldn't.

 

When traveling, hope for the best but be ready to take charge and make lemonade out of lemons, if necessary!

 

BTW, it would sure get everyone's message out better if the titles of these threads were more descriptive of the information you wish to disseminate. I looked over this one several times and I am sailing on Mercury 3/8 and 3/19. So I am interested.:)

 

You are 100% correct. I posted these sentiments yesterday but they were quickly deleted. This is obviously more the fault of the OP than it is Celebrity. You just can't sit back and let things happen in these type of situtation. You must be proactive and protect yourself.

[sailor2010]

As frustrated as the OP is over this, as most of us would be, I do think Celebrity is doing the right thing here. There is no point in continually infecting others, try and eradicate the virus. I would gladly wait an extra day to cruise rather than spend 4 days locked in my cabin feeling awful.

 

On a side note, I do not understand why everyone on these boards seem to think someone is flaming their favourite cruise line just because they may not have had a great experience. I'm sure the moderators have more to do than to eliminate every post which some may not agree with, yet might be fact based. Our experiences are all subjective, are they not?

 

I agree 100%, if you post even the slightest negative thing they get upset. This isn’t China! I have said many times I would like to hear it all to make informed decisions. People can believe what they want to believe.

I think if people look at the original post you see the police kept them back and there was no rep. from the cruise line outside giving direction, like a temp. table setup. So if they were trying to get info and can’t get in what are they suppose to do? The police directed them to a hotel.

[WineDown17]

I am not defending X in the least-

 

I personally am just not a fan of the "nannys state" zeitgeist so many have. I expect no one to make sure my needs are met except myself.. If I am unhappy in any situation- I do something about it. Period.

 

Sh*t happens. Especially where Noro is concerned!

 

This was a public health issue- police were there- how do we know that the state health dept maybe was not forthcoming with X? X does not own the state or the port... I am sure there were multiple bureaucracies at fault on this one.

 

Lets hope they all get it better next time..but if they dont, and I am impacted? I wont wait to be taken care of by some unseen, unknown, uncertain entity.

[JEDIKNIGHT]

lol@ sh** happens, especially with Noro.

[JEDIKNIGHT]

WineDown...

 

I'm with you on the Nanny State. Believe me I am I've even written so in previous posts. For instance, I hate the smell of cigarettes but I'm against gov't banning them in restaurants...even if it's to my benefit. Ditto trans fats, bad breath, whatever. "I don't like what you say, I don't like what you do, but I'll fight for your right to say it and do it" is what I believe. But when others can be harmed....I then support more stringent actions.

 

But I am for a private business, especially a tourism oriented one taking more precautions. This was not X's fault IMO. Getting sick, even Noro is a fact of life but hand-washing, and requiring the use of hand sanitizer can help contain this horrible illness better.

[Harley Granny]

I'm getting the impression that the biggest complaint is the lack of communications between Celebrity and the passengers.

 

Sure they could have taken a cab but the information given them was that it was just a couple of blocks. I would have walked a couple of blocks. If I would have KNOWN (see the difference?) it was 10 blocks, I would have called a cab.

 

If I still didn't know what was going on and needed a quick bite...I would have done McDonald's too. Not everybody wants to take a chance of taking a cab ride to a nice place to eat.

 

Communication is key. Celebrity's fault was the lack of this. They should have had a representative out there the entire time to pass this information on to the arrivals.

 

OP..I hope the rest of your vacation turned out so much better.

[ChucktownSteve]

OP sorry you had a bad experience but hope it won't totally tarnish your image of Charleston. This was an unusual and unexpected situation.

 

In reading the various postings in numerous threads, I've seen Celebrity go from Hero to Zero then back and forth again.

 

I'm going to play devils advocate for a moment with a couple of theories. Notice I didn't say fact? ;)

 

<begin hypothesis>

 

This norovirus cruise was Celebrity's first Charleston embarkation and debarkation. There probably weren't extra X staff in town ahead of time because I suspect they didn't expect the CDC would tell them once the Mercury arrived that the next cruise had to be delayed.

 

I bet behind the scenes, X was scrambling to get additional staff into Charleston from other cities. The embarkation problem for the 2/26 cruise I suspect is that parking and drop off is handled by the Ports Authority not X.

 

Since there were 1,800 people delayed trying to get off the ship and another 1,800 trying to get on, logistically I bet that was a nightmare. The cruise terminal also had to be thoroughly cleaned after debarkation.

 

OK now once X found out they couldn't sail Friday, I suspect they again had to scramble to try and find accommodations for as many as up to 800 rooms plus transportation for the pax. You just can't wave a magic wand and accomplish this when there are already a lot of non cruisers in town for the weekend.

 

By evening, X staff must have begun arriving in Charleston because of comments on other threads about them at a couple of the hotels that they were utilizing.

 

I watched the vans and busses lined up for yesterday's embarkation at the cruise terminal trying to unload all the passengers. It took several hours. The last van unloaded just before 5pm.

 

When you're not expecting the worst you don't have a contingency plan for it. They probably should have had one. I suspect X is developing one for Charleston now. Perhaps X didn't plan ahead because maybe they thought they would proceed with embarkation as planned. If it were Ft. Lauderdale or Miami there are lots of resources readily available. That's not the case in smaller ports like Charleston.

 

I understand that doesn't help the people who received the bad experiences. Hopefully Celebrity will step up after the fact and handle the PR nightmare appropriately.

 

<end hypothesis>

[jaybird from SC]

I is very easy to say Celebrity did a wonderful job if you weren't here. It was the most miserable day I have spent in years . When we arrived by taxi the police wouldn't not let anyone in . That was fine but they wouldn't even take our luggage . We had to stand on the sidewalk for almost 1 hour before a very nice police man who felt sorry for us got us more information. . He sent us to a hotel (Mills House) that he thought was just a few blocks away . At the time no shuttle was provided . Five of us had to drag our luggage all the way there that ended up being a lot more than a few blocks maybe 10 or more . Everyone was sent there later in the day or they had one other hotel set up too . The first thing we heard was boarding would be at 2 then 5 then no one knew anything . It was such a mess there people and luggage everywhere . The hotel staff were wonderful but very stressed because Celeberty sent them no one to help. They told me that . When A Celeberty rep finally showed up around 5:00 Pm that is when we were told what was going on . She said we were going to be put up at the Marriott RiverSide (a very nice hotel), accomodations only for those who lived more than 2 hours from the port. We stood in line while she checked our name off a list then you were suppose to collect luggage and get on the shuttle to hotel...at that time we were ahead of many people since we arrived early .

 

That was a real mess . Celebrity provided 1 shuttle for all of us (the man at the hotel said that's all Celebrity provided). We were out there for over an hour in the blowing cold waiting to get on . People were just shoving in front of you . No one seemed to care who's turn it was to board . By the time we got to board the shuttle the Marriott was full. :mad: More.....

Sorry for your inconvenience but this was somewhat of an unusual circumstance if I understand what you're talking about. And, being the independent people that we are, we would not have sat around and waited on Celebrity to take care of us if we knew that we were going to have to spend another night somewhere in Charleston. We would have called a cab and found a hotel ourselves. Charleston is a beautiful city and having another day there would not be a problem. Also, we tend to forget that the Noro Virus is NOT caused by the ship but by people. Celebrity or any other cruise ship loses money when Noro disrupts plans. I would be thankful that they are trying to make it safe for me by delaying sailing. That is sure better than having another ship load of sick people. I would not be worried about losing a day either because I'm sure things would be made right.....Would much rather lose a day than be sick with Noro. Some things can't be helped so "when you're given lemons, make lemonade!"

[cruisecluestoo]

I guess I didn't explain myself clearly enough . We thought we had a hotel room. We were marked off of the list as staying at the Marriott .Celeberity made the reservation . They told us to go out and board the bus . That was joke. People were pushing in front of you like you wern't there . Believe me I would have been glad to take a taxi if I would have thought it would have made a difference. They just over booked I guess and if you aren't pushy enough you lose .Remember we did not get our letters until we were on the bus. I guess I don't live in the big city any more and am not use to being agressive . We did finally go back to the hotel we stayed at the night before that was very nice. I knew I would get blasted for telling my story but that is just how I felt. This is not the first time we have cruised out of Charleston . We were on the Galaxy a few years ago and all was well. We ended up having a nice cruise even though some of us got sick on the ship and some on the way home

 

Diane cruiseclues

[emptynest1]

Diane, We sailed with you in 2003 on Galaxy,

We had booked this cruise originally to celebrate our anniversary and then Equinox caught our eye and we switched. So glad we didn't have to go through that nightmare. I can understand in a situation like this that communication is the key. Had Celebrity told you to go find a room and be back at the ship tomorrow, I'm sure most would have gone about their business and enjoyed another day in Charleston. I also suspect that there would have been a large group of people who would have loudly demanded to be taken care of. Since Celebrity told you to go somewhere and they would arrange a hotel, I can understand why you waited. No one wins.

A snafu that was hard to handle from the beginning. I hope Celebrity learned something and will have in place a more efficient plan of action when it(and this will) happens again.

 

Hope you let this go and enjoyed your vacation.

[benjispice]

To start, I had no idea what she was talking about either when I started reading the thread.

 

Understand and empathize that this was a bad situation..I would have been very unhappy personally just becuase of the dumb rotten luck...

 

But to imply X is responsible for the fact that the area hotels were crummy and that the restaurants nearby not to her liking??

 

Sounds like emotions are understandably running high...

 

X tried to do the right thing here, but they cant seem to win..

 

Concrete feedback to the company on what went well and what did not could help them respond better if this were to happen at this magnitude again for certain... but it should be specific to things they can control.

 

I agree with this post. Though it is EXTREMELY disappointing to start off a vacation this way, I'd rather stay in a gray looking hotel room and eat at McD's for a day, then get on board a ship where a virus had spread and risk getting ill. If they want to scour it, by all means, bring on the McD's.

 

I'm sure it was disorganized - it wasn't planned, or intentional. Nearby hotels only have so many available rooms, so they have to send a lot of people a lot of places. From the OP, it sounds like the people that really would have ticked me off isn't X, or the hotels....it's the other guests.

[smtcan]

We were also on this cruise and I agree with the OP that the situation in the Mills House was chaotic. We were told there would be a hotel room for us and to wait for our number to be called for the shuttle. After waiting a while and hearing no numbers called we found that people were just crowding around the desk and standing outside with their luggage to rush onto the shuttles without any system at all. Eventually we were told that there were no more hotel rooms and we would have to find our own. We were lucky to be able to go back to the hotel we had left that morning.

 

The next day we returned to the port at 2pm, the time we had been told to return and we sat in a bus at the port for over an hour to get into the terminal, then another hour inside a very crowded building waiting to have a faulty sea pass card fixed before we could board.

 

Needless to say we were not happy campers when we got on board, but things improved quickly. We were refunded our hotel and cab fares as on board credit, received more credit for incidental expenses and more for two days cost of our cruise. We felt this was very fair, and 25% off future cruise encouraged us to book on board.

 

I think the main problem was lack of communication, but I certainly wouldn't have wanted to board the ship before it was thoroughly cleaned. We arrived home last night after driving from Charleston and the memory of the bad beginning had faded from my mind until I read this thread. If any of our group had become ill, my attitude might have been different, but we all returned in good health.

 

Sheila

[BananaAnna]

D Chamless - I truly do feel your pain. Anyone that wasn't there can not comprehend having to drag your luggage all over timbuctoo, getting inaccurate info, waiting in line for hours, etc! We were told to get in line -Celebrity was securing hotel rooms. If you'd already made reservations Celebrity wouldn't cover them because they were taking care of it. After waiting 2-3 hours, were told they were out of rooms. Get your own transportation, get your own hotel. We'll cover the hotel.

Blah, blah, blah.....

I understand it was an unusual situation, but honestly, it was probably Monday before I was over the stress and fatigue of Saturday. On Thursday DH became sick. We spent an absurd amount of time, money, and energy on what basically became 4 days of vacation!

[cruisecluestoo]

I am glad to hear others tell what really happened . Like I said if you weren't there you just don't know how bad it really was . Of course none of us wanted to be on a sick ship . The day delay was not the problem . It was the way Celebrity treated it . When I called earlier in the morning to ask what we should do they told me they couldn't do anything for me but to apologize .They were in Kansas what could they do from there . They had no one in Charleston to talk to . If it wouldn't have been for the nice policeman who called his captain to find out information for us we wouldn't have even known to go to the Mills House . Well it is over now and it did get better thanks to the wounderful crew

 

Diane cruiseclues

[cruisecluestoo]

Hi emptynest .

I thought we were on a cruise together . We enjoyed our cruise on the Galaxy so much and going out of Charleston that we were really looking forward to going out of there again. Too bad this had to happen. Hope you enjoy your cruise . I am sure you will . Good to hear from you .

Diane cruiseclues