Tendering and bad weather

[nw gardener]

Cruising next week! on the Century and we tender at Icy Strait. Marine forecast [for what is worth this far out], says gale warnings so looking for guidance and any past experience on whether/where Celebrity draws the line on tendering in rough seas. Planned a private excursion so I am entertaining the thought of cancelling it and doing something different in Juneau instead. Thanks for any/all help!

[BellKat]

If the weather is truly bad or questionable, they will not tender. We have missed tender ports due to bad weather. Just look at it as another sea day. Did you have to pay upfront for your private excursion? Find out what their policy is regarding the ship not being able to come into port before you make a decision.

[FLACRUISER99]

If the weather is truly bad or questionable, they will not tender. We have missed tender ports due to bad weather. Just look at it as another sea day. Did you have to pay upfront for your private excursion? Find out what their policy is regarding the ship not being able to come into port before you make a decision.

Good advice.

[cle-guy]

They tender in the Cayman's and I read several unhappy stories of cruisers who missed the Caymans as they couldn't tender - once a wedding party that cruised and had intended a destination wedding, that they couldn't have, even though most guests FLEW in to this island !!! :eek:

 

It happens often there I guess. So I'd assume they will err on the side of caution if the weather is bad in the Icy Straight as well.

 

Check with your tour operator, often times they give refunds for bad weather and other issues out of the passenger's control, as they realize they will get a lot of bad marks on their various online forums for keeping peoples money for reasons beyond the control of the people that booked and don't want to lose future business over it based on those bad reviews.

 

The operators realize you passed on Celebrity's guaranteed refund benefit to take them, and most likely will honor a refund. If not, maybe find one that will.

[floridatravelersforlife]

They tender in the Cayman's and I read several unhappy stories of cruisers who missed the Caymans as they couldn't tender - once a wedding party that cruised and had intended a destination wedding, that they couldn't have, even though most guests FLEW in to this island !!! :eek:

 

It happens often there I guess. So I'd assume they will err on the side of caution if the weather is bad in the Icy Straight as well.

 

Check with your tour operator, often times they give refunds for bad weather and other issues out of the passenger's control, as they realize they will get a lot of bad marks on their various online forums for keeping peoples money for reasons beyond the control of the people that booked and don't want to lose future business over it based on those bad reviews.

 

The operators realize you passed on Celebrity's guaranteed refund benefit to take them, and most likely will honor a refund. If not, maybe find one that will.

 

 

It happens everywhere. We did one of the inaugural Antarctic cruises on the Infinity several years ago and missed tendering the Falkland Islands due to bad weather. There were about 300 Argentines on board trying to visit their fallen sons buried near Stanley. After we bypassed the Falklands the Argentines protested in droves and when we made it to Ushaia 10 were kicked off the ship for violence.

 

Safety trumps all else.

[Orator]

Safety first!

I've been on several cruises where sea conditions or local problems caused us to miss a port.

[Northern Aurora]

As someone who lives in Alaska I want to comment that weather here changes very quickly. Alaska is one of those places where we say that if you don't like the weather just wait five minutes.

 

And I've also been to Icy Strait Point (which is essentially the Tlingit community of Hoonah) three times. The strait is very protected with another island across from ISP. Also, the distance the tender travels to the pier is very short.

 

And, nw gardener: have you asked the excursion vendor what their policy is if for some reason the ship can't tender?

[constantcruiser]

We did a Pacific Coast repositioning cruise on Solstice last fall, and one of our ports was Monterrey, CA. Ships the size of Solstice rarely visit this port, so we tendered in using the ship's lifeboats. It was a breeze getting in that morning, but by mid-afternoon a sudden storm came up. The seas between the ship and the dock became so rocky that the Captain made the decision to halt all tendering...leaving hundreds of angry passengers in line in the rain.

 

When tendering finally resumed, I completely understood the decision. Our tender boat driver tried many times to tie up to the ship, and you could see the fear in his eyes. When we were finally able to tie up, about a dozen of the ship's crew boarded the lifeboat and literally carried passengers in their arms up the ramp. The ship was 2 hours late leaving Monterrey, trying desperately to get all the passengers safely back on board and the lifeboats reconnected to the ship. It was a frightening experience I wouldn't care to go through again.

 

All this is to say that sometimes it's not the current weather that keeps a ship from missing a port, but weather that is forecast later in the day.

[CHEZMARYLOU]

We missed Belize due to rough seas. I understand that often it is the harbor master that will not permit tendering in bad weather.

 

Mary Lou

[nw gardener]

Yes, not a problem cancelling and getting money back if unable to tender, very used to "wait 5 minutes" for the weather to change :) Does appear a little sheltered there especially if wind is from the s.e. so...will wait and see what happens when we get there, either way, I'm cruising and on enjoying time off from work whether we tender or not! Crossing my fingers, thanks everyone for the input.

[4774Papa]

We have had adverse results from cruises that involve tendering, so that I now look hard at booking such cruises.

 

We did Around the Horn of SA and had no adverse tendering issues. This is a must not miss cruise.

 

Our cruise that went to the Black Sea had to cancel Yalta tendering, so almost everyone missed the port. Still, we got to see Sevastopol, which was great.

 

The Solstice tendering around the top of Australia had problems with tendering into Bali, as we were delayed three hours getting into the port. Most of it was the local authorities holding up for a probably payoff. On the same cruise tendering into York's Knob (Cairns) was delayed far too long and Celebrity messed up on the shuttle bus process going to Cairns.

 

You have to expect that if the weather is bad, that tendering can be cancelled.

[ghstudio]

It is true that a number of ports get missed due to the weather being unfavorable...and having been on some tenders in borderline weather, the ship is doing you a large favor by not tendering...it's scary and can be dangerous. Clearly, the desire is to make it happen....and the folks who make money from excursions and your shopping really want tendering to happen, but celebrity really does focus on safety first.

 

Occasionally, there are cruises that completely miss some or all ports...eg when a hurricane is in the caribbean or the weather makes it impossible to cross to the antarctic and so on. Some ports are notorious for being missed..e.g. Port Stanley in the Falklands

 

It's just part of cruising....irrespective of the cruise line.