Strike at Barcelona Port?

[Aquarius2]

Hi All!

 

Yes, we made it...but it was a very very very difficult task...

 

I will post details later, but just to give you and idea: embarkation started at 11pm...ship left at 3am insted of 6 pm, people sleeping on the floor of the terminal...yes, it was a madhouse..brilliance docked in bcn with an approx. delay of 12 hours...

 

All this thanks to the nice fishermen...

 

Strike is solved in Spain and no further disruptions to be expected (we took all of it...)

 

Anyway, Brilliance is in beautiful condition, everything very nice as usual...

 

Cheers,

Phil:D

[hobo1937]

Well, glad someone got home. There are several hunded of us still stuck in Barcelona. It has become a complete disaster. RCCL offered free hotel rooms but neglected to tell us that they were in a town 94 km (60) miles from Barcelona. When we arrived at 130am and the bus was leaving they told us it was up to us to get back to the Barcelona airport either by a 150 euro cab ride or a train that was hard to get luggage on. They gave us the option to book a charter flight with them that was leaving today at 9am. Late yesterday we were told it was cancelled and is going to leave at 7pm tonight. At this point we have no idea when we will get home. There are no commercial flight s out of Barcelona until Sun or Mon. RCCL has taken a bad situation and made it even worse.

[critterchick]

We're on board now. Embarkation was a total nightmare, and RCI's shore agents were nothing short of completely incompetent. We talked to some people who were on a back to back and they were feeling as if they were being ignored in our favor HA! The ship gave each passenger a $150 onboard credit, but not until last night, so I think there will be a big run on casino cash once we reopen. First time cruisers on RCI will never sail them again, and I can't say as I blame them.

 

We're 0 for 3 sailing in & out of Barcelona - Splendour couldn't dock on time a couple of years ago, we got stuck in Genoa on our way to this cruise because of the strike and now Brilliance. We love the ship, and Barcelona is a great city, but the port facilities are completely incapable of handling a Plan B scenario, so we'll just stop in by land or air from now on, I think.

[r20312]

We just got off the Brilliance on 10/27. First official ship's news of a strike at barcelona was at noon on 10/26. The fishermen were blockading the port, nothing was going in. We diverted to Minocrca, then we turned north to Marseilles. That evening we were told Marseille did not have the transportation necessary for 2000 passengers, so the course was set for Barcelona in hopes that the strike would end. We spent all day on 10/27 off shore with 25 other various cargo, cruise and ferrie ships, finally sailed into harbor at about 5 PM. Earliest passengers could get off was around 7 PM so almost all with air reservations on 10/27 did not make filghts, RC offered 2 nights lodging and chartered some flights to JFK for 10/28. The crew thought the 10/27 cruise would still depart that evening but no one had boarded by the time we left that evening.