Avalon Mekong River Cruise Review - including COVID quarantine

[sanger727]

Hi all,

 

We traveled on an Avalong Mekong River Cruise with Siem Reap and Ha Long Bay extensions on 11/28. It was a wonderful trip for the most part, however, there were a few days that really bad. We have been home for a little over a week, but I wanted some time to digest everything that happened before posting. We found Avalon difficult to work with pre-cruise; and then we felt they really dropped the ball during the cruise. This was our first, and will certainly be our last Avalon cruise. However, there was so much good about it, I really wanted to share that. I am going to include the timeline of the illness that spread amongst the ship, not to focus on it, but just to show how little planning Avalon has done for a post covid world. 

 

To start off, the trip was fantastic. I was traveling with a friend. We spent a week in Thailand on our own before the trip and went to Bangkok and Phuket. We traveled into Siem Reap and met up with two more of her friends who booked the river cruise, so there were a total of 4 of us. Siem Reap was beautiful and modern. Easy to navigate and felt very safe. When we started the trip there were 18 of us. We were met by our cruise director when we checked into the hotel and he stayed with us for the Siem Reap days and then the river cruise. Upon check in he checked everyone's covid vaccination records (vaccination and boosters were mandatory) and visas. One couple told us later in the trip that they had gotten the wrote visa and the cruise director was able to assist them in getting the correct visa in time.

 

We also had a local guide that was with us the entire time we were in Cambodia. I can't say enough good things about the local guide. He was incredibly fluent, entertaining, knowledgeable, and had a great sense of logistics. We spent a day at Angkor wat and then another day seeing two other temples. These were excellent tours. The second day rain broke out, and our cruise director was prepared with umbrellas for everyone on standby and our tuktuks re-appeared with rain flaps so that we had a comfortable ride back into town. Note: On the second day of our tour, one participant came down with a mask in the morning saying that he had a runny nose and didn't want to get anyone sick. His wife missed a day of two of the trip also and he said she was under the weather. His mask disappeared at some point during the day and never re-appeared on the trip.

 

[sanger727]

After Siem Reap we flew to Phnom Phen to board the ship. 11 more people chose to do the cruise only so we were a total of 29 on the ship. I think they felt slightly out of the loop since we had all spent a few days together and had gotten to know the cruise director and local guide already. 

 

The ship was beautiful, but we had mixed feelings about our rooms. We had the bed split into twins and that really took up any extra floor space that we might have otherwise had. There were no balconies, just a sliding glass door to open the room up to the outside. However, it was extremely humid, so if you opened the door up all of the surfaces inside the room, quickly got wet. So we didn't find this as useful as it could have been. The bathroom was very nice sized. But overall there was little storage and closet space. 

 

The first night of the cruise, one of the single passengers sat with us at dinner. She mentioned that she had lost her voice that day but wasn't sick. We didn't think anything of it. That night we set off up the Mekong. The next day we visited a temple up on a hillside. There was an option to walk up to it or take a bus. I have to give our cruise director props. He did a great job with transportation. There were many times that unusually transportation was in the itinerary (oxcart, cyclo), but he always explained the day before what it was an offered to arrange a car or tuktuk for anyone that was uncomfortable. We returned to the ship for lunch and in the afternoon visited a local village. 

 

Note: on the bus ride back from the local village, the single who sat with us at dinner the night before had a prolonged coughing fit. 

 

We returned to the ship for dinner and sailed to another location.

[sanger727]

The next day, in the morning we visited another village via oxcart ride. We returned to the ship for lunch and sailed to phnom Phen. In the afternoon we visited the Genoside Museum and the killings fields. I personally did not know any of this history (I was born in the 80s), and we all found this very sad and impactful. 

 

I'm sure you can guess the next part of the story. In the evening and overnight I came down with a sore throat and cough. 

 

The next day we took a tour of Phnom Phen by cyclo in the morning. I wore a mask to prevent spreading anything. On the way back to the ship, our cruise director said that a couple people had requested to stop at a pharmacy, so if anyone would like to stop we could leave early and stop on the way back. I opted to do that. Our local guide went with us and assisted with working with the pharmacists to get everyone what they needed. 7-8 people went and it was quickly apparent that EVERYONE was ordering cough syrup. At that point I stopped wearing my mask, whatever this was had spread too far. 

 

We all returned to the ship and had a free afternoon. This was our last day with our Cambodian guide. He got off in Phnom Phen and we picked up our new Vietnamese guide. 

[sanger727]

The next day we entered Vietnam. This was a painless process. Our cruise director had collected everyone's passports at the beginning of the cruise and he handled all of the business with immigrations. When we arrived at our first port, we took a walk through the town to visit a local market. This was probably the least interesting stop in my opinion. I think they scheduled this as a quick stop because the length of time it takes to get through immigrations and customs can be unpredictable.

 

In the afternoon we took a boat ride to a town and went to a temple. It interesting to see the houses on the ride, fishermen, and just how people live. The temple was much different than anything we had seen in Cambodia or Thailand. Vientamese people aren't religious, and the temple looked a little bit like a Las Vegas slot machine. Just very different. 

 

The next day we went to another small town and visited a gentleman that had fought for Viet Cong in the war. And then we went to a shop where they wove cotton. When we returned to the boat our cruise director told us that he had noticed that many people were sick and upon consultation with Avalon, had purchased at home test kits and requested that anyone with symptoms volunteer to get tested. This is when things started to really fall sideways.

 

It became very apparent throughout the trip, that Avalon had no actual plans on how to handle a virus on a group trip/cruise. Up until this point nothing had been said, no masks were worn, and no policies had been stated. One woman asked "if someone tests positive, what will happen" and his answer was essentially "we will call Avalon and figure out what to do". This became his line throughout the rest of the trip. There were no plans, no policies, no forethinking into what should be done. Just "we will call Avalon and they will figure out what to do". 

 

 

 

 

[sanger727]

I took the covid test. My friend/roommate had also developed symptoms at this point so she tested as well. As did most of the ship. We all lined up (no masks), took our tests, and then went out to the sundeck for drinks. Around an hour later, people started asking about the test results. They refused to answer, just said that if you tested positive they would let you know. Shortly after this they pulled me to the side. I had tested positive. They told me to go to my room and asked if I need anything. This was shortly before lunch so I asked if they could bring me lunch and they said sure. 

 

Some time later a crew member came back to my room to administer another test. I didn't know this at the time, but was due to the fact that my roommate was also sick but tested negative. They took the test and asked if I needed anything, I just asked for lunch again.

 

Around half an hour later, the cruise director called me to tell me my second test was again positive. At this point I had had no contact with anyone except the ships crew. I had no idea that my roommate was negative and had been offered the chance to change rooms so she could stay with the rest of the group. And I had no idea if anyone else had tested positive. The wifi didn't work in the guest rooms, so short of someone calling me I was on my own. I again asked for lunch since they still had no brought anything. Shortly after this they did bring me a plate for lunch. I also asked for them to have my roommate call me.

 

I was filled in one what exactly was happening at this point. 4 people had tested positive. The rest negative. A wife and husband, a wife (but he husband tested negative), and me (with my roommate testing negative). We asked what would happen next and they said we would take another rapid antigen test the next day. The husband had opted to be quarantined in his room with his wife. My roommate had been given the option to change rooms and not be quarantined. We complained about the lack of wifi and ability to communicate. So one thing they did do right, was move the wifi routers so that we could get wifi in our rooms. 

 

On the ship, dinners were served at 7. I received a phone call around 6:30 asking for my dinner order. At 8, I still had not received anything. I texted my roommate and asked her to check on when we would be served. The waitor told her that they would serve all of the guests in the dining room (all courses) before they served the "positive" guests. She put up a sufficient arguement to that which led to them finally brining our food to us. 

 

[sanger727]

The next day was more of the same, they would bring any food or drinks we ordered to us. I was covid tested in the morning and tested positive again. I found out later that two of the "positive" guests had tested negative the second day. However, they were not released from quarantine. We were advised that when we arrived in Phnom Phen that evening a nurse would come onboard and administer PCR tests. The results would be available the next morning. We asked what would happen if they were positive and negative, and just got more of, we will call Avalon and they will decide. 

 

I had had an opportunity to speak to the other positive guests and we felt strongly that since our antigen tests had not been administered by medical personnel, the second test for two of the people were negative, and we had not received PCR tests that we weren't really sure we had COVID. I was also upset that no on had attempted to determine the length of quarantine if were were positive. No one had asked about symptom start date and no one had discussed when the "quarantine" would end. We still had more than a week of trip left, and under the US CDC's 5 days, we should have been released from quarantine the following day. 

 

We got our PCR tests in the evening and discussed what would happen the following day. The rest of the group would leave by bus and take a morning tour. We would leave separately and be taken into Ho Chi Minh city. We asked about going to the hotel and were told that the hotel wouldn't let us check in if our tests were positive. Also, if our tests were positive, they may require the entire group to get tested before checking in. I felt very uneasy the next morning leaving the boat, to essentially be turned loose in Ho Chi Minh city, with potentially nowhere to go. But that's what we did. We were dropped off near the hotel and given directions to a nearby market. We were on our own until 10:15 when we would meet our guide back at a cafe to get the results. So, with no other options, we walked around Ho Chi Minh city until the agreed upon time. We all received our results by e-mail and they were all negative.

 

When we met with our guide he said that he would take the results to the hotel so that we could check in. We asked if we could rejoin the tour at that point, and he said he had to call Avalon and they would decide. It was really unreasonable at that point that Avalon hadn't predetermined that. There were only two possibilities, all of us would test negative, or not. There's no reason they couldn't have decided ahead of time.

 

Our group had a morning tour only and free time in the afternoon. Our cruise director did work it out with the local guide that he would return in the afternoon and give us the group tour from the morning. So at this point they did do their best to make things up. Ultimately, Avalon did allow us to re-join the tour like nothing had happened. 

[sanger727]

The rest of the tour proceeded as scheduled. We visited the war remnants museum and Cu Chi tunnels in Ho Chi Minh. We then flew to Hanoi where we had a city tour and then joined a Ha Long Bay ship for a 2 day trip. We flew home and it was uneventful.

 

Again, this was a wonderful trip and I don't want to take away from that. But Avalon's lack of planning on 1. what to do if people display signs of illness 2. when and how to covid test 3. what to do if people test positive 4. how to arrange quarantine rules and who determines them 5. what to do if people test negative after all that was inexcusable. It was ridiculous to me that 4 people who apparently "had covid" were told to wander around town because the hotel wouldn't take them. And then there was no actual plan on where we would stay had our tests come back positive. Had policies and procedures been laid out, we still may have no liked the answer. But the stress of not knowing made the whole situation worse. 

[Host Jazzbeau]

Wow.  Where have they been the last two years?  The lack of planning would have been reasonable if your trip was in Spring 2020 – but at this point it is mind-boggling!

[ljandgb]

Thank you for your report.  We are doing this itinerary next November.  Hopefully they'll have it figured out better by then?  It really is surprising it was handled this way.

[sanger727]

8 hours ago, ljandgb said:

Thank you for your report.  We are doing this itinerary next November.  Hopefully they'll have it figured out better by then?  It really is surprising it was handled this way.

yes, possibly. Our cruise director kept saying that this had not happened before on Avalon. Hard to believe. But hopefully they see the importance of creating a plan now. 
 

My job at my workplace for like 2 years was managing the covid policies, quarantines, compliance, etc. So I certainly appreciate the need for isolation/quarantine. But it needs to be defined through policy. When an illness spreads through the tour, a handful of people are picked out to be quarantined; and there’s no policy on who, what, why, and how long; it starts to feel targeted. For example, at one point the ‘positive’ people asked if we could go on the sundeck by ourselves, during an excursion or dinner; a time when just about everyone would be busy. The answer was, ‘no’; and not because ‘our policy is you can’t leave your room for this many days’, it was ‘well, a negative person may not do the excursion or dinner and may way to use the sundeck’. And like I said, setting us loose in Ho Chi Minh City with directions to the central market detracted from the validity of any of the ‘rules’ they put in place.

Edited December 23, 2022 by sanger727

[Coral]

Thanks for the report. Definitely disappointing at many levels.

[Bill Y]

On 12/22/2022 at 6:52 PM, Host Jazzbeau said:

Wow.  Where have they been the last two years?  The lack of planning would have been reasonable if your trip was in Spring 2020 – but at this point it is mind-boggling!

Probably par for the course! We booked two river cruises for 2021 pre pandemic, not with Aavlon I must add. When it came to paying the balance in 2021 we had not heard from the tour operator and there was no definitive policy across the sector, so we asked our TA to ascertain what would happen if covid struck and would we be looked after not abandoned in some foreign quarantine hotel.  No answers were forthcoming only the suggestion that it may be better to move the cruises to 2022 which we did and it was weight off our minds.

 

2022 things were appearing to ease but then we appeared not to meet the Austrian entry requirements. When we asked our TA what this actually meant for us and what were the fall back arrangement the tour operator did not appear to know but did not dispute that we had a problem. I reasoned that surely the operators must be having high level discussions with governments and heath authorities along the route, to determine protocol and procedures. After a lot of obfuscation this cruise was moved again to 2023.

 

The remaining 2022 cruise in Portugal went ahead but we were shocked when the final paperwork arrived two weeks beforehand to be issued with T&C’s dated Jan 22 that stated if we tested positive for covid we would be removed from the boat to a quarantine hotel at our own expense etc. We left for Porto in July with vaccination certificates and heath questionnaires that we were told was mandatory. No one at airports or on board ship asked to see them. Covid was the elephant in the room no one dared to mention it. Luckily we remained healthy but the stress took the shine of the holiday.

 

I am firmly of the opinion that the operator did not wish to admit to problems (bad publicity), so just buried their heads in the sands hoping all the problems went away. So I am not surprised to hear this report regarding Avalon and it may be true across the entire European river cruise sector. Like insurance companies these operators sing their own praises but the proof on the pudding is when things go wrong.

[Coral]

40 minutes ago, Bill Y said:

 

I am firmly of the opinion that the operator did not wish to admit to problems (bad publicity), so just buried their heads in the sands hoping all the problems went away. So I am not surprised to hear this report regarding Avalon and it may be true across the entire European river cruise sector. Like insurance companies these operators sing their own praises but the proof on the pudding is when things go wrong.

It is not just river cruises. I did an ocean cruise. While they told us to call if we had symptoms, there were several people who obviously did not call with symptoms who were out and about and the ship was very sickly. We did have several on our roll call who did call and were quarantined and several who arrived home and tested positive. I thought the cruise line should have done more when it was obvious that a good % of the people were coughing through out the ship but they did not make any changes. It was easier for them to disembark individuals and have new passengers arrive and pretend nothing happened.

[ljandgb]

I think that there is a good amount of willful denial that includes the cruise company and the passengers.  You can't really expect an ocean cruiser to not be a high risk transmission event, yet the companies are willing to take your money and passengers are willing to go.  At the same time, neither group really wants to participate in what it would take to truly minimize general transmission risk and prevent known positive patients from passing on their disease.  Whistle past the graveyard and carry on.

 

River cruising is, probably, slightly lower risk just because fewer people and the ship practically empties during the day, but the same somewhat willful denial exists on both sides in many instances.

 

It would be maddening to be part of the seemingly random restrictions the OP had, but particularly when dealing with multiple countries that change their rules on their own timeline, it might be hard to truly create a one size fits all covid response plan.  Not saying Avalon did a good job, and suspect they could have had a better outline of options beyond wait and see.

[sanger727]

I don’t doubt that this is a difficult situation. Our cruise director first told us that we would be quarantined until we tested negative. Which, as we all know, can be problematic if you take a pcr test. Not to mention that two of the ‘positive’ people had tested negative at that point with no change in their quartine status. We finally called the embassy for answers and were told that there were no quarantine rules in Vietnam, but that could vary by city officials. Our cruise director laughed with we told him what the embassy said and was like, that might be the official policy but it’s really up to local officials. 
 

my point is that, especially if local officials are hard to predict, they have no business giving anyone a covid test without a policy on what that means.

 

I suspect they gave it thinking we would be negative. And everyone who took it thought they would be negative. Everyone on the trip was vaccinated and boosted. And the virus spread like crazy. We all assumed it was a different respiratory virus. And it may have been.

Edited December 25, 2022 by sanger727

[Host Jazzbeau]

57 minutes ago, sanger727 said:

I suspect they gave it thinking we would be negative.

I have had the test where it was clear the tester didn't want any positives – barely waved the swab near my nose.  As it turned out I wasn't stick at all, but it was no surprise when they announced that the ship was 100% negative!