QM2 & San Juan, PR

[bobby1119]

During her second winter season, Queen Mary 2 sailed several back to back, 8 day cruises from NY that initially included San Juan as a port of call. The ship never called there, and St. Thomas replaced San Juan on all cruises. I was on one of the cruises in April and was disappointed as St. Thomas is for me one of the most wretched places in the Caribbean.

 

San Juan seems to have been completely eliminated from all itineraries. My question is does anyone know why? San Juan has deep draft piers and wharfs, and the old city has been revitalized and sports some of the best restaurants in metro San Juan...

 

Thanks for any information.

 

Curious Bobby

[2moose]

During her second winter season, Queen Mary 2 sailed several back to back, 8 day cruises from NY that initially included San Juan as a port of call. The ship never called there, and St. Thomas replaced San Juan on all cruises. I was on one of the cruises in April and was disappointed as St. Thomas is for me one of the most wretched places in the Caribbean.

 

San Juan seems to have been completely eliminated from all itineraries. My question is does anyone know why? San Juan has deep draft piers and wharfs, and the old city has been revitalized and sports some of the best restaurants in metro San Juan...

 

Thanks for any information.

 

Curious Bobby

 

we overheard 2 stories on this matter one is that the channel and / or the port of san juan is not deep enough for the QM2 and that the channel was to be dredged deeper

 

the 2nd version was that one of the captains of the QM2 (perhaps warwick ???) had a run in or was insulted by the powers to be (?) in san juan and refused to return to san juan

 

that info was given to me 1 or 2 years ago by a third party (?) and not confirmed

 

ps the nice part of visiting st thomas is that most people get off the ship!!

[Jungle]

The QM2 called at San Juan twice and I was on one of the cruises. Captain Warwick made the first call and Captain Wright made the second. I heard that the water was not deep enough for the ship to dock so they had to anchor at the end of the airport runway as we did when I was on board. Apparently, both captains were unhappy about the safety of the anchorage so future calls were abandoned.

[3rdGenCunarder]

It's probably depth/safety issues.

 

Several years ago, possibly her last christmas out of NYC, QE2 got sort of stuck on a sandbar right next to the pier and it took a while to nudge her into place. (maybe waiting for tide to come in more) It was a return to US after foreign ports, so we had to deal with US customs/immigration, who were cranky becasue they got on board an hour late. The tour office did a good job of sorting out changed departure times for tours.

 

I agree with 2moose. San Juan is a much better stop than St Thomas (last time we were in St T we stayed on board and enjoyed the solitude)

Kathy

[godfreyb]

I was on that last QE2 departure from San Juan and it did seem to take forever for the ship to pull away from the pier and then she left very slowly after that. Shame, San Juan is a wonderful place to stop. St. Thomas for us involves a quick stop at the duty free liquor store and then we try to find an interesting jeweller who is located in a back street, and we can never remember where he is. We got so lost last time that we never made it back to the ship for lunch (delayed tenders were also involved) and ate in a local cafe and had the best jerk chicken ever!