Have you ever missed the ship when in port???

[clochette]

This is good to know.......just wondering......what was your experience?

I was in charge of a group in Madrid Spain, it was the last day of our tour, and 1 person got pick pocketed, her entire bag was stolen, wallet camera, everything, luckily she had a color copy of her passport in her suitcase, we immediately went to the embassy (we were flying back the US the next day) and had a short term replacement passport in 2 hours.

[Rancher Dave]

Personally I like to take my passport with me to port. I keep them in a pocket that would be hard to pick.

 

While in Amsterdam some fool tried to pick my pocket, I just let him know I'd be happy to snap him if he didn't back off so it worked out fine for me...but because that kind of think happens especially in tourist areas I tend to carry money, wallets, passports in front preferrable velcro shut pockets, or in a pocket with a zipper.

 

I'd be unhappy in a foreign country without my passport. That said, if in Mexico without, I'd just want to be close to South Padre Island so I could get picked up and brought back to the island without much ado.

 

Definitely good to know who is the Ship Agent in Port...of course you can probably ask around the dock and someone can probably direct you, especially with cruise ship docks. (When I was on all my Bermuda runs one Summer I got to know John the ships agent in Bermuda...If I were left behind in a port Bermuda would be a good one...John would help me out for sure, he is such a nice guy.)

 

Glad OP's FIL had a good ending to their story. Glad his DW was so happy to see him again.

 

As for ms mean and the comment about leaving her hubby behind, bet she would not be happy if someone had said to leave her behind. Best guess she has more than rectal disorders to deal with, perhaps a Brittney Spears type mental condition she needs to get cured. :D

[whatamess]

As it seems our odds of missing the ship in Cozumel are very high...we ensure we travel with TEXASMUNK who keeps us all together and escorts us to the ship every single time...

 

Almost missed it in the Bahamas once, since then, no more cruising without TEXASMUNK.

[marle7]

I've never missed the ship, but I will tell you a story, about how I "could" have on our most recent Brillance trip.

 

In Curaco, my husband and son went on a Jeep Safari tour. I opted for the culinary delights tour. The tour operators took all 30 of us over to the venue in cabs. After several hours, we were told the tour operator would guide us back to the ship. Apparently we were walking back.

 

We walked, and of course we had no clue where we were. We went down a side alley and the tour operator suddenly said, "if you want to go shopping go that way, and if you want to go back to the ship, go that way", and turned around and left.

 

Several people walked off in the "that way" direction of shopping. Another lady, her daughter and I wanted to go back to the ship so we tried to follow the other "that way" directions.

 

Eventually, we ended up in a part of town, (obiviously having taken a wrong turn somewhere), where is was quite evident, no tourists were about.

 

At no point were we able to see the ship to try to get our bearings. We finally came to a cross roads, and lo, there was the ship. Except we couldn't get to it because the road was blocked off. So we started to retrace our steps.

 

We finally ran across a ship's officer (thank god he was wearing his uniform), and explained our problem to him. By now, we'd been wandering around for almost an hour. Right then, two crew members were coming out of a store, and the ship's officer flagged them down and directed them to escort us back to the ship, which they cheerfully did. That took another half an hour.

 

My cell phone wouldn't work for some reason, and my husband was about to get off the ship and come and look for me as I was now two hours past when I should have been back at the ship.

 

I had plenty of time before the ship left, but what if I hadn't? What if something had of happened to the three of us?

 

I've always taken the ships tours rather than striking out on my own, because I'm one of those "scairdy cats" who are always afraid the ship will leave without me. At least with a ship tour, in theory, the ship won't leave until the tour's back. In this case, the tour operator abandoned all responsibility for us and we were on our own.

 

I did have my passport with me and my driver's licence and a credit card, because I never get off the ship without them, "just in case" .

 

This was the first tour I'd ever taken on my own, without my husband. I can tell you that it will be my last. I was not happy, we were hot, tired and a little frightened truth be told, when we found ourselves in a part of town where we probably shouldn't have been.

 

Would the ship have left without me, had we not been able to finally get back? I don't know, but I do know, I never want to test it again!

[Tredebo]

Thank you - something else I've learned from these boards: Look for the "All Board" sign.

[El Mono]

I am happy that everything went well at the end even if it was a horrible story to read :eek:

 

I am wondering if it would be possible to "catch" up with the ship if the situation was like the one you wrote, that the ship was just leaving and hadn't gone to far away from shore. Paying some dive boat or fisherman 500$ or 1000$ and say drive the fastest you can and call for the ship on the VHF radio.

Would the cruise ship stop to pick up the passenger then?

 

It would require an atm and a credit card available but still it would be cheaper than flying home and not losing the vacation.

[jfer873]

Hi El Mono,

I was on a 7 night in 05 on the VOS and a family missed the boat in one of the ports. They found someone on the pier to catch up with the ship and they boarded on a gangplank starboard side. The captain made an announcement that we were pulling out slowly due to a family who missed the boat and were catching up...he also told everyone which side they would be boarding on and people were out on their balconies and out on the decks laughing, taking pictures and cheering as they boarded. Great fun for all of us to watch!