San Juan Cruises

[PrincessShmoo]

There's no power, drinking water, or medical care....doesn't sound like the best place to take a vacation.

But, of course, it's up to Puerto Rico to make the call whether to allow cruise ships to port. And up to the various cruise lines to decide if the experience will be what they want to provide for their guests.

While not the typical "cruise ship experience", I'm fairly sure that a number of us here on the boards may have done vacations without power, local drinking water, or a nearby medical facility. It's still a vacation.

 

[Dug720]

Not sure which parallel universe you are in, but by my count, RCL has pulled three ships (Majesty, Empress, and Adventure) out of passenger service so they can run them as shuttles between the mainland and Puerto Rico, St. Thomas, St Maartan, and St. Croix to bring relief supplies and evacuate residents of those islands to safety in the U.S. I have yet to see a Disney ship do doodly squat to assist in either the relief or evacuation efforts. Adventure cancelled cruises until October to (quoted directly from the RCL website)

"Given the impact of Hurricane Maria, we are cancelling the September 30 cruise to utilize the ship for evacuation and humanitarian efforts. The ship will arrive on Wednesday, September 27 and will operate humanitarian calls in San Juan, St. Thomas and St. Croix to aid in the evacuation and donate critical supplies to each destination. The ship will bring evacuees to Fort Lauderdale before returning to San Juan on October 6 to prepare for the October 7th cruise."

Maybe you might want to rethink your statement.

I'm referring to their handling of Harvey. THEY were clearly living in an alternative universe with that one.

 

[cruiser21]

But, of course, it's up to Puerto Rico to make the call whether to allow cruise ships to port. And up to the various cruise lines to decide if the experience will be what they want to provide for their guests.

While not the typical "cruise ship experience", I'm fairly sure that a number of us here on the boards may have done vacations without power, local drinking water, or a nearby medical facility. It's still a vacation.

Camping is different then going into a city in a humanitarian crisis where millions of people are suffering.

 

[_auroraborealis_]

There is also a reasonable difference between a cruise calling on a poorer port/city (any call into Cuba, for instance), and a cruise calling on a city in ruins facing a humanitarian crisis. People are dying in San Juan right now. There is a difference between poor and what is happening in PR right now.

 

[_auroraborealis_]

Based on this, I just don't know how they think people will be flying in for a 10/7 cruise:

http://money.cnn.com/2017/09/27/news/puerto-rico-san-juan-airport/index.html

 

[gotomu212]

Not sure which parallel universe you are in, but by my count, RCL has pulled three ships (Majesty, Empress, and Adventure) out of passenger service so they can run them as shuttles between the mainland and Puerto Rico, St. Thomas, St Maartan, and St. Croix to bring relief supplies and evacuate residents of those islands to safety in the U.S. I have yet to see a Disney ship do doodly squat to assist in either the relief or evacuation efforts. Adventure cancelled cruises until October to (quoted directly from the RCL website)

"Given the impact of Hurricane Maria, we are cancelling the September 30 cruise to utilize the ship for evacuation and humanitarian efforts. The ship will arrive on Wednesday, September 27 and will operate humanitarian calls in San Juan, St. Thomas and St. Croix to aid in the evacuation and donate critical supplies to each destination. The ship will bring evacuees to Fort Lauderdale before returning to San Juan on October 6 to prepare for the October 7th cruise."

Maybe you might want to rethink your statement.

Well Adventure was cancelled because they home port in San Juan and there's no way they can do that right now. Also canceling all cruises until Oct only means the next 3 days. They are still planning (although I can't imagine how) to be back Oct 6. They only canceled the 9/30 cruise with 4 days notice so they aren't really winning at customer service awards.

They are also being paid to evacuate people out of PR and the VI so it's not exactly charity work.

 

[gotomu212]

I really don't think people understand how bad it is and cannot imagine what it is like when an entire area goes without power for a week. It is one step away from anarchy. You cannot get medical care (the number of people who won't travel without a passport because well you never know when you might get sick and need to fly home-but imagine if you have a heart attack in PR right now, chances are you are going to die-broken leg, you're going to have to wait), there is looting and violence and you are unable to call the police because the phones dont work, people cannot get water and are drinking from open streams (I can safely say I've never vacationed somewhere where my only option was to drink from an open polluted river), the airport is quickly devolving into a Katrina Superdome situation. There is a curfew in place.

I just can't wrap my head around people trying to vacation in a place that is begging the marines to please show up and help restore regular order and services. This isn't roughing it, this is a desperate race for survival.

 

[AquaDame]

I really don't think people understand how bad it is and cannot imagine what it is like when an entire area goes without power for a week. It is one step away from anarchy. You cannot get medical care (the number of people who won't travel without a passport because well you never know when you might get sick and need to fly home-but imagine if you have a heart attack in PR right now, chances are you are going to die-broken leg, you're going to have to wait), there is looting and violence and you are unable to call the police because the phones dont work, people cannot get water and are drinking from open streams (I can safely say I've never vacationed somewhere where my only option was to drink from an open polluted river), the airport is quickly devolving into a Katrina Superdome situation. There is a curfew in place.

I just can't wrap my head around people trying to vacation in a place that is begging the marines to please show up and help restore regular order and services. This isn't roughing it, this is a desperate race for survival.

i think it is also important to note that most efforts are focused on the north part of the island right now to boot - that is where the port and airport are. The more remote & south sections of the island are cut off - many of the roads are impassable. Despite whatever goods are being dropped off in the north its nigh impossible to get them passed around where they are desperately needed. Every day that passes the situation is getting worse. Not only are people in danger of not getting care for basics or life threatening issues can you imagine if you were on dialysis, needed refrigerated medicine or otherwise NEEDED power this last week? It was in the high 80s but said it felt like 100... with no a/c the most vulnerable population is not having an easy time of it.

Vacationers aren't the problem though in my opinion - the companies need to just take the "bad press" on the chin and keep out of the area until its safe and stop being all wishy washy leading people to think its not that bad there. I'm not sure whats going to happen in the next couple of months but right now it IS bad.

 

[_auroraborealis_]

The rapper Pitbull airlifted a bunch of cancer patients. There are children on ventilators who are dependent on generators. It is dire.

Shipments of supplies coming in by air, the planes are evacuating as many people as they can on return flights. I simply cannot wrap my brain around "let's fly in passengers commercial right now!"

Cruises leaving from San Juan aren't filling up with locals.
Cruises calling on San Juan... seriously, there are no excursions, and people are too busy trying to live to offer them, even before we talk about stuff like "water" and "gas" required to do them.

 

[mmouse37]

Not sure which parallel universe you are in, but by my count, RCL has pulled three ships (Majesty, Empress, and Adventure) out of passenger service so they can run them as shuttles between the mainland and Puerto Rico, St. Thomas, St Maartan, and St. Croix to bring relief supplies and evacuate residents of those islands to safety in the U.S. I have yet to see a Disney ship do doodly squat to assist in either the relief or evacuation efforts. Adventure cancelled cruises until October to (quoted directly from the RCL website)

"Given the impact of Hurricane Maria, we are cancelling the September 30 cruise to utilize the ship for evacuation and humanitarian efforts. The ship will arrive on Wednesday, September 27 and will operate humanitarian calls in San Juan, St. Thomas and St. Croix to aid in the evacuation and donate critical supplies to each destination. The ship will bring evacuees to Fort Lauderdale before returning to San Juan on October 6 to prepare for the October 7th cruise."

Maybe you might want to rethink your statement.

I am glad RCCL can do things....they have the ships to do it. Disney has donated to other places recently:
\

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-brief...m-in-aid-for-areas-impacted-by-hurricane-irma

http://www.wdwinfo.com/news-stories...-donate-500000-for-mexican-earthquake-relief/

Disney has 4 ships, RCCL has 25 ships with six more on order.

I love DCL and would hate to cancel a cruise but I personally WOULD NOT travel to PR right now on a cruise even if it went. As another poster mentioned, things are dire there. Reports are they are out of gas, no electric, no water, no cell service. Desperate people seeing a luxury cruise ship in port may not be thinking "yay tourism is back" but more like "how can they come here flaunting their vacation while we are lacking basic amenities".

Today on the news they had people lined up for HOURS for gasoline with the HOPES that the station would get gas..they didn't even know if they would. It is heartbreaking.

Not to be dramatic but putting tourists in the middle of that chaos is not can't be a good thing (IMO)...desperate people can do desperate things. It does not take much for civilized people to become desperate. Again, totally my opinion.

MJ

 

[PrincessShmoo]

Not to be dramatic but putting tourists in the middle of that chaos is not can't be a good thing (IMO)...desperate people can do desperate things. It does not take much for civilized people to become desperate. Again, totally my opinion.

And, because of that, I would hope cruise lines would re-evaluate what ports they want to go to. I'd think they really don't want to make a cruise a negative experience for their passengers, also.

 

[cruiser21]

The aftermath is usually worse then the storm. This is why I think it's really important for cruiselines to be more proactive in cancelling cruises. They should not be dumping passengers in cities where they are stranded. I'm not referring to dcl specifically. We have seen a wide array of responses from different cruiselines. Most good and then there's Royal. I do get tired of the well they aren't obligated argument. During time of crisis that all goes out the window.
I believe Carnivals ship is leaving San Juan today to head back to Miami. Hopefully they have room for some of the stranded tourists.

 

[_auroraborealis_]

I mean, let's just say, okay, none of these companies are humanitarian superstars. But the guest experience issues alone are huge even if you ignore the people without food or potable water all over the island.

Which is irresponsible and horrifying if you do ignore them.

 

[kmix78]

I'm on the Jan 9 to SJ as well, andnim hopeful that everything will be OK. We are staying two additional nights in SJ.

 

[dcassetta]

I'm on the Jan 9 to SJ as well, andnim hopeful that everything will be OK. We are staying two additional nights in SJ.

I wish you all good luck, and hope things are OK in San Juan by then. We just Canceled our January 14 out of San Juan. Just couldn't bring myself to get past paid in full without being more sure that things will be OK by then.

 

[eskimoinparadise]

Well Adventure was cancelled because they home port in San Juan and there's no way they can do that right now. Also canceling all cruises until Oct only means the next 3 days. They are still planning (although I can't imagine how) to be back Oct 6. They only canceled the 9/30 cruise with 4 days notice so they aren't really winning at customer service awards.

They are also being paid to evacuate people out of PR and the VI so it's not exactly charity work.

Actually, that's not true. According to FEMA reports, the relief and evacuation operations are completely voluntary.

 

[eskimoinparadise]

I'm referring to their handling of Harvey. THEY were clearly living in an alternative universe with that one.

Maybe you missed the outcome, but they immediately re-routed to FLL to disembark those passengers and get them back to their final destinations, and didn't attempt to sail back to Galveston until the port was cleared by the Army Corps of Engineers for marine traffic.

 

[Cackyschmackers]

I don't see how Disney can just change the origin point of the SJ cruises and have everyone booked still come.

This happened to us with DCL but not because of weather/damage; just "because". Our 7-nt out of PC changed to a 7-nt out of Galveston a few years ago. So they gave us the option to cancel or 25% off of a future cruise.

Just wondering how you change an embarkation port if everyone's bought airline tickets.

It was very frustrating and cumbersome for us. Since we had purchased air to PC and the new cruise was out of Galveston, different carriers service those different cities from our originating city. Travel insurance couldn't help us bc of course it *was possible* to use our original tickets and fly on our original carrier, it would have just taken probably 3 legs and an entire day (or more). Huge pain, lots of time and frustration trying to get back the money from our original air carrier.

I have a good friend who was born in Puerto Rico whose entire family is on the Western part of the island. She just finally heard from her family yesterday. Cannot even imagine the devastation and heartache.

 

[gotomu212]

Actually, that's not true. According to FEMA reports, the relief and evacuation operations are completely voluntary.

Voluntary participation is not the same as uncompensated participation. The federal government is contracting with cruise lines to help evacuate, transport supplies (expected to increase with today's Jones Act waiver) and to provide temporary housing for officials and relief workers.

 

[_auroraborealis_]

Voluntary participation is not the same as uncompensated participation. The federal government is contracting with cruise lines to help evacuate, transport supplies (expected to increase with today's Jones Act waiver) and to provide temporary housing for officials and relief workers.

And, if they would be unable to dock or embark from SJ, the payments from the government for this work help balance out the revenue loss.