Montego Bay Excursions

I know there are alot of posts here, but I need help! I have a client who requires a lift and I can't find any shore excursions for Montego Bay that are "Wheel chair friendly." I've tried Special Needs at Sea, Carnival, Shore Excursions....and I've come up empty. If not a Shore excursion, how difficult is it to get Taxi's with lifts in both Montego Bay and Jamica?

Thank much!

I know there are alot of posts here, but I need help! I have a client who requires a lift and I can't find any shore excursions for Montego Bay that are "Wheel chair friendly." I've tried Special Needs at Sea, Carnival, Shore Excursions....and I've come up empty. If not a Shore excursion, how difficult is it to get Taxi's with lifts in both Montego Bay and Jamica?

Thank much!

OOps!! I meant Montego Bay and Cozumel!!

I know there are alot of posts here, but I need help! I have a client who requires a lift and I can't find any shore excursions for Montego Bay that are "Wheel chair friendly." I've tried Special Needs at Sea, Carnival, Shore Excursions....and I've come up empty. If not a Shore excursion, how difficult is it to get Taxi's with lifts in both Montego Bay and Jamica?

Thank much!

The cruise line does not offer tours with lifts nor are they required to do so. One usually has to attempt to book private tours. .Really not meant to intentionally sound snippy but as a TA did you think to actually google the tourism sites for both destinations ? I did and found plenty of information . Here's just 2 of the sites that I found.

http://abilitytrip.com/caribbean/jamaica/montego-bay/montego-bay-st-james-jamaica/

http://abilitytrip.com/north_america/mexico/quintana-roo/cozumel/cozumel-quintana-roo-mexico/

IMPORTANT : if any of these ports are tender ports your client will probably not be able to get off the ship as people confined to wheelchair are generally not allowed to tender due to safety issues. In order to safely board tenders, guests must be able to take steps and use a collapsible, fold up wheelchair; motorized wheelchairs and mobility scooters cannot be taken on tenders.

The cruise line does not offer tours with lifts nor are they required to do so. One usually has to attempt to book private tours. .Really not meant to intentionally sound snippy but as a TA did you think to actually google the tourism sites for both destinations ? I did and found plenty of information . Here's just 2 of the sites that I found.

 

http://abilitytrip.com/caribbean/jamaica/montego-bay/montego-bay-st-james-jamaica/

 

http://abilitytrip.com/north_america/mexico/quintana-roo/cozumel/cozumel-quintana-roo-mexico/

 

IMPORTANT : if any of these ports are tender ports your client will probably not be able to get off the ship as people confined to wheelchair are generally not allowed to tender due to safety issues. In order to safely board tenders, guests must be able to take steps and use a collapsible, fold up wheelchair; motorized wheelchairs and mobility scooters cannot be taken on tenders.

Thanks for your help. "Snippy" accepted! Since posting, I did find Ken's Transportation and send my client the link. Grand Cayman is tendered and I advised them they may need to stay on the ship that day unless they can enlist some serious man power to get them on and off the boat!

Thanks again for passing on those two links.

Thanks for your help. "Snippy" accepted! Since posting, I did find Ken's Transportation and send my client the link. Grand Cayman is tendered and I advised them they may need to stay on the ship that day unless they can enlist some serious man power to get them on and off the boat!

Thanks again for passing on those two links.

Since it appears that your client is wheelchair bound you really shouldn't have misled them to believe that the cruise line might actually lift the wheelchair with you client in it onboard the tender by having stated "I advised them they may need to stay on the ship that day unless they can enlist some serious man power to get them on and off the boat!" No cruise line will do that as it's totally unsafe . Regardless if they can find the man power the Cruiseline/Captain has the final word and in this case it would mostly likely be no.

For future reference your client might want to consider Holland America as it has roll-on tenders on some of it's ship. There's even a wheelchair lift that takes them to board the tender.

Actually, both Royal Caribbean and Celebrity do lift passengers who are in manual wheelchairs onto tenders, weather and sea conditions permitting. One of our party is in a wheelchair, doesn't walk and has not had an issue with this on those cruise lines (and we are Diamond Plus and Elite in our own right on Celebrity, so we have sailed quite a bit with both cruise lines). They have trained teams of four persons who handle the transfer. And most of the ships have a lift which takes the disabled person to the tender platform. In addition, the last time we went to Grand Cayman (last Dec), there was one special tender that was designed for wheelchairs to roll on, and we waited on that one.

On the other hand, Princess will not allow you to tender unless you can walk onto the tender. It is not for the passenger safety--Princess claims they won't do it because they don't allow any of their staff to lift more than 50 lbs. Yet they certainly do charge the port fees to these passengers who are denied being able to tender into the port. While I understand that they can make the policy re tendering and we accept that when cruising on them, I don't think it is fair that they still charge port fees for passengers at ports where they refuse to allow those passengers to tender into that port.

The cruise ship has to pay the per passenger fees to the port -- regardless of how many people actually get off of the ship. I do agree that it is very important to read the cruise line's tender policy before you book.

And most of the ships have a lift which takes the disabled person to the tender platform. In addition, the last time we went to Grand Cayman (last Dec), there was one special tender that was designed for wheelchairs to roll on, and we waited on that one.

 

 

 

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The lift I was referring to is not the elevator (AKA -lift) that takes them to the tender platform. Once on the tender platform, Holland America actually has a wheelchair lift that tranfers the person from the tender platform directly onto the tender and so that the person just rolls aboard. This particularly helpful when the water levels change. No other cruise line that I am aware of has this type of tender lift.

Refer to the attached link. The lift I am referring to can be seen at about the 7min 24sec mark. http://www.hollandamerica.com/virtual-tours-videos/Main.action?cat=dining&type=video&id=8

Yes, I am familar with the Holland America wheelchair tendering system, as we have cruised on Holland America before and thought that their tendering system for wheelchairs which they have on the newer ships was excellent. Since Holland America is owned by Carnival Corp, as is Princess, we have made comments on Princess comment cards that suggested Princess look to their sister company's tendering system. Wonder if the new ship Royal Princess will have that?

The lifts I was talking about we have used on Royal Caribbean are not really elevators--they are lifts which go from one deck only to the next level and are basically external lifts which will hold only one person/wheelchair.

While I understand why the ship has to pay the port fees based on the number of passengers, it is also Princess' decision to prohibit those who cannot walk onto the tender from using the tenders, rather than using a method to accommodate those in wheelchairs, such as the Holland America wheelchair tendering systems or the team methods used by Royal Caribbean or Celebrity. IMHO, Princess is making a business decision to not incur the costs of providing such accommodation, so they should bear the port charge cost which would otherwise be incurred by those whom Princess prohibits from tendering. (And I am not talking about situations where the weather, waves and such make it unsafe).

Since it appears that your client is wheelchair bound you really shouldn't have misled them to believe that the cruise line might actually lift the wheelchair with you client in it onboard the tender by having stated "I advised them they may need to stay on the ship that day unless they can enlist some serious man power to get them on and off the boat!" No cruise line will do that as it's totally unsafe . Regardless if they can find the man power the Cruiseline/Captain has the final word and in this case it would mostly likely be no.

 

For future reference your client might want to consider Holland America as it has roll-on tenders on some of it's ship. There's even a wheelchair lift that takes them to board the tender.

Ok, now you are sounding snippy! The "using manpower" idea came directly from a Carnival Cruise line representative, and Holland America is out of the question as this is a young couple and they are a part of the Naval Aviation Cruise group.

Ok, now you are sounding snippy! The "using manpower" idea came directly from a Carnival Cruise line representative, and Holland America is out of the question as this is a young couple and they are a part of the Naval Aviation Cruise group.

Sorry that you found my post to be "snippy". However you should still inform your client that though the Carnival Rep made the "using manpower" suggestion the final decision is in the hands of the Captain. I've seen more too often that wheelchair bound passengers have not been allowed to tender as it just wasn't safe for both the passenger and or crew that woud be needed to assist.

The following was copied directly from Carnival's Website.

At certain ports of call, small boats known as "tenders" are used to transport passengers from the ship to shore. Certain tenders may not be accessible to individuals using wheelchairs or mobility scooters, or the status of the tendering process at a particular port under certain weather, sea, swell, current and/or tide conditions may prove difficult for a safe transfer to take place. In each case, it will be the decision of the ship officials to determine, based on their evaluation of safety issues for our guests and crew, whether or not a guest using a wheelchair may board a tender. In order to safely board tenders, guests must be able to take steps and use a collapsible, fold up wheelchair; motorized wheelchairs and mobility scooters cannot be taken on tenders.

You can also check the website directly http://www.carnival.com/cms/fun/cruise_control/emb_guest_specials_requirements.aspx