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Yikes! Just Booked Vision ~ Spanish Immersion!

maxs mom

By maxs mom,
in Royal Caribbean International

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seaofwonder

seaofwonder

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We were supposed to be on a Panama Canal boat tour. That morning apparently one of his boats broke down. He strung us along for 2 hours saying they would get us and then just said "sorry we can't take you." We scrambled for another tour and saw my friend Mario's boat going down the canal. We think they overbooked and just didn't want to tell us.

 

Wasted a big part of our morning telling us lies. Oh, and the phone numbers he gave us didn't work...so it took quite a while to actually track him down. He knew we were at our hotel and never bothered calling...we waited until he was thirty minutes late and started trying to call him.

 

I've done private tours a lot and have never had a problem like this. We understand things do happen, but very very poor communication (and not due to a language barrier) including not calling us, not returning our calls when they said they would, etc. I would never use again.

 

Others have had good experiences....but I wouldn't chance him for a once in a lifetime thing.

 

I never did get my cruise through the canal....I had to watch from the stands (watch Mario's boat go through).

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums mobile app

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PCWalton1

PCWalton1

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Jane,

You inspired us. We had a cruise booked on Adventure out of San Juan for April 2015 that we just moved to Splendour in March 2015 out of Sao Paulo. I can only count to ten in Spanish but that is still better than my Portuguese which I know none :eek:.

 

Should be fun. :D We rode Splendour out of Venice in 2012 and loved the ship and crew.

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maxs mom

maxs mom

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We were supposed to be on a Panama Canal boat tour. That morning apparently one of his boats broke down. He strung us along for 2 hours saying they would get us and then just said "sorry we can't take you." We scrambled for another tour and saw my friend Mario's boat going down the canal. We think they overbooked and just didn't want to tell us.

 

Wasted a big part of our morning telling us lies. Oh, and the phone numbers he gave us didn't work...so it took quite a while to actually track him down. He knew we were at our hotel and never bothered calling...we waited until he was thirty minutes late and started trying to call him.

 

I've done private tours a lot and have never had a problem like this. We understand things do happen, but very very poor communication (and not due to a language barrier) including not calling us, not returning our calls when they said they would, etc. I would never use again.

 

Others have had good experiences....but I wouldn't chance him for a once in a lifetime thing.

 

I never did get my cruise through the canal....I had to watch from the stands (watch Mario's boat go through).

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums mobile app

 

Wow!! Thanks for telling that story. I hope you posted on Trip Advisor. I rely heavily on TA when booking private tours. And I book private tours A LOT!!

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maxs mom

maxs mom

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Jane,

You inspired us. We had a cruise booked on Adventure out of San Juan for April 2015 that we just moved to Splendour in March 2015 out of Sao Paulo. I can only count to ten in Spanish but that is still better than my Portuguese which I know none :eek:.

 

Should be fun. :D We rode Splendour out of Venice in 2012 and loved the ship and crew.

 

Bill.......Good for you!! I think you will like that. Those cruises look very interesting! Can't wait to hear about it.

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Con5421

Con5421

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Wow!! Thanks for telling that story. I hope you posted on Trip Advisor. I rely heavily on TA when booking private tours. And I book private tours A LOT!!

 

I have booked 4 things whit mybestfriendmario so hope everything goes well.

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Con5421

Con5421

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What have you booked? Aren't you going on the Feb. 22nd sailing?

 

Yes, we're on the 22 feb sailing.

We booked transfer from airport to hotel.

Panama canal tour.

Transfer hotel to Colon.

Transfer from Colon to airport. But maybe we will cancel this one becausd it' s to early we must leave the ship.

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maxs mom

maxs mom

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If you need, there are several apps for iPhone and Android that do voice translation. I used several with a ELL student of mine in the past... they're not great, but pretty good....

 

Thanks for that tip! I haven't really used those, even though I taught ESL for the last 7 years of my teaching career. But I taught the little ones.

 

Royal Caribbean called today. They wanted to make sure that we knew that this was an Immersion cruise! They said we could change it to something else if we wanted. John assured them that we knew that. Sheesh.....I thought they were calling about an upgrade!!

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seaofwonder

seaofwonder

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I don't think so....he just gave me a card and I shared it with emerald. It's possible that emerald may have the info in his review, or I might have it in my review of the cruise. SorryM it's been so long....but he was awesome! He also drove us out to the port the next day.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums mobile app

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  • 2 weeks later...
nanwel

nanwel

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I asked the conceirge at my hotel to recomend the man we used, he did give me his card, but 3 yrs and a move, who knows where it went.

Asked the night before we left, so there was time to get someone, and we left the hotel at 10am so we did not have to rush for our afternoon departure.

He was great - took us around various spots and gave us a commontary as we went - then to the canal - told us where to go and waited - then drove us to old way to the port - stopped once at a stand for us to get a drink, and again at the port for my daughter to buy a six pack of coke a cola - he was awsome. Did not rush us, and cost was not bad.

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Tropicalgal2

Tropicalgal2

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I asked the conceirge at my hotel to recomend the man we used, he did give me his card, but 3 yrs and a move, who knows where it went.

Asked the night before we left, so there was time to get someone, and we left the hotel at 10am so we did not have to rush for our afternoon departure.

He was great - took us around various spots and gave us a commontary as we went - then to the canal - told us where to go and waited - then drove us to old way to the port - stopped once at a stand for us to get a drink, and again at the port for my daughter to buy a six pack of coke a cola - he was awsome. Did not rush us, and cost was not bad.

 

Thanks for getting back . . . Understand about moves and three years! :)

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