Galveston Texas

[runner2013]

Hi all,

 

I'm just looking for thoughts about the recent cancellation of the trip from Galveston due to the oil spill.

From what I read on RC's face book page, originally they cancelled the trip on the 24th, giving a full refund of the cruise price, a 25% off booking for another cruise and told the passengers they were welcome to stay on the ship for the week while docked. If people chose to go home it was o.k. too.

The next day they said they would be sailing with a different port of call and people wishing to come back could do so.(and they all still get the above mentioned concessions no matter what)

Many people who chose to go home seemed to be writing in complaining it wasn't fair and they were upset about the decision to sail after all.

What do you all think?

Me personally, while I do feel terribly for those who chose to leave and won't be able to take advantage of the trip, they did choose to go while others chose to stick it out and hang around.

Is it fair to those to left, should they be angry? :confused:

[HappyCruiser54]

Since it sounds like this was not anything that RCCL could control then I feel like they should not be angry. Until they were given the go ahead RCCL had no idea when they would be able to leave port. If they had told the passengers " stay on....we think we will be able to leave port in a day or two" and then could not those same passengers would still be angry. (IMHO)

I can't image how upsetting it must have been to wait all year for your cruise and have this happen, but I think RCCL did the best they could under the circumstances. And I believe they are being very generous with the offer made.

[Cindy]

You know, sometimes things just happen. I think RCI made what they thought was the best decision with the information they had available Monday night. Kudos to them for reevaluating when things improved and salvaging a short cruise for those who were still on-board. Extra brownie points for giving departed passengers the opportunity to return if they wished.

 

Most of the posts I've read here have been pretty understanding, but there have been a couple people on Facebook who have been spewing a lot of negativity.

 

I understand people had to make the decision they thought was best for them and their personal circumstances. There was definitely a problem with some of the off-site parking lots and if passengers wanted access to their cars they had to get them yesterday or wait until Sunday -- I'm sure that influenced some decisions.

 

Glad things are getting back to normal for the cruise ships. I hope the oil clean-up moves just as quickly with minimal damage to the environment or loss of wildlife.

[AustinCruise]

There are some people that under normal circumstances would have gone on the cruise as scheduled, everything would have gone as planned, and they still would have complained about something.

[JYD Hawkeye]

A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. Never look a gift horse in the mouth. No one has anything to complain about as far as RCCL goes. The ones who left did so of their own free will with the information they bad at the time. Situation changed and they were given a window of time to change their minds. They still got a refund + some. I cruise out this coming Sunday. I almost bought passage on this cruise this week to do a back to back. Still wish I would have. They knew when they left they were, A. getting a refund B. had the opportunity to stay on the ship and enjoy the amenities for free C. obviously still had the time available because they would have otherwise been on the ship anyways. No one is wrong for the decision that they made, they just gambled wrong.

[overthehillcruiser]

Looks to still be parked there now, so are they still sailing ? This is Wednesday.

Hi all,

 

I'm just looking for thoughts about the recent cancellation of the trip from Galveston due to the oil spill.

From what I read on RC's face book page, originally they cancelled the trip on the 24th, giving a full refund of the cruise price, a 25% off booking for another cruise and told the passengers they were welcome to stay on the ship for the week while docked. If people chose to go home it was o.k. too.

The next day they said they would be sailing with a different port of call and people wishing to come back could do so.(and they all still get the above mentioned concessions no matter what)

Many people who chose to go home seemed to be writing in complaining it wasn't fair and they were upset about the decision to sail after all.

What do you all think?

Me personally, while I do feel terribly for those who chose to leave and won't be able to take advantage of the trip, they did choose to go while others chose to stick it out and hang around.

Is it fair to those to left, should they be angry? :confused:

 

 

 

http://www.galveston.com/cruisecam/

[tkportersat]

Is any of this the end of the world?....No.

But when you work hard all year and it is vacation time and it doesn't go as planned it is disappointing. I think the way RC handled it was confusing. I personally preferred the way Carnival handled it from the beginning by offering folks the option to cancel or stay based on the fact they may or may not cruise or have a shortened trip. But that is just me. I am sure we will hear more on the topic when both of these ships return to port on Sunday.

[LoneStarJeffe]

I am one of those impacted. We booked this cruise 8 months ago. I did a lot of planning and we had high hopes for a fun week. Then came the oil spill and late arrival of Navigator. We boarded a little past midnight Sunday. Monday night at dinner they informed us the cruise was officially cancelled and the ship was not leaving Galveston. We decided to at least stay on board for few days before driving back home to Spring, Texas an hour and a half away from Galveston.

 

Three things happened Tuesday that really impacted our decision on what to do next.

 

The first was, as I suspected, they began shutting down the hot tubs and pools. Navigator uses salt water and the water is changed out frequently. They could not refill them when docked port side with the oil in the water.

 

The second was the announcement that we had until 6 pm to get our cars out of the parking facilities, including all private cruise parking lots, or else we would not get access to our car until Sunday. This meant we could not stay on board day by day and leave when we wanted.

 

I will get to the third item shortly.

 

Once they made the announcement about getting your car, we left the ship and went to our parking facility and confirmed that access would be closed until Sunday. We then went to find an alternate parking facility. There was none available that we found. Hotels would not accept liability for cars unless they were registered guests. City of Galveston parking has essentially daily metered parking lots which you must pay at least twice a day or else they would boot your car. So our choices to pay for a hotel room to allow us the option to go day by day, leave and drive home, or stay om board until Sunday. We went back to the ship to think through our options. That is when the third item happened.

 

It was 2 pm and we were not immediately allowed back on board., We had to wait in the terminal since they were moving the gangway. That was done for cleaning the ship of oil. So we then had to worry if we decided to leave the ship, would we hit another delay of missing our window to get our car because they were not just allowing you to go on or off the ship at any time.

 

We decided that since the last report was the ship was there for the week, the pools were going to be shut down, and we had been to Galveston many times and sightseeing was not really preferred over just going home and relaxing there, we decided to leave. We got off the ship a little after 3pm. We stopped along the way home for dinner. We got home a bit after 6pm due to rush hour traffic Tuesday. It was then we found out they ship planned to sail the next day to Cozumel.

 

At some point you have to call it. I asked my wife if she wanted to go and take the shorter cruise. We discussed and decided we were already back home and it didn't make sense to us. Yes, it is essentially a free cruise to Cozumel. But we already had a full refund. We were not out money and we will cruise again in the future. We had already decided what we would do instead for the rest of the week. Had we stayed on board, we would have enjoyed the cruise to just Cozumel. But the lack of car access until Sunday and the fact we were previously told in no uncertain terms the ship was not leaving meant we had to decide if five more days in Galveston was how we wanted to spend our vacation time. That answer was no.

 

I am very happy for those who had flights and no option to leave that they get a shorter cruise plus the full refund. Especially the families with children. For us, we made the best decision we could at the time. Stuff happens. We will enjoy our time together a different way and thanks to RCL, we are not out any cost of the cruise.

 

I am watching the Galveston cruise cam and RCL just moved away and is departing. Bon voyage and happy cruising to those on board!

Edited March 26, 2014 by LoneStarJeffe

[MandyMooToo]

I am one of those impacted. We booked this cruise 8 months ago. I did a lot of planning and we had high hopes for a fun week. Then came the oil spill and late arrival of Navigator. We boarded a little past midnight Sunday. Monday night at dinner they informed us the cruise was officially cancelled and the ship was not leaving Galveston. We decided to at least stay on board for few days before driving back home to Spring, Texas an hour and a half away from Galveston.

 

Three things happened Tuesday that really impacted our decision on what to do next.

 

The first was, as I suspected, they began shutting down the hot tubs and pools. Navigator uses salt water and the water is changed out frequently. They could not refill them when docked port side with the oil in the water.

 

The second was the announcement that we had until 6 pm to get our cars out of the parking facilities, including all private cruise parking lots, or else we would not get access to our car until Sunday. This meant we could not stay on board day by day and leave when we wanted.

 

I will get to the third item shortly.

 

Once they made the announcement about getting your car, we left the ship and went to our parking facility and confirmed that access would be closed until Sunday. We then went to find an alternate parking facility. There was none available that we found. Hotels would not accept liability for cars unless they were registered guests. City of Galveston parking has essentially daily metered parking lots which you must pay at least twice a day or else they would boot your car. So our choices to pay for a hotel room to allow us the option to go day by day, leave and drive home, or stay om board until Sunday. We went back to the ship to think through our options. That is when the third item happened.

 

It was 2 pm and we were not immediately allowed back on board., We had to wait in the terminal since they were moving the gangway. That was done for cleaning the ship of oil. So we then had to worry if we decided to leave the ship, would we hit another delay of missing our window to get our car because they were not just allowing you to go on or off the ship at any time.

 

We decided that since the last report was the ship was there for the week, the pools were going to be shut down, and we had been to Galveston many times and sightseeing was not really preferred over just going home and relaxing there, we decided to leave. We got off the ship a little after 3pm. We stopped along the way home for dinner. We got home a bit after 6pm due to rush hour traffic Tuesday. It was then we found out they ship planned to sail the next day to Cozumel.

 

At some point you have to call it. I asked my wife if she wanted to go and take the shorter cruise. We discussed and decided we were already back home and it didn't make sense to us. Yes, it is essentially a free cruise to Cozumel. But we already had a full refund. We were not out money and we will cruise again in the future. We had already decided what we would do instead for the rest of the week. Had we stayed on board, we would have enjoyed the cruise to just Cozumel. But the lack of car access until Sunday and the fact we were previously told in no uncertain terms the ship was not leaving meant we had to decide if five more days in Galveston was how we wanted to spend our vacation time. That answer was no.

 

I am very happy for those who had flights and no option to leave that they get a shorter cruise plus the full refund. Especially the families with children. For us, we made the best decision we could at the time. Stuff happens. We will enjoy our time together a different way and thanks to RCL, we are not out any cost of the cruise.

 

I am watching the Galveston cruise cam and RCL just moved away and is departing. Bon voyage and happy cruising to those on board!

 

I have no dog in this particular fight but I have to say that I appreciate hearing a positive attitude regarding this situation. I have been following these threads/posts about NOS and AOS wondering what I would have done in the same spot. I think we would have stayed for the simple fact that we have to drive 10+ hours to get to any RCCL port so it would have been even more depressing to make that drive home but if I lived within a couple hours I may not have made the same decision. I also think that there was a lack of good info, whoever was at fault, but RCCL seems to have resolved the situation well with refunds and future cruise credit (or whatever it is called :rolleyes:). Just my 2 cents...probably not worth a penny!

[Sat1]

The NOS pushed off about 10:15 this morning, dest: COZ.

[tkportersat]

Very sorry to hear your vacation didn't go as planned :( I hope you are able to schedule a make up trip soon! You sound like y'all have a great attitude about everything.

 

I am one of those impacted. We booked this cruise 8 months ago. I did a lot of planning and we had high hopes for a fun week. Then came the oil spill and late arrival of Navigator. We boarded a little past midnight Sunday. Monday night at dinner they informed us the cruise was officially cancelled and the ship was not leaving Galveston. We decided to at least stay on board for few days before driving back home to Spring, Texas an hour and a half away from Galveston.

 

Three things happened Tuesday that really impacted our decision on what to do next.

 

The first was, as I suspected, they began shutting down the hot tubs and pools. Navigator uses salt water and the water is changed out frequently. They could not refill them when docked port side with the oil in the water.

 

The second was the announcement that we had until 6 pm to get our cars out of the parking facilities, including all private cruise parking lots, or else we would not get access to our car until Sunday. This meant we could not stay on board day by day and leave when we wanted.

 

I will get to the third item shortly.

 

Once they made the announcement about getting your car, we left the ship and went to our parking facility and confirmed that access would be closed until Sunday. We then went to find an alternate parking facility. There was none available that we found. Hotels would not accept liability for cars unless they were registered guests. City of Galveston parking has essentially daily metered parking lots which you must pay at least twice a day or else they would boot your car. So our choices to pay for a hotel room to allow us the option to go day by day, leave and drive home, or stay om board until Sunday. We went back to the ship to think through our options. That is when the third item happened.

 

It was 2 pm and we were not immediately allowed back on board., We had to wait in the terminal since they were moving the gangway. That was done for cleaning the ship of oil. So we then had to worry if we decided to leave the ship, would we hit another delay of missing our window to get our car because they were not just allowing you to go on or off the ship at any time.

 

We decided that since the last report was the ship was there for the week, the pools were going to be shut down, and we had been to Galveston many times and sightseeing was not really preferred over just going home and relaxing there, we decided to leave. We got off the ship a little after 3pm. We stopped along the way home for dinner. We got home a bit after 6pm due to rush hour traffic Tuesday. It was then we found out they ship planned to sail the next day to Cozumel.

 

At some point you have to call it. I asked my wife if she wanted to go and take the shorter cruise. We discussed and decided we were already back home and it didn't make sense to us. Yes, it is essentially a free cruise to Cozumel. But we already had a full refund. We were not out money and we will cruise again in the future. We had already decided what we would do instead for the rest of the week. Had we stayed on board, we would have enjoyed the cruise to just Cozumel. But the lack of car access until Sunday and the fact we were previously told in no uncertain terms the ship was not leaving meant we had to decide if five more days in Galveston was how we wanted to spend our vacation time. That answer was no.

 

I am very happy for those who had flights and no option to leave that they get a shorter cruise plus the full refund. Especially the families with children. For us, we made the best decision we could at the time. Stuff happens. We will enjoy our time together a different way and thanks to RCL, we are not out any cost of the cruise.

 

I am watching the Galveston cruise cam and RCL just moved away and is departing. Bon voyage and happy cruising to those on board!

[satxdiver]

I have no dog in this particular fight but I have to say that I appreciate hearing a positive attitude regarding this situation. I have been following these threads/posts about NOS and AOS wondering what I would have done in the same spot. I think we would have stayed for the simple fact that we have to drive 10+ hours to get to any RCCL port so it would have been even more depressing to make that drive home but if I lived within a couple hours I may not have made the same decision. I also think that there was a lack of good info, whoever was at fault, but RCCL seems to have resolved the situation well with refunds and future cruise credit (or whatever it is called :rolleyes:). Just my 2 cents...probably not worth a penny!

 

RCCL flipped on their decision to cancel and then to go ahead and sail to Coz. I understand their situation but the other two cruise lines, Princess and Carnival, stood by hoping to be able to salvage something out of this disaster in the bay. I think RCL jumped to conclusions too soon since the very next day things changed for the better. I can see your point of having to drive 10 hours versus the other one who had to drive an hour and half. We have a 4 hour drive to the port and I would probably have left the ship as I have been to Galveston and don't particularly like it. It is too touristy.

[jonbgd]

RCCL flipped on their decision to cancel and then to go ahead and sail to Coz. I understand their situation but the other two cruise lines, Princess and Carnival, stood by hoping to be able to salvage something out of this disaster in the bay. I think RCL jumped to conclusions too soon since the very next day things changed for the better. I can see your point of having to drive 10 hours versus the other one who had to drive an hour and half. We have a 4 hour drive to the port and I would probably have left the ship as I have been to Galveston and don't particularly like it. It is too touristy.

 

Didn't Princess cancel monday night

All Princess pax are getting the same deal as RCL

They decided to sail Tuesday after Magic was cleared.

 

Personally I would have stayed on the ship enjoyed doing nothing but relaxing. Something I don't do at home

[Janet524]

It goes back to the old saying, "you can please some of the people some of the time, all of the people some of the time, but not all the people all of the time." No matter what compensation RC would have offered, there will always be those who think it's just not enough. You just can't make some people happy no matter how hard you try.

[Polarbear Pa]

We are wintering in Galveston we have been watching all this going on.

We have never been to Galveston before we live on Pa so this is new to us.

I think RCCL handled the refunds and credits very nicely and quickly. But I do think that when they cancelled the sailing they should have added that if anything changed they would do a shorter cruise. I think they did jump the gun, but I think they did a fair compensation.

[chengkp75]

Not sure why the pools were drained. Even salt water pools must be put on recirculation mode when within 12 miles of land, so the oil wouldn't have affected them. There is no USPH requirement for pool draining intervals, though most lines do it at least weekly. Unless there was a fecal incident in the pools, there was no reason to drain it.

 

The hot tubs are usually fresh water, and are required to be drained every 72 hours at the most, but these don't take too much water.

 

Maybe they decided that given a week out of sailing, that it would be time to paint the pools.

[tserface]

I think RCI's response to this was very fair. We have friends on the cruise and they are having a blast in spite of the changes. Giving a full refund, plus allowing people to stay on board for a free week of ship time is really fair. I think they also get a 25% discount on another cruise.

 

I would have stayed on board and enjoyed pretending we were at sea for the week. There are so many things to do on a cruise and doing it all, basically, for free seems like a score to me.

 

I think the decision to go to Cozumel was made when they found out they actually could go somewhere. Obviously, they make money because now they can open the shops and casino and get their kickback and port fees from Cozumel, etc. The cruisers get a free shorter version version of the cruise. Sounds like a win-win to me.

 

It's not the vacation people planned and hoped for, but there are lots of benefits to the way it worked out and I applaud RCI for being so generous considering it wasn't there fault the cruise fell apart. I understand they are still trying to work out the fault and cause of the oil spill, but RCI could have just directed cruisers to get restitution elsewhere.

 

We were on a cruise once to Mexico and, because of the swine flu we only got one Mexican port. They gave us some watered down drinks and $200 OBC that had to be spent on the ship. We still had fun on the cruise even though we cruised to San Francisco (where we lived at the time), but the Galveston cruisers got a way better deal.

 

Tom

[runner2013]

I am one of those impacted. We booked this cruise 8 months ago. I did a lot of planning and we had high hopes for a fun week. Then came the oil spill and late arrival of Navigator. We boarded a little past midnight Sunday. Monday night at dinner they informed us the cruise was officially cancelled and the ship was not leaving Galveston. We decided to at least stay on board for few days before driving back home to Spring, Texas an hour and a half away from Galveston.

 

Three things happened Tuesday that really impacted our decision on what to do next.

 

The first was, as I suspected, they began shutting down the hot tubs and pools. Navigator uses salt water and the water is changed out frequently. They could not refill them when docked port side with the oil in the water.

 

The second was the announcement that we had until 6 pm to get our cars out of the parking facilities, including all private cruise parking lots, or else we would not get access to our car until Sunday. This meant we could not stay on board day by day and leave when we wanted.

 

I will get to the third item shortly.

 

Once they made the announcement about getting your car, we left the ship and went to our parking facility and confirmed that access would be closed until Sunday. We then went to find an alternate parking facility. There was none available that we found. Hotels would not accept liability for cars unless they were registered guests. City of Galveston parking has essentially daily metered parking lots which you must pay at least twice a day or else they would boot your car. So our choices to pay for a hotel room to allow us the option to go day by day, leave and drive home, or stay om board until Sunday. We went back to the ship to think through our options. That is when the third item happened.

 

It was 2 pm and we were not immediately allowed back on board., We had to wait in the terminal since they were moving the gangway. That was done for cleaning the ship of oil. So we then had to worry if we decided to leave the ship, would we hit another delay of missing our window to get our car because they were not just allowing you to go on or off the ship at any time.

 

We decided that since the last report was the ship was there for the week, the pools were going to be shut down, and we had been to Galveston many times and sightseeing was not really preferred over just going home and relaxing there, we decided to leave. We got off the ship a little after 3pm. We stopped along the way home for dinner. We got home a bit after 6pm due to rush hour traffic Tuesday. It was then we found out they ship planned to sail the next day to Cozumel.

 

At some point you have to call it. I asked my wife if she wanted to go and take the shorter cruise. We discussed and decided we were already back home and it didn't make sense to us. Yes, it is essentially a free cruise to Cozumel. But we already had a full refund. We were not out money and we will cruise again in the future. We had already decided what we would do instead for the rest of the week. Had we stayed on board, we would have enjoyed the cruise to just Cozumel. But the lack of car access until Sunday and the fact we were previously told in no uncertain terms the ship was not leaving meant we had to decide if five more days in Galveston was how we wanted to spend our vacation time. That answer was no.

 

I am very happy for those who had flights and no option to leave that they get a shorter cruise plus the full refund. Especially the families with children. For us, we made the best decision we could at the time. Stuff happens. We will enjoy our time together a different way and thanks to RCL, we are not out any cost of the cruise.

 

I am watching the Galveston cruise cam and RCL just moved away and is departing. Bon voyage and happy cruising to those on board!

 

Very well said..

Very sorry you lost out on your trip, but as you said, you get another one in the future. :)

[jwmimi]

MandyMooToo, I a sorry you missed your cruise, but it was so nice to see someone with a positive attitude!! So sad that people go on cruises and manage to find negatives no matter what!

 

Bless you!

[Kcruiser2014]

I was on NOS last week for the "oil spill cruise". We live about 3.5 hours away and decided to stay on for at least a few days. We parked at the Port parking lot and almost changed our minds about staying after they closed the pools and told us we would not have access after Tuesday to our cars until Sunday. However, we spoke to the Port Police Chief and he informed us that RC made that announcement prematurely, because they had a meeting scheduled with then to talk about it, but it had not happened yet. He also informed us that all we had to do was call the number on the signs and the Port Police would come and unlock it so you could get your car. They ended up refunding us for the entire week and then let us park for free. While I am glad we stayed, there were some difficult moments that day. The other 8 traveling with us decided to drive home Tuesday. Only 2 came back. We ended up having a great cruise. I am glad they decided to reverse course and have a short cruise. At that point, it was kinda damned if you do and damned if you don't for RC. I think they made the vast majority happy with the decision they made. Since the whole situation was not within their control, I truly feel they did all they could.... And then some. Hindsight is always 20/20. So maybe their decision to cancel Monday was premature, but it was a reasonable decision. Personally, I feel like I just had a very inexpensive vacation and feel lucky to have gone. Now, to wait for the refund and FCC so I can book another!! I am so glad to be on RC instead of Carnival!!!

 

 

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Edited April 3, 2014 by Kcruiser2014