CDC only allowing 7 day cruises till Nov 2021

[voljeep]

14 minutes ago, Daniel A said:

Well, I'm not going there again anytime soon...  I can spend my money where I'm welcomed.  BTW I've never been to Key West on a cruise, always stayed on land in KW.

looks like Bar Harbor is also exploring limiting cruise ship somewhat ...

 

it's been awhile, but KW is definitely a "night town" - at least to us

[mcrcruiser]

2 hours ago, Daniel A said:

Well, I'm not going there again anytime soon...  I can spend my money where I'm welcomed.  BTW I've never been to Key West on a cruise, always stayed on land in KW.

Key WesT,  imo is a great American cruise port to visit .We really enjoyed it there  /We do hope that future  cruise  travelers can get  the same enjoyment as we did on  our past cruise .

[mcrcruiser]

2 hours ago, voljeep said:

looks like Bar Harbor is also exploring limiting cruise ship somewhat ...

 

it's been awhile, but KW is definitely a "night town" - at least to us

That is not good to hear .Acadia National Park was a delight for us on our New England Canada cruise  .We pray that all will be well in the nearest future

[suzyed]

On 12/1/2020 at 10:23 AM, mcrcruiser said:

This 7 night limitation can be lifted .It all depends on the successful roll out of the vaccinations with the first 2 vaccines    .The CDC does not want to keep the cruise lines pinned down to 7 nigh cruises if it can be avoided . so let us all pray that we will soon see day light 

I was thinking that too, but why then did they go ahead and cancel all those cruises?

[Cruise Raider]

17 hours ago, suzyed said:

I was thinking that too, but why then did they go ahead and cancel all those cruises?

 

I think that is because what is here and now in terms of the requirements.  You know how people like to plan their vacations in advance ... can you imagine if they can get passengers to book a longer cruise only to have to cancel those, as well?  All the while, they'd have been able to actually maintain some sailings if only they were 7 days or less?  I just think they did what they needed to do.  I don't know how many more cancellations they can bear.  

[cruisernh]

On 10/30/2020 at 11:30 PM, jagoffee said:

 

I checked by reading the 40 page document.  I do not think it says anything about prohibiting B2B cruises.  

Page 32 does include a statement stating no cruises more than 7 days.

After I read the document, I do not feel any better about bureaucrats.  IMO it has a lot of B.S. stuff.  But I guess it is a start.  It comes across as a document that says - “I could not do what I wanted (keep it all shut down for a long time),  so I will show them”.  
 

Just my opinion.

I am scheduled on a B2B in December. Interesting. I would like to know how that will work. We have to leave the ship and re-check in so I would think we are doing 2 7 day cruises vs a 14 day cruise. We have never done a B2B before.

[Daniel A]

2 hours ago, cruisernh said:

I am scheduled on a B2B in December. Interesting. I would like to know how that will work. We have to leave the ship and re-check in so I would think we are doing 2 7 day cruises vs a 14 day cruise. We have never done a B2B before.

December is beyond the Framework cutoff so there's no prohibition against B2B or 14 day cruises.  I've never done a B2B but as I understand it, the B2B people assemble in one area of the ship and CBP comes aboard and checks the paperwork onboard without requiring the PAX to disembark and re-embark.  Maybe someone with some B2B experience can give some better insight.

[Astro Flyer]

5 minutes ago, Daniel A said:

December is beyond the Framework cutoff so there's no prohibition against B2B or 14 day cruises.  I've never done a B2B but as I understand it, the B2B people assemble in one area of the ship and CBP comes aboard and checks the paperwork onboard without requiring the PAX to disembark and re-embark.  Maybe someone with some B2B experience can give some better insight.

That has been my experience in non-USA ports but in USA ports needed to get off the ship while in-transit on B2B cruises. There was an area in the terminal for in-transit passengers who were the first to reboard the ship,

[capriccio]

7 minutes ago, Daniel A said:

I've never done a B2B but as I understand it, the B2B people assemble in one area of the ship and CBP comes aboard and checks the paperwork onboard without requiring the PAX to disembark and re-embark.  Maybe someone with some B2B experience can give some better insight.

 

The process is dependent upon the port and the number of back-to back passengers.  We have done it once in Barcelona, once in Valparaiso, and twice in Port Everglades.  In Barcelona we disembarked for our excursion and returned to the ship as normal with no formalities.  In Valparaiso, IIRC, we had to show our passports when we disembarked and returned to the ship after our excursion. 

 

In Port Everglades we were not taking an excursion (we live just up the beach).  Princess had all the B2Bers not on an excursion meet in one of the dining rooms warning all to be prompt.  There were approximately 800 passengers on the B2B!  They started bringing passengers down to the luggage/ customs area where we were to show our passports and re-board as soon as all passengers were off the ship.  Well one couple ignored instructions and couldn't be found for about an hour.  Meanwhile the space, which had very limited seating, quickly got uncomfortably filled.  Finally the miscreants were found and greeted with a well deserved round of boos and we quickly re-boarded the ship.  During the next B2B with a few hundred B2Bers everything worked perfectly.   While we still had to file out to luggage/customs area we showed our passports and re-boarded within a few minutes.  I have read of CBP officers coming on board to clear B2Bs with only a small number of passengers.

[skynight]

14 minutes ago, Daniel A said:

December is beyond the Framework cutoff so there's no prohibition against B2B or 14 day cruises.  I've never done a B2B but as I understand it, the B2B people assemble in one area of the ship and CBP comes aboard and checks the paperwork onboard without requiring the PAX to disembark and re-embark.  Maybe someone with some B2B experience can give some better insight.

Speaking about U.S. ports we have experienced CBP coming on board for the immigration in Ft. Lauderdale, but not in other ports. It is up to the authorities if they do or do not come on board. We haven't experienced CBP coming on board in maybe three or more years. In February 2020 we sailed three 10 day Caribbean cruises b2b2b from Ft. Lauderdale. On each of the two turn around days passengers who did not wish to go ashore in Ft. Lauderdale gathered in the theater around 10am. They were then escorted as a group off the ship, into the terminal and once everyone had been accounted for, the zero count, we were escorted back on. We did not have to go back through security. When we did b2b2b's in San Pedro it was more complicated. We had to gather as mentioned above. We were then escorted into the terminal and through immigration. From there we actually had to go outside, make our way curbside through disembarking and embarking passengers and re-enter the terminal at another door. There we had to go through security and wait in an area of the embarkation lounge until boarding began. It's much smoother and better in Ft. Lauderdale. Post covid the procedures may again change.

[cheone]

3 hours ago, cruisernh said:

I am scheduled on a B2B in December. Interesting. I would like to know how that will work. We have to leave the ship and re-check in so I would think we are doing 2 7 day cruises vs a 14 day cruise. We have never done a B2B before.

I have done B2B many times.  All passengers have to get off and clear immigration usually around 10AM.  After you clear immigration, you go to a designated area waiting for customs to let  the B2B passengers to come back.  They will not let you back on until  all passengers have gotten of the ship. One time we waited 90 minutes for 2 passengers to clear immigration.   They had to hunt them down to leave the ship and clear immigration.  In most cases, you are back on board within 15 minutes  

[rabin1]

I have a question. I know the ships have to do trial runs before they are permitted to sail again. Remember when they said that a few months ago? Will they have passengers or not and if passengers will they be volunteers? Does anyone know these answers?

I live in South Florida and when they do our weather reports on TV they start always with a background photo of the port of Miami. I know the ships come in for provisions but there are a lot more of the them in Miami docked and have been for a couple weeks. I might take a ride down to Port Everglades. I am only about 20 minutes away and see what I can see or find out.

 

Thanks 

Kathy

[beg3yrs]

3 minutes ago, rabin1 said:

I have a question. I know the ships have to do trial runs before they are permitted to sail again. Remember when they said that a few months ago? Will they have passengers or not and if passengers will they be volunteers? Does anyone know these answers?

I live in South Florida and when they do our weather reports on TV they start always with a background photo of the port of Miami. I know the ships come in for provisions but there are a lot more of the them in Miami docked and have been for a couple weeks. I might take a ride down to Port Everglades. I am only about 20 minutes away and see what I can see or find out.

 

Thanks 

Kathy

Royal Caribbean asked for volunteers and got overwhelmed with positive responses. I haven't heard of Princess (or any other line for that matter) asking for volunteers.

 

What worries me most is the CDC has been dragging its feet regarding details of what's specifically required for these test cruises. That's why to date there have been no test cruises. This makes me very angry.

[Astro Flyer]

4 minutes ago, rabin1 said:

I have a question. I know the ships have to do trial runs before they are permitted to sail again. Remember when they said that a few months ago? Will they have passengers or not and if passengers will they be volunteers? Does anyone know these answers?

I live in South Florida and when they do our weather reports on TV they start always with a background photo of the port of Miami. I know the ships come in for provisions but there are a lot more of the them in Miami docked and have been for a couple weeks. I might take a ride down to Port Everglades. I am only about 20 minutes away and see what I can see or find out.

 

Thanks 

Kathy

Princess has stated that after the CDC releases their requirements for resuming USA cruises they will seek volunteers for test cruises. RCI asked for those interested in test cruises & last I read stopped at 150,00+.

 

Currently cruise ships periodically go into ports to resupply & staffing.

[Astro Flyer]

4 minutes ago, beg3yrs said:

Royal Caribbean asked for volunteers and got overwhelmed with positive responses. I haven't heard of Princess (or any other line for that matter) asking for volunteers.

 

What worries me most is the CDC has been dragging its feet regarding details of what's specifically required for these test cruises. That's why to date there have been no test cruises. This makes me very angry.

I’ve read it could take up to 60 days after the CDC establishes their requirements. The question was asked in this week’s Princess webinar & they are not currently seeking volunteers until receiving the CDC’s requirements.

[beg3yrs]

1 minute ago, Astro Flyer said:

I’ve read it could take up to 60 days after the CDC establishes their requirements. The question was asked in this week’s Princess webinar & they are not currently seeking volunteers until receiving the CDC’s requirements.

Yep, even if the CDC put out requirements on March 1, no test cruises until May at the soonest. Very sad situation.

[LACruiser88]

It is possible that the test cruise requirement could be eliminated before cruising resumes.  All previous CDC guidelines are fluid and can be changed/eliminated at any time by the CDC.

[chengkp75]

2 hours ago, LACruiser88 said:

It is possible that the test cruise requirement could be eliminated before cruising resumes.  All previous CDC guidelines are fluid and can be changed/eliminated at any time by the CDC.

Is it possible that the simulated cruise requirement will be eliminated?  Yes.  Is it likely?  No.  Given that the requirements for the Conditional Sailing Order are virtually the same as the ones required under the No Sail Order to get permission to sail, it shows that the CDC is pretty firm in their commitment to completing their "phased approach" to restarting cruises, and that includes simulated cruises to test and train procedures and protocols. 

[chengkp75]

2 hours ago, beg3yrs said:

What worries me most is the CDC has been dragging its feet regarding details of what's specifically required for these test cruises. That's why to date there have been no test cruises. This makes me very angry.

Well, again, since the requirements for the Conditional Sail Order, are the same as the CDC issued back last spring in the No Sail Order, and the cruise lines took months to respond to that, and then only with a panel's recommendations, not action plans, there is a lot of blame to go around.  

 

Typically, the CDC will set requirements based on their area of expertise; infectious disease and epidemiology.  They then look for input from the industry as to what the industry feels is accomplishable both physically and fiscally, and then they will hash out a final plan from there.  As I've said, since the cruise lines have never responded with action plans of what is accomplishable based on the CDC's requirements, the CDC has had to go to the "technical instructions" route, and write requirements that are not in their field of expertise (but which are in the cruise lines' field of expertise), and therefore the CDC wants to take its time and do it carefully.

 

So, yes, the CDC is "dragging its feet" in getting the technical instructions out, but the cruise lines have dragged the anchor in getting action plans proposed.

 

According to the CDC, the next "phase" of the restart program will be technical instructions regarding the service agreements that cruise lines will have to have with ports and local health care, transportation, and accommodation systems, for the disembarking, transportation, treatment, or quarantining of passengers.  The cruise lines knew they had to have these (at the earliest from the No Sail Order, but certainly from October when the Conditional Sail Framework was published), yet has any line offered information that they have even started negotiations on this?  Could they possibly negotiate a conditional contract with actual numbers of patients, level of service, etc, to be determined at a later date (letter of intent)?  With the amount of finger pointing, don't you think that if a line had reached a tentative agreement for some ports, that they would have announced it?  I see, again, a total lack of initiative by the cruise line management.

[beg3yrs]

4 minutes ago, chengkp75 said:

Well, again, since the requirements for the Conditional Sail Order, are the same as the CDC issued back last spring in the No Sail Order, and the cruise lines took months to respond to that, and then only with a panel's recommendations, not action plans, there is a lot of blame to go around.  

 

Typically, the CDC will set requirements based on their area of expertise; infectious disease and epidemiology.  They then look for input from the industry as to what the industry feels is accomplishable both physically and fiscally, and then they will hash out a final plan from there.  As I've said, since the cruise lines have never responded with action plans of what is accomplishable based on the CDC's requirements, the CDC has had to go to the "technical instructions" route, and write requirements that are not in their field of expertise (but which are in the cruise lines' field of expertise), and therefore the CDC wants to take its time and do it carefully.

 

So, yes, the CDC is "dragging its feet" in getting the technical instructions out, but the cruise lines have dragged the anchor in getting action plans proposed.

 

According to the CDC, the next "phase" of the restart program will be technical instructions regarding the service agreements that cruise lines will have to have with ports and local health care, transportation, and accommodation systems, for the disembarking, transportation, treatment, or quarantining of passengers.  The cruise lines knew they had to have these (at the earliest from the No Sail Order, but certainly from October when the Conditional Sail Framework was published), yet has any line offered information that they have even started negotiations on this?  Could they possibly negotiate a conditional contract with actual numbers of patients, level of service, etc, to be determined at a later date (letter of intent)?  With the amount of finger pointing, don't you think that if a line had reached a tentative agreement for some ports, that they would have announced it?  I see, again, a total lack of initiative by the cruise line management.

Lots of good information here Chief, thanks. Of course us laymen often get only one side of the story and I greatly appreciate your input.

 

Thinking a little about this, having each cruise line (or better, each parent corporation) negotiate separate contracts / agreements with the ports (and wouldn't that only be the US ports?) cause problems as there could be multiple agreements in each port and confusion would abound as each ship / cruise line / parent corp would have different requirements. Yeah, maybe the CLIA could have stepped in and made one overarching agreement that all cruise lines would adhere to but infighting probably put the kibosh on that.

 

So, I can sort of understand why the cruise lines did force the CDC to take the long route. Not that I'm happy with that either. Once think there could have been some kind of meet-in-the-middle approach to help the CDC come up with technical instructions sooner. Too bad it doesn't seem to be happening.

[Astro Flyer]

14 minutes ago, chengkp75 said:

So, yes, the CDC is "dragging its feet" in getting the technical instructions out, but the cruise lines have dragged the anchor in getting action plans proposed.

Thanks again Chief for taking the time to educate cruise passengers on CC by sharing your wealth of knowledge about cruising & ships. 👍👍

[ronrythm]

16 minutes ago, beg3yrs said:

Lots of good information here Chief, thanks. Of course us laymen often get only one side of the story and I greatly appreciate your input.

 

Thinking a little about this, having each cruise line (or better, each parent corporation) negotiate separate contracts / agreements with the ports (and wouldn't that only be the US ports?) cause problems as there could be multiple agreements in each port and confusion would abound as each ship / cruise line / parent corp would have different requirements. Yeah, maybe the CLIA could have stepped in and made one overarching agreement that all cruise lines would adhere to but infighting probably put the kibosh on that.

 

So, I can sort of understand why the cruise lines did force the CDC to take the long route. Not that I'm happy with that either. Once think there could have been some kind of meet-in-the-middle approach to help the CDC come up with technical instructions sooner. Too bad it doesn't seem to be happening.

They are going to need agreements with every port on their itinerary, which complicates it more. Each agreement will need a retainer to hold the medical care available, so it could be quite the financial investment. Nobody knows how much, as no one knows what the requirements are. Ten passengers? One hundred? The entire ship’s manifest? No one knows. Until the cruise lines start making advances and giving them to the CDC to approve, nothing is going to happen.

Enjoy

Ron

[chengkp75]

56 minutes ago, beg3yrs said:

Thinking a little about this, having each cruise line (or better, each parent corporation) negotiate separate contracts / agreements with the ports (and wouldn't that only be the US ports?) cause problems as there could be multiple agreements in each port and confusion would abound as each ship / cruise line / parent corp would have different requirements.

Well, the one overriding requirement is what the CDC requires, and this is why I say that you go with the "letter of intent", where you make an assumption, based on your study of the CDC requirement, as to the level or quantity of service you will require, and get a tentative price tag, based on this assumption, with differential amounts for set amounts of more or less service.  They don't have to actually sign an agreement, just get commitment, and the shore entities would know how much they have committed to each line, and whether their infrastructure can support that level, or whether they need to charge more to cover increases in infrastructure.

[ontheweb]

5 hours ago, ronrythm said:

They are going to need agreements with every port on their itinerary, which complicates it more. Each agreement will need a retainer to hold the medical care available, so it could be quite the financial investment. Nobody knows how much, as no one knows what the requirements are. Ten passengers? One hundred? The entire ship’s manifest? No one knows. Until the cruise lines start making advances and giving them to the CDC to approve, nothing is going to happen.

Enjoy

Ron

And the more ships in port (especially the mega ships), the more chance that the medical infrastructure of any of the Caribbean islands will not be able to handle the possible load of infected passengers.

[jagoffee]

23 hours ago, cheone said:

I have done B2B many times.  All passengers have to get off and clear immigration usually around 10AM.  After you clear immigration, you go to a designated area waiting for customs to let  the B2B passengers to come back.  They will not let you back on until  all passengers have gotten of the ship. One time we waited 90 minutes for 2 passengers to clear immigration.   They had to hunt them down to leave the ship and clear immigration.  In most cases, you are back on board within 15 minutes  

That was also my experience in Florida.