Upcoming cruise and wishes for a healthy new year

[LLOM]

We are suppose to be going on a canaries island cruise next week , (rebooked from a previous cancelled cruise ) we thought with stricter rules a

being applied to Scotland, Wales and Ireland that Boris would follow suit and had expected this to be cancelled as well, but not sure he is. This would be our last chance of getting away for quite some time ,but hey ho there are a lot of people worse of then us, have a healthy new year everyone .

[ferretktf]

Belief is that you should be ok.

 

no further restrictions in England until Jan 2 at the earliest (if at all) and even if there are, they are likely to follow those introduced in Scotland, Wales and N.Ireland , which Does Not preclude foreign travel for leisure (and no point really given that every single country in the world has fewer cases than us at present)

[LLOM]

Thank you ferretktf for your reply, if we cannot go then we will be disappointed but as I said there are plenty of people worse of than us but I am sure if we get on the cruise then we will make the most of it !! 

[Medeba]

After much soul searching we decided at the very last minute not to go on our Christmas cruise on Ex2.  Too many concerns about the fast transmission of Omicron and, having read reports of Covid outbreaks on ships, the possibility of quarantine in Spain did not appeal.  

[Pensioncruiser]

👌Brave decision, one we made many months ago. 

[ferretktf]

We are still going on our New Years Cruise on EX2 ... have stocked up with plenty of N99/FFP3 masks.  

 

We do not have any great concerns about the Cruise itself as we feel we can mitigate the risks to ourselves (while accepting that - given the prevalence - there are almost certain to be some covid cases on board). We don't feel that onboard will be any greater risk than remaining in the UK

 

The flight out is almost certainly the greatest risk as although cruisers need to have a negative test before boarding, those travelling to Malaga for a land based trip only need to be double vaccinated and so they are the potential spreaders.  We will not be eating/drinking onboard and so will keep our N99 masks on for the entire flight.

 

However, we have reluctantly decided to put our 14 night late February Caribbean Cruise on hold given that the Caribbean seems to be slowly closing down, coupled with the much greater issues presented by quarantining out there (as opposed to Spain for example) 

 

[Brummijam]

12 hours ago, Medeba said:

After much soul searching we decided at the very last minute not to go on our Christmas cruise on Ex2.  Too many concerns about the fast transmission of Omicron and, having read reports of Covid outbreaks on ships, the possibility of quarantine in Spain did not appeal.  

We cancelled our land based Tenerife xmas trip as our son in law and daughter couldn’t risk being isolated in Spain because of work commitments  back home. Fortunately Jet2holidays were very accommodating in letting us cancel and re book for next year.  To be honest we were relieved to cancel, not really wanting to risk becoming ill abroad.

 Happy new year to everyone on here and stay safe.

[LLOM]

Ferretktf, two of our relatives (75yrs young ) who have not been away since the start of Covid went to Tenerife not too long ago, they were quite concerned about the flight, but they both said that they felt very safe on it, everyone wore masks , you could not stand in the aisles and the staff came round frequently to check on people, they were very apprehensive about going but really enjoyed themselves, my brother and his wife went to Tenerife second week in December again they felt safe with the protocols that were in place, as I said earlier if we do not go because TUI cancel or we don’t feel safe , so be it. We will take a PCR two days before and obviously the lateral flow after 9 pm the night before the flight. Hope you enjoy your new year cruise, we would have liked being on that but because of time restraints could not go on it. Keep safe and enjoy.

[Medeba]

3 hours ago, ferretktf said:

We don't feel that onboard will be any greater risk than remaining in the UK

I'm not sure I agree with you here, Ferretktf, but I sincerely hope you have a wonderful cruise.  I keep thinking about what life is like on EX2 at the moment so I would be really interested to hear about your NYE cruise on your return.  Safe travels.

Edited December 28, 2021 by Medeba
typo

[Medeba]

2 hours ago, Brummijam said:

Fortunately Jet2holidays were very accommodating in letting us cancel and re book for next year.

That was indeed very fortunate, Brummijam.  We obviously lost our money but still feel we made the right decision.

[ferretktf]

@Medeba I was on Discovery in October and social distancing was very easy and both encouraged and well maintained by the crew - even in the theatre (I did not go in the pools).  I believe the ship was 60% full.   

 

Anecdotal evidence suggests EX2 will only be 50% full, hence why I don't feel threatened by "life on board" particularly with a robust mask routine when anywhere close to others - such as in transit, on the plane etc.

 

At home over Christmas - with six children between us (plus partners, kids etc) coming and going (and also coming and going to multiple other places inbetween seeing us - including places where there has been covid outbreaks)  - I think we have actually encountered far more risk as mask wearing indoors at home with relatives hasn't really been viable. ... on the ship we will keep ourselves to ourselves and will be happy being "billy no mates!"

We have taken LFT's daily for the past weeks and so far all has been well. Two to go!

 

 

Edited December 28, 2021 by ferretktf

[Cardiff girl]

On 12/27/2021 at 10:42 PM, Medeba said:

After much soul searching we decided at the very last minute not to go on our Christmas cruise on Ex2.  Too many concerns about the fast transmission of Omicron and, having read reports of Covid outbreaks on ships, the possibility of quarantine in Spain did not appeal.  

Sorry to hear that, @Medeba, I know how much you were looking forward to it.