Left behind in Key West

[joeinsb]

The captain of the Century said "I told everyone to be on board by 1:45 p.m., and the ship sailed five minutes late at 2:05 p.m.'' That left one couple who arrived at 2:10 with tons of shopping bags in hand on the dock as the ship sailed away. We were told they would have to fly back to Miami to catch a flight to Cozumel, the Century's next port of call, but it's only a four-day cruise, so we don't know if the tardy couple will bother doing that.

[dkjretired]

Not unusual, one of the sightseeing outings on a cruise is to sit up on deck as the ship is about to leave and watch the late ones running to get the ship. You will find its always the same people at every port. We have even seen people get on the pilot boat to get back to the ship.

[misha1]

When we were in Key West on a cruise a couple of years ago, we were in our cabin packing (last day...boohoo) when we decided to step out onto our balcony and watch the sail away. The crew had brought the gangway into the ship and the engines had started to churn when, along came a couple running from the shopping area, swinging their bags and yelling. I thought that the girl was having particular difficulty running because she looked like her feet were tripping over each other. I noticed the crew returning the gangway to the pier and just as they did, the girl fell flat on her face...onto the metal gangway. And to make the story even more interesting, so did her male counter-part. Me thinks they were a little intoxicated...but lucky nevertheless.

[usha]

An assistant hotel manager we dined with several cruises ago told us that they average 3 people left behind at each port of call.:eek: I don't know if he used a slide rule to come up with that number, but he probably had a pretty good idea of what goes on.

[Liat]

Joyce Gleeson-Adamidis tells the hysterical story of an experience she had as a young junior assistant cruise director. She was commandeered by the captain's wife for a shopping expedition. You guessed it; they arrived back at the pier as the ship was sailing away. The captain's wife managed, at the top of her lungs, to persuade a pilot boat to take them out to the ship. The very annoyed captain lowered a rope ladder from the bridge and made his wife (and Joyce) climb up back on board in full view of the passengers. Of course, Joyce had to carry all the packages; but she said it was worth it to have the somewhat unpopular captain's wife get her come uppance.

[woodofpine]

The Captain's willing to leave his own wife ashore... sounds like a lovely marriage. :D

[Cruisenouvelle]

Well, let's see... the Capt. announced his 'drop-dead' return time and the ship was STILL late leaving port. If it was me, guess I'd make my way over to Miami, find a motel, and do some sightseeing till the ship returned, then claim my luggage. I certainly hope they got some bargains on their shopping excursion, as it appears it will be more costly than they thought.

[RdubYa]

Pure Schadenfreude.

[jezzdogg]

On our second cruise..the Mercury as we left the docks in Cailica(not even sure they stop there anymore), we saw 5 or 6 cabs pull up with people from our ship.....yelling and screaming.

The Captain stop the ship......this took some time and dropped a life boat to get them......CD said it was highly unusual, but since the next 2 days were sea days before we headed back to FT Lauderdale, we had the time..

However, the Captain made a point of annoucing there names and the couples paid a fine. Heard they paid several hundred dollars a piece, but better than having to fly from Cozumel or Cancun to Florida

[greydog]

In Key West last year Galaxy had pulled about 200 yards away into channel moving slowly when an old fishing skiff came alongside with a twenty-something male who transferred onto the pilot entry. Don't know "the rest of the story".

[Liat]

This was told to us by one of Celebrity's Enrichment Series speakers on our Galaxy repostioning cruise to Rome in May 2004.

Celebrity had made arrangements to fly the lecturer, her husband, a couple of crew members and I think two passengers from Florida to Baltimore to catch the ship. The flight ran into trouble after take off and had to return. They all were put on another flight, but arrived at the Baltimore pier as the ship was pulling out. They were put on a flight to Cape Henry at the south end of the Chesapeake Bay, and when the pilot boat went out from that location [all large ships use pilots down the Bay] at about 4:00 A.M the next morning, they were transported to the ship. Of course Celebrity had to pay for all this, because the company had arranged the original flight; but if they had not done so, the next stop was the Azores, and I believe the only flights from the US to these islands are from Boston.

[dakodacruiser]

Last week while on the Diamond Princess, at two of the three ports in Mexico we were late leaving while the loudspeaker kept calling out the same five or six names to report that they were on the ship. They kept calling out these names each time calling out one or two names less. We asked some crew and they said that they were not accounted for and the captain was waiting for them. We

[shofer]

Interestingly enough, on our Princess cruise in February, we heard my husband being paged over the loudspeaker to call security. Turns out his replacement room card had not checked him back in when we returned to the ship. Seeing as we were already underway for about an hour, I don't know what they would have done had he not been on board. Tough luck, I guess.

[jaxon41]

I did not see this, but heard about it at dinner that evening. In St. Petersburg, Russia there is a souvenir store at the dock -- pretty decent, good prices -- and it seems some folks tarried there instead of boarding. We left late, the horn sounded numerous times before pulling out. They were seen waving frantically from the dock. I can't imagine being stuck in Russia, and since most everyone goes with a tour group, so one doesn't have to have a VISA, I wonder what they did. Call the embassy, I guess. They would have had to take the train back to Helsinki, and then a ferry over to Estonia to catch up.

[Texas_Diver]

Theses are probably the same people who are chronically late to work and to their other obligations.

 

D.

[fsr44]

The same thing happened during my cruise on Century a couple of weeks ago. We left Key West about 10 minutes late. There were several announcements, in several languages, asking for a certain couple to call guest relations. And of course, as we pulled away, that couple came running down the dock. I don't think they made it onboard until the next day.

I have to say, I don't get this. You have endless announcements and notices of when the ship is leaving. If you're shopping (or drinking) on Key West, you're probably within sight of the pier. 1,800 other people managed to make it back in time. How hard is it? I have sympathy for those few people who have some emergency/misfortune that causes them to miss the boat. But the "I lost track of time" thing I have no sympathy for.

[The Scotsman]

No doubt they are the same people who are constantly being called to the gate at the airport and being threatened with having their bags unloaded :rolleyes: .

 

Where do they go?

[calberry]

Last May we boarded the Regent Paul Gauguin (Tahiti) very early, well before most other people (check-in wasn't even ready for us, so we had a short wait). After having a glass (or two) of champagne, checking-in, and visiting our cabin, I then went back onto the dock to take pictures of the ship and surroundings. When leaving the ship there wasn't even anyone at the security desk at the top of the ramp (that's how early we were), but when I came back on board it was staffed and the attendant scanned my card. At the sail-away party (like 5-6 hrs later) we were sitting poolside when a crew member approached me, and addressed me by name (We were surprised that she would know me since I hadn't seen her before...at least didn't remember seeing her...champagne???). She said the ship's computer showed that I was not on-board, and she was just out looking for me (I guess she was going by the picture they had taken of me when I checked in). We figured that when I came back on board and had my card scanned that the computer interpreted that I was leaving instead of returning. An easy fix, but for a second it was a bit of an awkward moment trying to figure out what had happened, and she sure seemed relieved! At least it didn't get to the point of having my name called over the loudspeaker!!!

 

Steve

[Tatka]

I did not see this, but heard about it at dinner that evening. In St. Petersburg, Russia there is a souvenir store at the dock -- pretty decent, good prices -- and it seems some folks tarried there instead of boarding. We left late, the horn sounded numerous times before pulling out. They were seen waving frantically from the dock. I can't imagine being stuck in Russia, and since most everyone goes with a tour group, so one doesn't have to have a VISA, I wonder what they did. Call the embassy, I guess. They would have had to take the train back to Helsinki, and then a ferry over to Estonia to catch up.

 

Ya, completely different language, plus everything is so expensive in St.Peter and Moscow nowdays. :eek:

[cdbaum]

The funniest one that I can remember was in St. Lucia. We were on Summit having a snack in the buffet area prior to departure as we often do and were sitting in one of the bumped out areas so that we could see down the pier. If you are familiar with the harbor in St. Lucia you know that there are piers on two sides not double sided piers. We were docked on one side and a Carnival ship and a Hal ship were on the other side.

 

The Carnival ship was apparently scheduled to leave just before Summit because we heard her horns blow and looked out the other side to see her moving. At the same time we saw a cab speed down toward our pier, stop quickly and a couple jumps out and starts running down the pier. The gandway was still out and when they saw this they slowed to a fast walk down to the gangway. They stopped at the gangway with a confused look on their faces and spoke to the crew standing around. At this point one of the crew pointed out past our bow toward the ship now preparing to go through the narrow harbor entrance.

 

The man and woman ran to the end of the pier screaming and waving at the ship now 1/4 mile away and then preceeded to yell at each other for the next ten minutes before walking slowly back down the pier... about 15 feet apart.

 

A crew member later confirmed what I had assumed in watching this. The couple had jumped in a cab downtown (I use that term loosely) and said take us to the pier, and hurry. They didn't specify which pier.

 

You have never seen a quicker run of emotions and facial expressions from relief to confusion to shock to anger.

[dalitos]

Hilarious posts!!! :D

Why would you ever expect a ship with 2000+ passengers to wait for you?!

[GW Phoenix]

Well, someone earlier in this post hit the nail on the head about the kind of people who are late coming back...late for everything in their lives.

 

On the Constellation last month there was that one couple who were late returning from the first port (St. Martin). The ship waited a few minutes and their names were announced several times, quite a few people knew who they were from watching over the rails for them. They made it, may have been reprimanded, who knows? The ship waited for them, though, a few minutes.

 

Someone else I spoke to a few days later said that these people were on a shore excursion with them, the tour bus waited for them while they took their time doing whatever being late and they had no concern whatsoever for anyone else or the fact that they were late. Guess they never had to learn their lesson.

[geoherb]

On the Century a few years ago, the captain stopped the ship after leaving San Juan and waited for two passengers to take a small boat out to meet us. I'm not sure if it was in the spirit of being a Christmas cruise or if it's because San Juan was our last port, with two days at sea before we ended up back in Fort Lauderdale.

 

On last year's Christmas cruise (on Princess), we had lunch with a man who's name we recognized from being paged the day before. He was on a ship-sponsored golfing excursion. The leader of the excursion had told him and another man to wait in one spot. The leader then forgot them and did not bother to do a head count. Someone from the golf course gave them a ride back to the ship and they barely made it on before sailing.