iloveglee

I also have questions about this situation. We are departing from the UK, on the Jade in September. I am hoping that things will have changed by then, but can't guarantee. I was told when I booked, that we needed to test 72 hours before boarding, and that would be the only test required. I only found out later that for Greece, a further antigen test is done, by NCL, actually at the port. That's pretty clear, but what is not clear, is what do you have to do with that 72 hour test? Upload it somehow, or just take it to the port. I then assume (Greece only), they are concerned you have picked covid up in the intervening 3 days, and test again. In which case, as you say, why not just turn up and get tested at the port. Or will they not let you onto the port without showing the negative test? I note that for cruises departing US ports, the test has to be done no more than 48 hours before. These rules are so random, and so confusing, it wouldn't surprise me if there are many people get it wrong. And of course, if you turn up at the port, having previously tested negative, then subsequently test positive, what on earth do they do with you. Refer you to the authorities who ship you off to self isolate, leave you to sort yourself out, or what? Ive asked this question on live chat, but they refer you to the cancellation/refund policy, which isn't quite what I am asking. My cruise consultant, who is otherwise very helpful, didn't appear to know that this extra test at the port was required. Of course I get that with so many different rules for different countries, it's hard for them to have all this information at their fingertips. It would be wonderful, for us who are cruising after you, if you'd post back on here, exactly how this works.

What doesn’t make sense to me is the extra test for greece. Antigen within 24 hours paid for and administered by ncl. So if they’re doing it, has to be at the port. So anyone testing positive at the port gets denied boarding. And then what? No one seems to be able to say. Live chat can do nothing except refer you to the cancellation and refund policy. Which isn’t much help on the spot.

It does say or antigen you are correct. Although a huge document from EU does say pcr 72 hours before. It came out a while ago though so could have been updated. It’s all very confusing We’re not going until September and things could have changed a dozen times before that

With ncl, you have to do pcr, antigen not accepable, 72 hours prior to boading, which I believe is europe regulations for cruise lines. when sailing from greece, for some bizarre reason best known only to the greek authorities, you have to also do an antigen test at the port immediately prior to boarding. I can only imagine that this may be to protect the greek islands where the cruise is going. I was interested to know what happens to you, at the port, if you do test positive and can't board. clearly you have no accommodation booked, as you should have been on a cruise ship. I don't know if they report to the authorities who come and ship you off to a quarantine hotel (greece currently still has 5 days self isolation), or whether ncl leave you to your own devices, request you leave the port, for obvious reasons, and you are then on your own. I have tried live chat for this, but they keep referring me to the cancellation refund/future cruise voucher link on the website. I know all this, and have travel insurance anyway, but I am just interested in what goes on, at the time, on the ground as it were. Maybe going forward, people who are now taking cruises on this route, may experience this and will know how it pans out.

Ah that’s useful. It must be pretty time consuming at the port to have to do all these tests!! And I just found it odd that they don’t do it at other ports, where the entry to those countries have more stringent rules than greece now has. but things can change in days not months. It could be better later, or even worse. I wonder what they do with you if they deny you boarding? Inform the authorities and they ship you off to a Greek quarantine hotel. Or leave you to sort yourself out. it’d be interesting to know if this has happened to anyone and what they did. We live in uk and don’t need tests to go home. Not too worried about getting seriously ill as we are all fully vaccinated and had it already.

I just booked a cruise for September to Greek islands. The cruise consultant told me a pcr test was required no more than 72 hours prior to boarding. That was it, no further tests. Just received an email from them, standard one with links to all the covid stuff that says for Greek cruises a further antigen tests was required in the 24 hours prior to embarking and would be provided and administered by NCL. Given that Greece has given up all requirements now, even vaccinations, this seems an odd thing specifically for Greece. anyone been recently, or currently cruising I’d love to know exactly what is the requirements

Well curiouser and curiouser said Alice. I see the logic of packages are not ‘selling’ you a drink so makes some sense. Not good for those who drink little but enjoy a wine with their meal. I wish Greece had a website like the .yougov website here, where you can search for any law and read it in fine detail. Then again it’d be in Greek so not much help

I also tried with the live chat. she did admit some guests had been asking the question, and she spoke to her manager (she said), and there had been no updates. So a non answer really. The cancelled schedules from new york began in january, think to the caribbean, for the winter months obviously. it may be that the gem was always destined for the med in the summer. they do move these ships around a lot. So not that then, so the mystery deepens. I have trawled and trawled to see if I can find anything about greek customs etc but don't seem to be able to come up with anything. Hopefully as the summer schedules get under way, if there are issues, there may be more posts on here, or on other social media sites.

Indeed from everything I have read, I do wonder if this is specific to the gem, and is a licencing issue. I can't imagine cruise lines get licences for every ship and every country given that some ships tend to sail in certain countries at certain times of year. I know from an online article that the gem should have been sailing from new york to ? caribbean islands. All of those sailings were scrapped, the whole schedule in fact. So did they redeploy the gem to greece as europe generally is relaxing covid regulations for people to enter the country. And possibly the alcohol licence somehow got missed. This does make sense, as have experienced this on land when I was involved with the licence trade. All it takes is somebody to not think ahead 'oh we need an alcohol licence', for the whole thing to go pear shaped. Fingers crossed this is so. It's certainly correct to say that if this is a customs issue applying to all cruises then it will decimate the cruise business in greece. Which will do absolutely nothing to help the tourist trade. For example, and I think we are pretty standard cruisers, last time we stopped in Athens, we paid for a taxi to take us into the city, we paid to go in the museum. We bought honey and some local cosmetics, sat in a cafe and bought coffees, beers and baklava. Multiply that kind of thing, which is kind of minimal really, by all the cruisers that go in and out of greek ports, and it's quite a sum of money going into the tourist trade. We will see, we don't go until mid September, by which time hopefully theres going to be a definitive answer to this

Having just read a huge document relating to alcohol in greece, there is a reference to licences to sell alcohol, which of course any establishment, anywhere needs. My guess would be that the ships are probably licenced for the countries they are usually in, rather than having the whole fleet licenced for everywhere they sail, which is a multitude of places. I do know that the gem, which the ship leaflet referred to, had a schedule to sail out of new york at the beginning of the year, but the whole schedule was cancelled due to some kind of covid issue. Possibly they have redeployed the Gem to the greek islands, and as has been suggested, they didn't properly sort out the licence. I hope this is the case, because we are not going to be pleased, given the amount of time our ship is in port, if this is applicable as a regular thing. We had all better keep our eye on this

This is very strange, and one would have thought that NCL would have been advising clients prior to them booking their cruise. I for one might have considered a different itinerary. But it's interesting that currently this appears to be NCL. Customs authorities one would have thought had jurisdiction on all cruise ships? I'm not very happy I just admit having paid over £1000 per person, including our £149 extra for the drink package, which is a reasonable amount of money, to not be able to take advantage of it for a considerable amount of time. Our itinerary is in a greek port every day except for half a day in Turkey. I guess, as has been mentioned in another thread you can make contingencies for this, getting drinks when they are at sea, and taking them to your cabin. OK with spirits but beers are a bit of a challenge, unless they'd agree to let you have them unopened. I imagine the staff aren't too thrilled about this, they are after all the front facing people and the ones who come in for any arguments flying around. Fact is, if this the case, Norwegian should be warning prospective clients BEFORE they book.

The whole thing is really weird frankly. But you're right, there is a fair bit of time in port, every day on the cruise we are taking, at some stage. Two of the stops are until between 9.30 pm and 11.59 pm so yes, no drink with dinner on those two days, and no drink at all in the evening. Makes no sense at all. It has been suggested that this has been enacted to benefit the greek economy, OK I can see they have suffered during the pandemic, but to deny people alcohol on board, to benefit the greek economy, why stop there, deny people food as well? What's more weird is the difference in what people are posting. Some are saying that there were no issues whatsoever, some apparently on the same sailing, same ship saying alcohol was refused. Some saying it was one ship, some saying it was a different one. I can't get my head around it. NCL are going to have to get a grip on this otherwise people are going to read these things and decide to go with someone else. But if it's the law, then it would apply to all cruise lines wouldn't you think? If it is the law, and does apply to all cruise lines, it will decimate the cruise business in Greece which will do nothing for their economy. Even though people tend to eat and drink, mostly on board but not solely, cruise passengers do put money into the economy. We have been on a multitude of cruises, all over the place, and money goes into excursions, run by locals, taxi journeys, shops selling speciality goods, clothing that you can't get elsewhere. Museums and historical sites, the list of stuff cruise passengers do is endless. What I have done is to go on two other boards, one for Celestyal and one for MSC and asked this question on there. If it is the law, surely someone must have encountered this issue. Watch this space then.

Has anyone sailed to Greece recently, and found that they are refused to be served alcoholic drinks whilst the ship is in port. There seems to be some issue with this on NCL cruises, passengers are being told that they cannot serve alcohol while docked, as it's the law. Comments from anyone who has sailed in recent weeks welcome.

Has anyone sailed recently with Celestyal and had an issue with not being served alcohol whilst docked in greek ports. Strange question I know, as this isn't something I have ever experienced on other cruises. The issue appears to be with NCL cruises, we have been telling (some) passengers that they are not allowed (greek law), to serve alcohol whilst docked in a greek port. Does anyone know if this is in fact true, and applies to all cruise lines. Or just some lines, or even just the one!! We are booked on NCL in september - wanted Celestyal for preference but the dates didn't fit. Now I am wondering if we made the right decision. It's very difficult to get a definitive answer to this, as some are reporting yes they were refused alcohol during port stays, and others saying, no issues noticed at all. Some are saying this is just a social media rumour got out of hand, others, who are reporting from an actual ship say it's true.

It does seem to be that way. I contacted them via live chat and she said this was the case. As it goes we rarely take excursions anyway, we prefer to do our own thing. There were a couple we may have considered on our cruise, each of them only costs £23. We only have the one credit, so obviously even though there is £17 remaining, the second person has to pay in full. But - looking at it positively, it means that each of you only end up paying £11.50, and given that the tour we were looking at could be challenging to do it independently (due to the time the ship leaves), it might be worth it. On another thread, there are questions about them not serving alcohol in port in greece, which is an issue that probably requires some looking into.!!

This is truly bizarre isn't it. If it's greek law, surely it would apply to all cruise lines not just NCL? Whatever the problem is, it's not good for the cruises going to greece, when they are selling you a package to have an open bar, for just over £20 a day, but then the bar is not open for a considerable amount of the time. I recognise that many people are not on board whilst in port, but in fact some do stay on board. We have done the same thing, maybe because we've been to the port and aren't too bothered about going onshore again. Not that I'm personally too fussed about drinking alcohol in the daytime, but my husband does like a beer in the afternoon. I've not seen any posts to suggest anyone has been able to contact NCL for information, and trying to find out what the actual greek law is around the subject is impossible so far. Although I've not given up yet!!

I am interested in this topic as we have just booked for September on the Jade. Since I booked, I get NCL ads on my facebook feed, and this is where I first saw remarks about this. Find it a bit hard to believe, if this was greek law then there surely would have been complaints from cruisers on other lines. I know for certain the shops are closed, which is the law, and casinos also, not just in Greece, everywhere. I wonder if this may have been some kind of staff training issue, maybe with new starters? We had a major issue on a Royal Caribbean cruise in south america a few years ago relating to drinks. Nobody had a clue, the new regime had been handed down from the powers that be in Florida and it was mayhem. It was actually quite hilarious and provided us many hours of entertainment, but we hadn't bought a drink package up front so weren't especially affected. This was of course, a staff training issue, not their fault as they hadn't been properly informed beforehand. And if someone was declined a drink during drill then of course, you can't get a drink then as all the staff are supervising it. And you should be there anyway!! When you read stuff on non specialised social media, all it takes is for some kind of misunderstanding to have happened, and it spreads like wildfire, and is not actually true. Although from reading some of the previous posts, this has actually been happening, to what extent is uncertain. I have to speak to our cruise consultant in a week or so, I might see if she has heard anything of this, or at least can find out. She's an exceptionally helpful young lady so if she can't get the word, nobody can. Look forward to further updates on this.

Ah that's good to know. You read such conflicting reports in various places (not here usually), you never know what to believe. I have booked our speciality dining, and indeed that did come with nothing to pay, I have the confirmation to prove it.

Does anyone know exactly how this works exactly. I was under the impression that the $50 (£40) credit was for the cabin. On trying to book an excursion that costs £23, mine has the credit applied. The other person in the cabin has to pay the full £23 even though there would be £17 remaining from the credit. Am I therefore incorrect to assume it's for the cabin. I admit the free at sea offer is pretty complicated generally, what with all the items currently on it, but then the restrictions that apply. We have paid £149 per person for this, and again assumed that the drinks, and entry to one speciality restaurant came with no further charge. I have subsequently read that gratuities are applied to the value of drinks and food in the speciality restaurant. is this the case?