Ever miss the ship while on a Private Excursion?

[STARFISH*4]

came pretty close one time due to tour-van breaking down and just got back on the ship with no minutes to spare:eek:--its always in the back of my mind when booking independent!

on a ships tour in Canada we waited and waited for 2 ladies that never showed up at the scheduled time to leave a place, we were running late so the tour operator arranged with another ships excursion bus to take them back to the ship--there was an afternoon tour--we were on the morning one--that was all they could do we waited and they even went out looking for them---not sure what they would have done if there was not another tour...send out a SEARCH PARTY:D

[Capt_BJ]

How about ending on an UP note

 

left behind

 

Dateline...hmmm 1987....

 

I was Operations Officer on a Coast Guard Cutter working the Caribbean and we were making an R&R stop in Cozumel. Typically, we @ 210 foot length were snuk into a place on the pier between the revenue producing cruise ships.

 

About 6pm I was on on board and after speaking to the gangway watch, I went to the bridge to watch one of the cruise ships leave.

 

The cruise ship cleared the pier and headed away when I looked down from the bridge wing to see a lady with a shopping bags in either hand running down the pier. She got adjacent to 'my' ship, stopped, dropped the bags & stared at the empty pier the cruise ship had just left.

 

I called down, "Is there a problem?"

 

"My kids and husband are on that boat." It was now just a few hundred yards away from the pier.

 

"Wait there, I'll be right down."

 

I picked up the bridge to bridge radio and hailed the cruise ship, "I have one of your passengers."

 

They couldn't come back to pick her up, but.....

 

I rounded up a boat crew and launched our fast rescue boat. The cruise ship lowered the same ladder they use for the pilot and the wayward shopper and mother was rejoined with her family.

 

Somewhere there's a lady with a very special cruise story....my guys felt it was a great change to a boring duty day!

[smeyer418]

I was on an NCL ship in the Bahamas and we were leaving the dock and it(the dock) was getting smaller until it began to get bigger again as we went directly back to the dock to pick up two passengers....Took all of ten minutes and is part of the miracle of azipods....

but I wouldn't miss the ship myself....

[junglejane]

Wow, knock me down on the play ground and give me a wedgie for asking a question! I am not a rude person.

 

Nobody had a problem with your question. The problem arose when you started scolding people for their answers.

[pg.]

Nobody had a problem with your question. The problem arose when you started scolding people for their answers.

 

Exactly,, sometimes people just like to "talk" ,, you certainly made it clear in your second post you are not interested... next time just explain you only want certain type of answers then some of us won't bother you with our useless dribble.. LOL

[room010]

Clarification: I was there to witness the "Noumea Incident" because we were on the same cruise and were waiting anxiously for our friends to return. Technically it's "second hand anecdote" but it most definitely happened the way I described.

[Grannycb]

I think this is a pretty straight forward question. Opinions were not requested. A debate was not requested. Like many I have enjoyed well researched independent/private tours as well as the ship sponsored excursions in my 20 plus past cruises.

From my experience I would say that having travel insurance is probably a must either way.

This is not a poll or subject for debate. I wanted to see if I could get a clear picture if there were people on CC who could say first hand they had missed their ship on an independent excursion.

 

Not a debate just a clear question. If no one answers, I have my answer. That's all.

 

To answer the original question: No. We have not missed a ship.

 

I was curious about travel insurance covering a missed ship at ports so called our company. The insurance rep. told us we would not be covered unless something like an accident, illness or terrorism caused the problem. A flat tire or not keeping track of time would not be a good enough reason to be covered. Might be a good idea to check with your own travel insurance company.

[smeyer418]

To answer the original question: No. We have not missed a ship.

 

I was curious about travel insurance covering a missed ship at ports so called our company. The insurance rep. told us we would not be covered unless something like an accident, illness or terrorism caused the problem. A flat tire or not keeping track of time would not be a good enough reason to be covered. Might be a good idea to check with your own travel insurance company.

 

 

It has to be a covered reason. Illness and accident are covered some terrorism is covered but not all. A flat tire might be but not keeping track of time or your being arrested probably is not.

[geoherb]

We've never missed the ship. I can see, however, that with many ships in a port how it's better to rely on yourself and not your cab driver to know what time you need to be back.

 

For instance, when we were in Antigua on a Celebrity ship, our time in port was much longer than the Royal Caribbean ship docked next to ours. I arranged to do a kayaking excursion through a tour operator. There were several people from the Royal Caribbean ship on the excursion with us. When it was over, they were rushing back to their ship--and it left about 30 minutes later. We still had a couple of hours before our ship sailed.

 

And we saw a woman who was left behind in Curacao on a Holland America cruise. There is a pontoon bridge in Curacao. Our ship was docked on one side of the bridge and the downtown area was on the other. We heard them paging a passenger over and over before we finally left. As we passed the pontoon bridge, we could see a frantic woman who was stranded on the other side.

[Krazy Kruizers]

Has anyone ever missed the ship because they couldn't get back to port in time from a Private tour. Not from a Ship sponsored excursion! But late for any reason from a Private tour?

 

Nope.

[frangran]

Every cruise I've been on has left one or more persons behind because they were not back in time. I don't know whether they were on private excursions or just drinking. Some caught up with the ship later.

[paul929207]

Last summer on the Ocean Princess, we had people miss the ship twice.

 

In Durban, South Africa, a group got off to go on safari and planned to rejoin the ship six days later in Victoria, Seychelles Islands. Due to pirate activity in the Seychelles, the captian decided to skip that port. The safari group rejoined us five days later in Oman.

 

In Mumbai, India, about 40 people took private tours to Delhi, Jaipur and Agra. They planned to meet the ship 4 days later in Chenai, India. One woman had problems with flights and missed the ship. She rejoined the hsip three days later in Yangoon, Myanmar.

[Hlitner]

Since we have been doing independent port things for about forty years we always need to think about missing a port. Not to give this issue some consideration is just plain stupid. As I said, we always have a "Plan B" which what to do if we miss the ship. As a generaly rule we always go to our most distant places early in the day (in Europe this can be hours from the ship) and work our way back during the day so that we are relatively close to the ship as we near sailing time. If we know that we could easily catch the ship the following day (a good example would be a ship that is in Civitavecchia one day and Livorno or Monte Carlo the following day) we might cut things close. If we did miss the ship we would simply telephone the ship's agent to let them know our status (we will catch-up tomorrow) and make our way to the next port (in Europe this would usually mean taking a train). I should also add that folks will often plan to miss the ship in Europe (we did this once). In those cases we notify the pursers office in advance. This happens quite often on some longer European cruises when a passenger decides they want to spend one or two night ashore and catch the ship at a future port (we are considering this for a cruise next May).

 

Hank

[trainfan]

We did a tour in Buenos Aires one time (a CC group) with a reliable tour operator. What wasn't planned on was a terrible accident on the Pan America Highway that held us up for over an hour. We made it back with one minute to spare!

 

I have seen people get off in one port (New Zealand) take a land tour tour to the next port and get stranded when the ship couldn't make port. The only option was to fly to Australia!

 

On the other hand, I travel by train here in Canada frequently and have seen people miss intercity trains by a minute or two - they will not hold the train (get the next one 4 hours later), have seen a passenger get stranded in the prairies when they got off for a smoke and wandered off, and have seen people get on the train to "visit" a relative before the train leaves, fail to get off in time, and wound up with a ride to the next station (for which they were billed).

[Hlitner]

You might smile at this, but one reason (of many) that we prefer to travel independently is that we have control and can take personal responsibility for ourselves. When you take a private tour you are at the mercy of the tour operator and we have noticed that many private excursions will plan a long day and bring their charges back to the port relatively close to sailing time. When we are on our own and rent a car, we give ourselves a better margin for error and will usually do the same on trains where we do not like to take the "last train." We also look at travel as an adventure and have learned to go with the flow! In Europe we will often start off with a general plan of our day and many times everything changes because we stumble on something unexpected and often quite wonderful.

 

Hank

[lovemylab]

Never missed the ship.

 

When booking private excursions we usually book half day excursions that take place in the morning or we book ones that get us back to the ship several hours before sailaway.

 

Before booking any private excursion I do A LOT of research (not only on this board, but on other forums as well).

[okbowler]

Unless I missed it there is not one reply of someone personally missing the boat due to a private tour operator getting them back late. Most of the posts of people being late do not know the reason. So OP's question to date remains unanswered or maybe not.:rolleyes: Bill

[Hlitner]

Unless I missed it there is not one reply of someone personally missing the boat due to a private tour operator getting them back late. Most of the posts of people being late do not know the reason. So OP's question to date remains unanswered or maybe not.:rolleyes: Bill

 

As you hinted, perhaps that is the answer. Despite the fear tactics used by some on CC and some port lecturers (paid by the cruise line excursion companies) it is rare for folks to miss the ship. We have been on more then 50 cruises (many in Europe and Asia) and chatted with hundreds (maybe even more) of passengers who take private tours or go on their own (this is what we love to do on ships in order to trade information) and have only met a few who missed the ships, and in each case it was a situation where they knew the risk and had prepared to catch the ship at the following port,

 

Hank

[paul929207]

As you hinted, perhaps that is the answer. Despite the fear tactics used by some on CC and some port lecturers (paid by the cruise line excursion companies) it is rare for folks to miss the ship. We have been on more then 50 cruises (many in Europe and Asia) and chatted with hundreds (maybe even more) of passengers who take private tours or go on their own (this is what we love to do on ships in order to trade information) and have only met a few who missed the ships, and in each case it was a situation where they knew the risk and had prepared to catch the ship at the following port,

 

Hank

You will only accept comments from people who personally missed the ship. Perhaps the people who post hear are either smart enough not to miss the ship or embarassed enough not to admit it.

[smeyer418]

or the people who read/post on cruise critic don't miss the ship. people do miss the ship. There was the couple on Kerabuti who didn't set their clocks to ship time. There were the people who had an accident in Costa Rica. It happens...relatively rarely and for the most part alcohol is involved so they rarely admit it. More likely to get pick pocketed.

[okbowler]

I know people miss the boat, I have seen this personally, but in both cases it had nothing to do with tours. Either too much booze or just didn't pay attention to the time. Bill

[Tallcruiser]

Thank you everyone for your posts. I truly did not intend to come off as I was perceived. I was just trying to cut to the chase with out dragging out another missed the ship thread. I too was proving a point for myself. I don't think there are more or less people who miss the ship on an ship excursion or privately arranged. Stuff happens. OK, we all like to talk about the stuff that happens. I wondered how those who were stuck handled their sticky situation. Did the ship help with direction and advice? Were they left to fend for themselves? Did they have to get permission to re board the ship from the Captain?

All the advice I agree with. If on your own, Do your research. Have plan B and your ship contact numbers and paper work in order. I would add to travel with good travel insurance. And a sense of adventure and humor.

I could add my own stories of excursions with a glitch.... ship arranged .

I even have left the ship to escort my cabin mate to a hospital stay in a another country. The adventures of that and then trying to catch up with the ship again in yet another country days later. Dealing with flights and hotels and oh yes, our luggage. We had good insurance and the ship and insurance company's were very helpful.

I just don't think that good independent excursions are any riskier than the ship excursions.

[Lard Greystoke]

I went off on my own in Antigua on a self-propelled walking trip to a distant beach. I didn't lose track of time but deliberately cut it close - about 10 min to spare. The roads there are pretty much unmarked and I somehow got on the wrong road coming back in to St John's, which lost me some time. Had to ask locals for the quickest way back which they provided. I was running down the pier about 5 min past the listed time to be back. The gangway was still down and the guy at the bottom motioned me to cool it. Ever since I've built about 1 hr leeway into my self-excursions.

[flamomo]

Nope! I'm not willing to run that risk!

We only book ship's excursions, partly for that reason, and partly because the cruise lines vett the tour companies they use for the excursions they offer, for vehicle safety, health safety (if food is involved), quality of the excursion, and do ongoing evaluations by placing ship's staff in the tour groups anonymously.

To me, both of those reasons make it worth the few extra dollars of cost for ship's excursions.

 

Actually, on my very first cruise, our ship's tour was over an hour past sailing time in getting us back to the pier, due to traffic issues when returning from the other coast of Panama. It was a huge relief to arrive at the port in Cristobal and see that ship sitting there waiting for our tour group to reboard.

"Ship" does happen!!!

[Mommaof2]

My sister and I JUST had to make that one last call home to our babies before getting back on the ship:rolleyes: Our DH's went ahead and got onboard. We are standing at the phone both talking and hear a ships horn blowing:eek: i say to my sister that couldnt be our ship could it:confused: Well we take off running saying to each other Oh we are being silly our DH's wouldnt let the ship leave without us;) We round the corner and sure enough it was our ship and they were honking the horn for us:o We run to the plank and they tell us well your lucky we were waiting on you 2! Going back to our rooms we find both of our DH's sound asleep...Oh what help they would have been:D