Half Moon Cay-did any HAL ships visit 10/30-11/01?

[twentyknots]

I asked this question on another thread but did not get any replies so I'll ask again. Does anyone know if any HAL ship made a stop at HMC between Tuesday 10/30/12 and Thursday 11/01?

 

The reason I ask is I was on a Carnival cruise from 10/27/12 to 11/03/12 and HMC was on our itinerary for Wednesday 10/31. We were told Tuesday night that the island had not yet completed the necesssary repairs for us to call on them the next day.

 

Thanks.

[kazu]

I asked this question on another thread but did not get any replies so I'll ask again. Does anyone know if any HAL ship made a stop at HMC between Tuesday 10/30/12 and Thursday 11/01?

 

The reason I ask is I was on a Carnival cruise from 10/27/12 to 11/03/12 and HMC was on our itinerary for Wednesday 10/31. We were told Tuesday night that the island had not yet completed the necesssary repairs for us to call on them the next day.

 

Thanks.

 

I don't have your answer - but i am not surprised. It seems to me that there was an announcement that it would take a few days to fix the damage (although minor) on the island.

 

Many people are still without power - it stands to reason that the island may not have been a safe place to visit on those dates:)

[Krazy Kruizers]

The majority of HAL's ships aren't back from Europe yet.

Eurodam is back from her Europe and then Canada/New England cruises -- and her first cruise was a Charter, so I do not know if HMC was on her itinerary.

Zuiderdam just left on 10/29 for either a 10 or 11 day cruise and was scheduled to be at HMC on 10/30 -- no one from the ship is doing a "Live" report so I don't know if they made it or not.

Nieuw Amsterdam, Westerdam and Noordam aren't scheduled to be there until around the 12th and later in November.

[mcw331]

I am on Eurodam now and just spoke with our concierge in Neptune and she did confirm that Eurodam did stop at HMC last week. She said some trees were downed but all of the cabanas survived fine. she said it seemed fine and that they did get most of the mess cleaned up.

[twentyknots]

Mike, did she say which day they visited HMC?

[KirkNC]

I am on Eurodam now and just spoke with our concierge in Neptune and she did confirm that Eurodam did stop at HMC last week. She said some trees were downed but all of the cabanas survived fine. she said it seemed fine and that they did get most of the mess cleaned up.

 

Thats good to hear.

[SuitCaseBears]

By Next week we should already have more reports, but I'll be on Half Moon Cay on 11/19, and will be trying to post live updates nightly, with some pictures ... if the interwebs cooperate.

[NCTribeFan]

I was curious about this, too. I was on Leg 2 of a B2B and had already missed Freeport on 10/25 during Leg 1 so we could return to Charleston and outrun the worst of the storm.

 

We were to call at Grand Turk on Tuesday, 10/30; HMC on Wednesday, 10/31; and Nassau on Thursday. The announcement was made on Monday afternoon that we would not stop in HMC on Wednesday because of the damage.

 

Then I get home and hear that HAL had a ship there on Tuesday?!? Just wondering if Carnival was a bit hasty in cancelling the stop. Of course, it's possible that the seas would've been too rough to tender anyway, but since we'd changed the cruises specifically to get HMC in our itinerary (DD and new hubby were on board Leg 2 for their honeymoon), and had booked my first cabana, it was disappointing.

 

Nothing to be done about it, but I would like to know.

[twentyknots]

NCtribe, if you go to the Eurodam roll call for 10/27 you'll see that Reginakarek said that the Eurodam stopped at HMC on Friday, Nov 2. That's 2 days after our scheduled visit so the Fantasy probably didn't diss us. I asked the same question on the Zuiderdam roll call for 10/29 Panama Canal, but didn't get an answer.

[quanta88]

NCtribe, if you go to the Eurodam roll call for 10/27 you'll see that Reginakarek said that the Eurodam stopped at HMC on Friday, Nov 2. That's 2 days after our scheduled visit so the Fantasy probably didn't diss us. I asked the same question on the Zuiderdam roll call for 10/29 Panama Canal, but didn't get an answer.

 

FWIW, I noticed on MarineTraffic that the AIS for the 10/29 Zuiderdam indicated its next destination was Aruba, not Little San Salvador, aka HMC. They were due to arrive early Tuesday 1/30 at HMC, so it's possible they skipped that stop to give HMC a bit more time to clean up.

 

The 10/29 doesn't come back until Friday so maybe someone on the roll call will be able to give a definitive answer this weekend.

[Typhoon1]

I read on Private islands CCL missed HMC on 11/5 due to damage. It appears HAL has made stops prior to that.

[Himself]

Mike, did she say which day they visited HMC?

 

The Eurodam stops there on Friday

[Krazy Kruizers]

Seems as though Carnival made decisions not to stop there and HAL has stopped there.

Mixed bag of what is happening.

[twentyknots]

Doesn't surprise me. I've been to HMC 3 times as scheduled all on HAL. I read often on Carnival that the island is missed for one reason or another, disappointing many. I suspect that Holland makes a bigger effort to stop there since the passsengers have probably paid much more for their cruise than Carnival's.

[sail7seas]

Doesn't surprise me. I've been to HMC 3 times as scheduled all on HAL. I read often on Carnival that the island is missed for one reason or another, disappointing many. I suspect that Holland makes a bigger effort to stop there since the passsengers have probably paid much more for their cruise than Carnival's.

 

 

I think it useful to comment we have been scheduled to stop at HMC while on HAL ships probably in the range of 35 times. I would guess we have not been able to drop tenders and have either not even approached the island or came, Captain evaluated and we left somewhere in the range of 25-30% of the time.

 

Captains certainly try hard for us to have the day there particularly if the weather is beautiful but, of course, safety is paramount. There have been times we have arrived on a beautiful, bright sunny day and had to leave due to high chop. When you see the waves breaking high on the rocks you just know it isn't safe to tender.

 

No reason to think Carnival captains do not try just as hard to enable the visit.

 

 

 

[Himself]

Doesn't surprise me. I've been to HMC 3 times as scheduled all on HAL. I read often on Carnival that the island is missed for one reason or another, disappointing many. I suspect that Holland makes a bigger effort to stop there since the passsengers have probably paid much more for their cruise than Carnival's.

 

I have missed this stop on HAL. If the currents are such that it would make tendering dangerous for passengers or crew they will bypass this little tropical paradise.

[twentyknots]

No way to know for sure what goes on in the decision-making process to bypass the island. Since it is a tender transfer I suppose conditions can appear to be suitable to the passengers but the captain has much more information. My problem with the 10/31/12 decision for our Carnival cruise is that we were told it was because repairs had not been made. Yet, it appears that one or two HAL ships may have made the stop the day before or the day after. OTOH, even if HAL did stop there I realize that doesn't mean that Carnival could have on 10/31.

 

It serves no point for me to continue to second guess what happened. If I really want to visit HMC again I will book HAL and take my chances with them, not Carnival.

[sail7seas]

No way to know for sure what goes on in the decision-making process to bypass the island. Since it is a tender transfer I suppose conditions can appear to be suitable to the passengers but the captain has much more information. My problem with the 10/31/12 decision for our Carnival cruise is that we were told it was because repairs had not been made. Yet, it appears that one or two HAL ships may have made the stop the day before or the day after. OTOH, even if HAL did stop there I realize that doesn't mean that Carnival could have on 10/31.

 

It serves no point for me to continue to second guess what happened. If I really want to visit HMC again I will book HAL and take my chances with them, not Carnival.

 

 

Before you book a HAL cruise for the purpose of getting to HMC, please take into consideration the posts those of us who have sailed HAL a great deal wrote in this thread.

 

In post #15 in this thread, I mentioned we have missed going to the island about 25-30% of the time.

Keep that in mind if you are booking a specific cruise/cruise line mostly in order to visit HMC or you could be disappointed a second time.

 

There is a reason there is an asteric beside that port on itineraries and it references 'conditions permitting'.

That reason is they know they will miss that port a high enough percentage of times they 'alert' guests in advance it could happen.

 

And yes, we can say why HAL and Carnival Captains turn away from the island that percentage of time. We have spoken with a number of Captains about it and the answer is Always the same...... Safety. The risk of injury/damage to crew, guest, tender and/or ship. They are fully aware of the disappointment of guests when they make that decision.

 

We Never second guess a Captain on any issue involving safety.

 

 

[sapper1]

I have a 75% chance of being on HMC next Monday so I will report back about conditions.

[kazu]

Before you book a HAL cruise for the purpose of getting to HMC, please take into consideration the posts those of us who have sailed HAL a great deal wrote in this thread.

 

In post #15 in this thread, I mentioned we have missed going to the island about 25-30% of the time.

Keep that in mind if you are booking a specific cruise/cruise line mostly in order to visit HMC or you could be disappointed a second time.

 

There is a reason there is an asteric beside that port on itineraries and it references 'conditions permitting'.

That reason is they know they will miss that port a high enough percentage of times they 'alert' guests in advance it could happen.

 

And yes, we can say why HAL and Carnival Captains turn away from the island that percentage of time. We have spoken with a number of Captains about it and the answer is Always the same...... Safety. The risk of injury/damage to crew, guest, tender and/or ship. They are fully aware of the disappointment of guests when they make that decision.

 

We Never second guess a Captain on any issue involving safety.

 

 

 

ditto to what Judy said - except we have probably missed HMC about 40% of the time:eek: if they can't tender, they can't tender:D

[SuitCaseBears]

We've been lucky. Four perfect days at HMC out of 4 tries. I hope our luck hadn't run out. If not we're going to be there Monday with Sapper.

 

Sent from my DROID X2 using Tapatalk 2

[vicocala]

Is it possible that HAL did go to the island and the customer's/crew's reported that the island wasn't really ready for that many people? I would think HAL/Carnival would have prescouted the island, but it may be that the island couldn't accomadate either the guests or the larger number of guests that may of come on one of Carnivals larger ships.

[Krazy Kruizers]

When we first started to cruise HAL in 1996 -- and after doing Europe and South America a few times -- we were finally scheduled to do HMC in 1998 for the first time -- missed it.

And for the next several cruises -- HMC was cancelled. We had a bad record -- we got there 1 time out of every 5 or 6 cruises.

So we are used to missing HMC.

We have been fortunate over the years to visit HMC quite a few times so that now if we miss it -- not a big problem.

But I do feel sorry for those who have HMC on their schedule for the first and don't make it there.

HMC is such a beautiful island with the soft white sand.

[vicocala]

But most posters are missing the point that the OP didn't give weather as the reason for missing the island, it was that repairs were not complete.

[Krazy Kruizers]

We have had that as well.

We have over 60 cruises on HAL.