Sending mail from a cruise

[Jchivers]

We bought postcards in Malta on July 24 to send to family back here in the States.  The next day (a sea day) I left them with the guest services desk who assured me they would be posted when we arrived in Kotor, the next day.

 

The postcards reached their destinations sometime during the week of September 20...ie, 8 weeks later.

 

Of course this is not really significant -- the cards were nothing more than "weather's fine, wish you were" stuff.  (Or as Jimmy Buffet says, "weather's here, wish you were beautiful".)  But is this a typical experience?  Do we think that the cards just languished in a Montenegrin post office for a month?  Or did they get stuck in the bottom of a drawer on the Venus?  

 

 

Edited September 29, 2021 by Jchivers

[njhorseman]

Eight weeks is nothing. Mail we sent 15 years ago still haven't arrived...and that was only sent from Canada...😁 

[Heidi13]

44 minutes ago, Jchivers said:

We bought postcards in Malta on July 24 to send to family back here in the States.  The next day (a sea day) I left them with the guest services desk who assured me they would be posted when we arrived in Kotor, the next day.

 

The postcards reached their destinations sometime during the week of September 20...ie, 8 weeks later.

 

Of course this is not really significant -- the cards were nothing more than "weather's fine, wish you were" stuff.  (Or as Jimmy Buffet says, "weather's here, wish you were beautiful".)  But is this a typical experience?  Do we think that the cards just languished in a Montenegrin post office for a month?  Or did they get stuck in the bottom of a drawer on the Venus?  

 

 

 

The mail, both pax and ship, is handed to the Ship's Agent just prior to them departing the ship for the final time. How long it remains with the agent is anyone's guess, but since posting mail is a standard task for the Ship's Agents, I expect it was posted the following day.

 

From the WC, some of our postcards to the grandkids arrived after we were home, at least 3 months in transit. They were probably sent surface mail.

[TayanaLorna]

13 minutes ago, Heidi13 said:

 

The mail, both pax and ship, is handed to the Ship's Agent just prior to them departing the ship for the final time. How long it remains with the agent is anyone's guess, but since posting mail is a standard task for the Ship's Agents, I expect it was posted the following day.

 

From the WC, some of our postcards to the grandkids arrived after we were home, at least 3 months in transit. They were probably sent surface mail.

From Norway our post cards took 6 weeks to Wisconsin.

[Twitchly]

Postcards take longer than envelopes, as I recall. When I lived overseas, before email, we sent aerograms because they were the fastest. Still took at least a couple weeks. Regular letters took longer, and postcards took forever. Sounds like things haven’t improved.

[MarkTapley]

1 hour ago, Twitchly said:

When I lived overseas, before email, we sent aerograms because they were the fastest.

Wow, those were the days.  We worked overseas for four years in the late 70s and DW wrote lots of aerograms back to the parents.  She wrote very small, to get as much as she could onto the paper, before folding it up.  Mail was the only way to communicate back to the states, as the phone system where we were living was very primitive.  Good memories!

[Jim Avery]

post cards are, I believe, handled by hand.  Anyone who has been in any western world PO knows there just aint that many hands working at any one  time....🍺

[Messybill]

6 hours ago, njhorseman said:

Eight weeks is nothing. Mail we sent 15 years ago still haven't arrived...and that was only sent from Canada...😁 

Yes, a similar experience.  We sent a check(cheque) to Florida via Canada Post 11 months ago and it is not there yet.  I have about 100% certainty that it did not make it to the border yet and is probably being forcefully ignored.  I bet it takes longer than 15 years -- if I live to see it delivered I will be very surprised.

 

[Cienfuegos]

My sister sent postcards to me and other relatives from Cuba in 2018. Mailed them at a post office.

 

seven months. 220 miles or so.

[Twitchly]

4 hours ago, MarkTapley said:

Wow, those were the days.  We worked overseas for four years in the late 70s and DW wrote lots of aerograms back to the parents.  She wrote very small, to get as much as she could onto the paper, before folding it up.  Mail was the only way to communicate back to the states, as the phone system where we were living was very primitive.  Good memories!

Same here. Teeny tiny writing! And no phones where I was. Had to take a bus about 5 hours to get to a phone, and then calls to the US cost about $25/minute. I called home once a year for Christmas. Hard to imagine this now.

[zitsky]

It takes a long time for the bottle to make it all the way back here.  🙂

[lackcreativity]

Even when my daughter has mailed post cards to us directly from wherever she is visiting, they take forever and she always beats them home. Having the ship take care of posting them may add some time to it, but I doubt that is the main problem.

[chengkp75]

On 9/29/2021 at 1:57 PM, Heidi13 said:

How long it remains with the agent is anyone's guess, but since posting mail is a standard task for the Ship's Agents, I expect it was posted the following day.

Andy, you are real optimistic about ship's agents.  I've had mail sit in their "out" basket for weeks, until they are buried under other stuff, and forgotten.

[Heidi13]

8 minutes ago, chengkp75 said:

Andy, you are real optimistic about ship's agents.  I've had mail sit in their "out" basket for weeks, until they are buried under other stuff, and forgotten.

 

Possibly since we were generally on regular runs and had the same agents, we were lucky. Can't recall ever having issues or delays with anything mailed on board, or received.