"What Ports Are Closed to Cruise Ships Right Now?" -- yikes???

[FlyingAnchor]

4 hours ago, trabeler said:

FYI that Bonaire had officials on the dock yesterday that wanted to see our original vaccination cards.

How did the ship communicate this to you or did you find out on your own on the dock? 

[Beachin2]

1 hour ago, earthpoet said:

Yes, confinement would not be pleasant, for sure. We are in AquaClass, and I'm wondering if it's even worth it now--they may not have the steam rooms/sauna rooms open, etc. due to the masking. Uggh...what to do.

Also in the same boat in AQ.  (pun intended).

[davekathy]

3 hours ago, miaminative0853 said:

On Edge now. As has been widely reported, first stop, San Juan cancelled and replaced by Nassau on the way back. Tortola and St. Martin still a go.

Sounds like Captain Ron's magical mystery cruise. The Captain spins the wheel every morning to see where he is  going. 😂

[kearney]

We were supposed to go on Adventure of the Seas last August... it was sailing out of Nassau and one of the reasons for taking two flights to get to port...was that there would be no indoor masking since everyone over 12 was required to be vaccinated. About 10 days prior to sailing the protocol changed requiring masking unless in vaccinated people only areas.... I decided to cancel... Why spend over 5 hours traveling by air to do what I could do driving to Florida... As it was the itinerary was not really ideal...it called for 2 days at their private island and one in Cozumel... well when I cancelled there was a hurricane forming... turns out the ship ended up with 3 days at Coco Cay. Now for some that is a wonderful change...but I get sunburned just thinking about the beach... so beach trips are not my cup of tea. So cancelling turned out to be a good thing..   We did sail Celebrity in December... mask free and it was great... hope to do it again..later in the year

[ohiojohn]

44 minutes ago, Ckirtz3 said:

I just spoke to customer service manager about that change and they have no information. Their system  still states we are going to San Juan. Beginning to get a bit frustrated. I will probably cancel but was hoping they would first. 🙂 

 

It seems like we all want concrete answers, myself included.  But I can agree the IT information systems probably is not up to date.  For us we will be on the ship, whether 7 ports of call or 1.  I really doubt Celebrity will cancel this cruise, but this is only my opinion.    

[trabeler]

4 hours ago, FlyingAnchor said:

How did the ship communicate this to you or did you find out on your own on the dock? 

We had a letter before getting to any ports that said that we should bring a copy of our vaccination card onshore at all the ports. Similar info has been in the daily program. 
 

For Bonaire, the requirement to actually show the original card or digital certificate (if non US) was a last minute announcement made during the ‘we’ve been cleared by the authorities’ morning announcement just as the gangway opened. 

[maggie.1008]

Right now Hawaii is not allowing cruise ships and not sure what will happen with Canada. Our next three cruises begin or end in these ports. 

[curmudgeon98]

5 hours ago, maggie.1008 said:

Right now Hawaii is not allowing cruise ships and not sure what will happen with Canada. Our next three cruises begin or end in these ports. 

That's not quite current on Hawaii.  They opened up about the first of the year.  Grand Princess is there now on a R/T from LA, and Carnival Miracle and Oceania Insignia are enroute from California.  I think Norwegian has held off on restarting their Hawaii-based ship; I suspect their normal crew challenges would be even more difficult in the current environment. 

 

Who knows what it will be next week, though.

 

I've read on other boards that the challenge for Cartagena is that they are requiring a PCR test for all passengers on ships calling there.  Most ships have limited PCR test capacity, and mostly use that to confirm positive antigen results, so while Cartagena may not be officially closed, it's currently not very practical for large cruise ships. 

[nevadajack]

According to this Washington Post article: Every U.S. cruise with passengers has coronavirus cases on board https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/2022/01/05/every-cruise-ship-covid-cdc/   (How could this be when all on board are fully vaxxed?)   Eventually all ports should open and the masks and tests should disappear as herd immunity is reached in the near future.  Then, cruising will be fun again.

[lara h]

No Australia ports are open, hence NO cruising downunder for this summer 😞 

[cruisestitch]

On Silhouette this week and all five of our ports were open

 

st. Maarten 

St. lucia

Barbados

Antigua

St. kitts

[anniedave]

5 hours ago, nevadajack said:

According to this Washington Post article: Every U.S. cruise with passengers has coronavirus cases on board https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/2022/01/05/every-cruise-ship-covid-cdc/   (How could this be when all on board are fully vaxxed?)   Eventually all ports should open and the masks and tests should disappear as herd immunity is reached in the near future.  Then, cruising will be fun again.

I manage  care homes & within the last month I have had residents & staff who have had both vaccines &  their boosters  - done lateral flow tests & pcr tests on the same day - lateral flows have come back negative but then 3 days later  the pcr is positive . So quite possible that people double or triple vaccinated can have covid but have a negative lateral flow test on the day of embarking.  

[JamieLogical]

7 hours ago, nevadajack said:

According to this Washington Post article: Every U.S. cruise with passengers has coronavirus cases on board https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/2022/01/05/every-cruise-ship-covid-cdc/   (How could this be when all on board are fully vaxxed?)   Eventually all ports should open and the masks and tests should disappear as herd immunity is reached in the near future.  Then, cruising will be fun again.

 

The vaccine's primary function is not prevent infection. It is to prevent serious disease and death. Especially with Omicron, we have seen HUGE numbers of people getting infection and mild illness, despite being vaccinated and boosted. Thankfully, these people are staying out of the hospitals, because their infections are not serious. The county where I live publishes data on how many people in our hospitals with COVID are vaccinated vs. unvaccinated. It's not even close. 80%+ of those in the ICU are unvaccinated and 90%+ of the those in the ICU and intubated are unvaccinated. Meanwhile, in our general population 70% of people are fully vaccinated, so it's not even like those are equal populations.

 

My sister's fiancé is a respiratory therapist in the COVID ward of our largest hospital and he says that those who are in the ICU and intubated who are vaccinated are in such poor health, they would probably be intubated whether they had COVID or not.

 

I can completely understand why these tiny island nations with few health resources and possibly lower vaccination rates would not want to accommodate cruise ships right now. Ultimately, their local governments need to decide for themselves what is best for their citizens. I know that when I went to Bermuda in late September/early October, they were experiencing a surge and their only hospital's ICU had 14 beds total. Not 14 beds available. 14 beds total. That does not afford much capacity if too many of their citizens became seriously ill or if passengers on a cruise ship became ill enough to require hospitalization. It's not like in the US where if one hospital is full, you can send patients a few miles away to another hospital.

[TeeRick]

8 hours ago, nevadajack said:

According to this Washington Post article: Every U.S. cruise with passengers has coronavirus cases on board https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/2022/01/05/every-cruise-ship-covid-cdc/   (How could this be when all on board are fully vaxxed?)   Eventually all ports should open and the masks and tests should disappear as herd immunity is reached in the near future.  Then, cruising will be fun again.

Answer is simply Omicron.  I very politely suggest that you maybe take a few moments and research it a bit and read the threads here on quarantined cruisers on Celebrity ships where everybody is "fully" vaxxed.  And how current vaccines and even boosters, and 2 day pre-tests,  will not keep it off cruise ships.   Ports are in the same situation.  But this wave will pass hopefully quickly as you say- but near future might be the spring sometime in the US anyway.

[Arizona Wildcat]

19 minutes ago, TeeRick said:

Answer is simply Omicron.  I very politely suggest that you maybe take a few moments and research it a bit and read the threads here on quarantined cruisers on Celebrity ships where everybody is "fully" vaxxed.  And how current vaccines and even boosters, and 2 day pre-tests,  will not keep it off cruise ships.   Ports are in the same situation.  But this wave will pass hopefully quickly as you say- but near future might be the spring sometime in the US anyway.

All my family is vaxxed and boosted.  Both kids and grandkids.  All have been diagnosed with Covid in the last 3 months.  Symptoms mostly like a bad flu for "kids".  Grandkids less symptoms but lingering loss or either taste or smell.

Friends flew to Florida.  Vaxxed and boosted.  Tested negative at port.  2 days later felt "off".  Yup covid.  Like Rick suggest you read about Covid and how it takes a while for an infected person to test positive.   Disappointed that so many do not seem to understand how contagious omicron is.  Best friend not vaxxed.  Still very ill 8 weeks later.  No energy and still feels awful.

Wish the CDC numbers showing over 5000 cases on board from 12/15 to 12/29 was more widely shared.  So many cases.

Edited January 11, 2022 by Arizona Wildcat

[JamieLogical]

4 minutes ago, Arizona Wildcat said:

Wish the CDC numbers showing over 5000 cases on board from 12/15 to 12/29 was more widely shared.  So many cases.

 

Agreed. There were only ~150 cases reported onboard cruise ships the first two weeks of December. There were over 5000 cases reported onboard cruise ships in the second two weeks of December. And that wasn't even the Omicron peak! Omicron is just insanely transmissible. There will be cases onboard every ship, no matter how cautious they are. We should all just be thankful nearly all of these cases are mild, since cruise passengers and crew are vaccinated.

[TeeRick]

1 hour ago, Arizona Wildcat said:

All my family is vaxxed and boosted.  Both kids and grandkids.  All have been diagnosed with Covid in the last 3 months.  Symptoms mostly like a bad flu for "kids".  Grandkids less symptoms but lingering loss or either taste or smell.

Friends flew to Florida.  Vaxxed and boosted.  Tested negative at port.  2 days later felt "off".  Yup covid.  Like Rick suggest you read about Covid and how it takes a while for an infected person to test positive.   Disappointed that so many do not seem to understand how contagious omicron is.  Best friend not vaxxed.  Still very ill 8 weeks later.  No energy and still feels awful.

Wish the CDC numbers showing over 5000 cases on board from 12/15 to 12/29 was more widely shared.  So many cases.

Want to bet that the following two weeks (Dec 30 to Jan 13, to be reported by CDC in a few days) are exploding way past 5013 reported for Dec 15-29?   The previous two weeks had 162 reported cases.  Maybe this will be an eye-opener for some - or others will just shrug it off.

[RichYak]

26 minutes ago, TeeRick said:

Want to bet that the following two weeks (Dec 30 to Jan 13, to be reported by CDC in a few days) are exploding way past 5013 reported for Dec 15-29?   The previous two weeks had 162 reported cases.  Maybe this will be an eye-opener for some - or others will just shrug it off.

I would start the over/under at 12,000. Thoughts?

[cangelmd]

38 minutes ago, TeeRick said:

Want to bet that the following two weeks (Dec 30 to Jan 13, to be reported by CDC in a few days) are exploding way past 5013 reported for Dec 15-29?   The previous two weeks had 162 reported cases.  Maybe this will be an eye-opener for some - or others will just shrug it off.

I’ll take that bet, although I agree there is plenty of transmission still going on and a significant number of passengers are bringing omicron aboard. I’m hopeful that between reinstating masking, reduced capacity through cancellation, isolating crew and just plain being more aware, that the numbers will stabilize this week - at least I don’t think there will be exponential growth.

[TeeRick]

1 hour ago, cangelmd said:

I’ll take that bet, although I agree there is plenty of transmission still going on and a significant number of passengers are bringing omicron aboard. I’m hopeful that between reinstating masking, reduced capacity through cancellation, isolating crew and just plain being more aware, that the numbers will stabilize this week - at least I don’t think there will be exponential growth.

The numbers will start to stabilize soon- but not sure about that happening this week.

[TeeRick]

1 hour ago, RichYak said:

I would start the over/under at 12,000. Thoughts?

I will take the Over.

[RichYak]

32 minutes ago, TeeRick said:

I will take the Over.

I think that's a good bet.

[Arizona Wildcat]

On 1/10/2022 at 10:10 AM, ohiojohn said:

 

It seems like we all want concrete answers, myself included.  But I can agree the IT information systems probably is not up to date.  For us we will be on the ship, whether 7 ports of call or 1.  I really doubt Celebrity will cancel this cruise, but this is only my opinion.    

John - Celebrity's website is not the best, but how do you expect them to know what ports any ship will be able to visit?  Impossible today as some two dozen countries are changing their rules often and there is no way to know what the status as to Covid cases on board until AFTER you sail - and it changes daily.

If you are not completely flexible seems waiting a while to cruise would make for a more enjoyable vacation .

[Arizona Wildcat]

1 hour ago, TeeRick said:

I will take the Over.

15200.  The big thing is if they provide any detail.  My Senator has requested at least numbers by ship and passengers or crew.  No response yet.

[cruisestitch]

I was actually on a ship in December, not a celebrity but a royal Caribbean ship, that was pulling into the dock at Saint Lucia and suddenly had to come to a halt because they were denied entry. There was no prior notice because the St. Lucian authorities decided that morning that the Explorer could not dock there, just minutes before it was scheduled to