No more Kauai for RCI and Celebrity?

[CarpeCerevisi]

Those of us booked on the 9/23 sailing of the Radiance to Hawaii just found out yesterday that we're no longer stopping at Kauai (we also lost Hilo). After some digging on these boards, I found that the Radiance, the Serenade and Celebrity's Summit and Infinity have all had there stops in Kauai cancelled for later this year (it looks like those in April and May are still okay). The reason I've heard is "berthing conflicts". It seems strange that all RCI and Celebrity ships have had Kauai cancelled.

[GMoney]

Wow that really hurts the Hawaii experience. I loved Kauai when we stopped there in Oct on X Infinity!

[OPSoccermom]

Interesting - the timing coincides with the launch of Pride of Hawaii - NCL's third Hawaiian ship. NCL still has Hilo and Kauai on their itineraries.

[Coralc]

Yep. We just found out yesterday that it has been dropped from our itinerary on Serenade on 10/05/06. You know what is even worse? We are spending an extra day "parked" in Honolulu. Instead of sailing on October 5th, we now board on the 5th and sail at 6PM on October 6th. We are flying in 3 nights pre-cruise. If we had wanted to spend 4 nights in Honolulu we could have booked it for ourselves. :(

[GMoney]

Yep. We just found out yesterday that it has been dropped from our itinerary on Serenade on 10/05/06. You know what is even worse? We are spending an extra day "parked" in Honolulu. Instead of sailing on October 5th, we now board on the 5th and sail at 6PM on October 6th. We are flying in 3 nights pre-cruise. If we had wanted to spend 4 nights in Honolulu we could have booked it for ourselves. :(

 

Wow that's really too bad. Not too much worth seeing in Honolulu...

[Mildred]

This is a very active topic on the Radiance M&M board.

 

There are now two days scheduled for Honolulu instead of one. There is no substitute for the 2nd missed port. We are to cruise aimlessly around the Pacific for an evening viewing of Mt. Kilauea instead. This is an additional sea day disguised as something else.

 

In essence, we went from 5 ports to 3 ports which is a 40% reduction in ports.

 

I understand when RCCL has to change a intinerary for serious weather conditions but that is not the case here. Why can we not be tendered into the orginal ports?

[GMoney]

What are the other 2 ports? Honolulu, ??? and ???

[Coralc]

There are things we want to see on Oahu, but I think that 3 days will give us plenty of time to see them. We were looking forward to Kauia. We are tossing around the idea on our roll call of flying over there on one of our pre-cruise days. Airfare is only $43 each way and flights run hourly.

 

The 14 day Radiance fall cruisers are really getting the short end of the stick. On the 11 night eastbound, our other ports (so far) are Maui overnight and Hilo and Kona on the Big Island. :)

 

oh yes. They added that Mount Kileaua (sp) Evening Sail to our cruise also. It supposedly occurs the day AFTER we visit the Big Island. I guess we are at sea, and then sail BACK to the Big Island to look at the volcano, that we already sailed past 2 days before? We aren't quite clear on this new "attraction". :=)

[Mildred]

For the Sept circle cruise the new itinerary is:

 

Honolulu

Honolulu

Lahaina (Maui)

Kailua Kona

Mount Kilauea evening sail (disguised sea day)

 

old itinerary:

 

Hilo

Kailua Kona

Nawiliwili (Kauai)

Honolulu

Lahaina (Maui)

 

Only 3 ports on the new itinerary and there were 5 ports on the old itinerary.

[GMoney]

Sorry to hear that Mildred; That itinerary is very disappointing. No one you guys are up in arms. I know the cruise lines reserve the right to make changes but you really don't get the full Hawaiian experience. Have you been before?

[Murphy]

How sad for you all! Kauai was absolutely my favorite stop. We actually flew into Kauai for 3 days pre-cruise and then puddle jumped to Honolulu to board the ship and then had one more day there as part of the cruise. Maybe you could change your pre-cruise to do something similar so you don't have as many days on Oahu...

[Mildred]

This would have been my first trip to the Islands and I was very excited about going. Even arranged with my parents to fly in from the East Coast to stay with the teenage boys while we were gone. For peace of mind if nothing else :rolleyes:

 

DH is not retired yet, although we are practicing, so flying out to the Islands first or staying later will not work for us. We were planning to drive to LA for this sailing.

 

DH wants to cancel but we decided to wait to see if RCCL changes it back.

[GMoney]

If it were me I'd cancel. When we did 14 day Hawaii on X Infinity in August, we had 5 stops, and even that seemed like too little. Best of luck to you.

[xpcdoojk]

Yep. We just found out yesterday that it has been dropped from our itinerary on Serenade on 10/05/06. You know what is even worse? We are spending an extra day "parked" in Honolulu. Instead of sailing on October 5th, we now board on the 5th and sail at 6PM on October 6th. We are flying in 3 nights pre-cruise. If we had wanted to spend 4 nights in Honolulu we could have booked it for ourselves. :(

 

That does suck. I wonder if they will change it to an extra day in Maui? Kauai was great in 2001 when we went there on the Radiance. The good news is Honolulu is a tiny part of the whole island of Oahu and the Northshore the Southeastern corners are definitely worth visiting! We spent 3 days on the Northshore alone on our first trip, and Honolulu is an easy place to spend a couple of days and the two could not be more different. So it is like visiting two completely different places. There are some great activities that you can do on Oahu, so turn a negative into a positive. It is amazing how Hawaii is selling itself out to NCL a cruise line nobody really wants to sail. :(

 

jc

[xpcdoojk]

How sad for you all! Kauai was absolutely my favorite stop. We actually flew into Kauai for 3 days pre-cruise and then puddle jumped to Honolulu to board the ship and then had one more day there as part of the cruise. Maybe you could change your pre-cruise to do something similar so you don't have as many days on Oahu...

 

That is an excellent suggestion. I would definitely look into it if I had my cruise affected this way. You want to spend as much time as possible in the islands and this is a good option!

[GMoney]

It is amazing how Hawaii is selling itself out to NCL a cruise line nobody really wants to sail. :(

 

 

I couldn't agree with that more...

[Coralc]

I agree also with xp, on the NCL monopoly. The awkward thing for us is spending an extra day and night at the embarkation port. We will have a rental car and go exploring until we check out of the hotel and board the ship on Thursday the 5th. Then we will be on the ship, at the dock, until 6PM on Friday the 6th. There is no reason to keep the rental car, because we won't have anywhere to park it. So..I don't know what we are going to do on Friday the 6th. Sit by the pool, go out for lunch on shore. I don't know yet.

 

Our friend's travel agent informed them of the change, and they let us know. Of course, RCCL never provides notification to anyone, and we are booked directly with the cruise line. Their wonderful TA also mentioned that if they could work out the berthing conflicts, that Kauai might return. :)

[MrWizard]

Well, I just spent the last hour on the phone with RCL trying to find out why Kauai and Hilo were cancelled. At first they attempted to tell me it was due to all the flooding there. However, they eventually fessed up that it is due to "berthing conflicts" that have caused them to drop those two ports. According to RCL, there will be no compensation for losing two ports as they repeatedly quoted their disclaimer "*** All itineraries are subject to change without notice". When asking them about port charge credits, the person attempted to tell me that RCL does not charge guests port charges. He stated that RCL pays the port charges, but does not "specifically charge" guests and if RCL is credited the port charges, they do not reimburse the guests.

 

He went on to say that he was confident that the RCL Deployment Department did everything they could to provide guests the best intinerary and that most guests cruise for the "cruise experience", not the Ports of Call.

 

Very expensive cruise for just 3 ports of call in 14 days...

 

Unless they bring at least one of those two ports back, we will most likely cancel this cruise...

[emmy]

Well, I just spent the last hour on the phone with RCL trying to find out why Kauai and Hilo were cancelled. At first they attempted to tell me it was due to all the flooding there. However, they eventually fessed up that it is due to "berthing conflicts" that have caused them to drop those two ports. According to RCL, there will be no compensation for losing two ports as they repeatedly quoted their disclaimer "*** All itineraries are subject to change without notice". When asking them about port charge credits, the person attempted to tell me that RCL does not charge guests port charges. He stated that RCL pays the port charges, but does not "specifically charge" guests and if RCL is credited the port charges, they do not reimburse the guests.

 

He went on to say that he was confident that the RCL Deployment Department did everything they could to provide guests the best intinerary and that most guests cruise for the "cruise experience", not the Ports of Call.

 

Very expensive cruise for just 3 ports of call in 14 days...

 

Unless they bring at least one of those two ports back, we will most likely cancel this cruise...

 

The dropping of this port is disappointing as I am anxiously awaiting to book this sailing for May 2007 the 14 day return voyage... so do they expect this to continue past this years sailings?

 

Emmy

[MGoBlue2]

NCL hires Hawaiians to man their ships, and runs them 52 weeks a year, is anyone actually surprised they would get first dibs on any port they want?

[AFT_LOVER]

We just got home from 2 weeks on Maui (Kaanapali Beach) and the beach is no more! Ocean to the grass or stone walls protecting timeshare & hotels from flooding. It has rained for 3 months non-stop.

 

Kauai 2 weeks ago had a massive mudslide from a broken dame atop a volcano that washed out homes, the freeway & 1/2 the airport. The island is basically closed, even the locals have gone elsewhere.

 

Oahu is 2nd worse shape ( but these two island are the oldest & 2nd oldest). Mudslides, rock sides, flooding is massive there also. Even lost had to move to a different area of the island as their plane was being washed out to sea.

 

We had 2 day in 2 weeks that had sun, Hana was a lake, no visitors, W Maui Mountain had mudslides & rock slides on any mountain. The County has netting on RT 30 mountains of W Maui to protect cars & people. Shakes have bitten 4 people, 1 on Maui, 2 Oahu & 1 Big Island of Hawaii'.i

The Maui attack was near Wailea. Oahu's N shore had the 2. Hilo had #4.

[Jimbo]

Makes you wonder doesn't how soon before the upcoming Radiance of the Seas May 7th 2006 itinerary is changed.

 

Hopefully it it does change they will tell everyone before they board the ship, so those making excursions privately can make the necessary changes beforehand.

 

Royal Caribbean stand up and be counted, what is going on? Be honest....

 

Jimbo:D

[gratefulguy]

May 7th cruise has been changed--go to their roll call.

[Jimbo]

The May 7th still shows 5 ports.......the September 23rd one only has 3 ports now....:(

 

[FlorenceItaly]

I am doing a 30 day Hawaii/South Pacific R/T from San Diego, Jan 22, 2007, and Kauai is on our itinerary. You may want to check out the 14 day HAL itinerary if 30 days is too long. Btw, HAL only does this particular 30 day itinerary one time per year.

 

Marie