Were You Ever Scared On A Cruise?

[Arizona Laura]

The scariest cruise I ever went on was my first one. In 1974, I went on a Greek ship called the Amerikanis with my family. I was 17 at the time and my sister was 20. The two of us met up with a group of kids from NY onboard and we hung around with them for most of the trip. My parents would let us stay up late at night as long as we promised to stay with each other at all times. One of the last nights on the ship, the group that we were hanging around with decided to go hang out up on deck, but I needed to go to the bathroom first. My sister went up with the group and I told them I would meet them on deck in a few minutes. After going to the restroom, I went up on deck to where I thought I was supposed to meet them, but they weren't there. I figured that they must have stopped along the way and decided to wait for them. I leaned against the railing and was looking out to sea when two of the crew members from the lower decks came up and got on either side of me. They started speaking in Greek (and of course I had no idea what they were saying), when suddenly they each grabbed one of my arms and started walking me down the deck. I started yelling at them to leave me alone, but there was no one around to hear me. I kept struggling to get away, but they still continued to pull me along...heading for a door. Suddenly an officer of the ship came around the corner and hollered something to them in Greek and they both let go of me and ran off. The officer came and made sure that I was okay, and then took me to the other side of the ship where my sister and our friends were waiting. I have no idea what happened to the crew members that had grabbed me. My sister and I decided not to tell our parents because we had promised that we would stay together for the whole cruise and we knew they would be mad (yes, we were stupid). I didn't tell my parents about the incident until about 2 or 3 years ago, and my mother was absolutely horrified!

 

That is definitely the scariest moment I have ever had on a cruise ship!

 

Someone was watching over you. How frightening. Laura

[jayfurr]

I haven't booked an official cruiseline excursion since. Supposedly one reason we pay outrageous prices for the official excursions is that they're contracted to reputable local operators, who have some standards of safety and reliability. Not so, at least not for us that day in Cabo.

 

We were less than impressed by the operators of the snorkeling shore excursion we went on in the Bahamas (at Nassau) when we cruised RCL in spring 2004. They didn't have proper snorkeling vests and the vests they did have had no crotch strap so the vests would ride up right over your head while you were floating along. When we complained, the operators suggested we skip using them and just float without them.

 

In a similar vein, our snorkeling trip off Cozumel was run by operators who tried to force passengers to drink shot after shot of tequila on the trip back to the ship, and by force, I mean that they'd parade up to you, pour a shot, rap it rapidly on the gunwale to get it to froth up, and then shove it in your face. If you declined, they'd do it again before going on. If you didn't want to come back from a snorkeling excursion stinking drunk, that was NOT the excursion for you.

[Snugglesx24]

I have been on several cruises and experienced some rough seas, but this one trip terrified me and got me sick for the first time on a ship. I was on the Star Princess out of New York during the last week of October into November last year. During the first three days up to Canada we were stuck in a low pressure system that was causing all kinds of bad weather in the whole Northeast. We got hit with 25+ waves and winds gusting up to 70mph. We were told not to even go outside. Sleeping was almost impossible since you rolled back and forth and I even fell out of bed once.

 

On one sea day my fiance was playing in a ping pong competition in the solarium and the listing got so bad that you could see straight down to the ocean on one side of the windows in the solarium and only the sky on the other side . Then the ship would tilt back to the other side. It got so bad that the crew member that was running the competition started yelling for everyone in the solarium to sit down. Most of the water emptied out of the pool in there and a lot of the alcohol and glasses in the bar area there fell onto the floor. All of a sudden it got really quiet and she told us that they had cut the engines. The captain came on sounding a little nervous and told everyone to remain seated. The woman told us that he cut the engines since we were, "out of control." Those are not words I want to hear in the ocean.

Here is a picture I took from the top of the ship and from the library. I'm not sure what floor that is considered but these waves were way over that level.

 

[rclcruzer]

The scariest cruise I ever went on was my first one. In 1974, I went on a Greek ship called the Amerikanis with my family. I was 17 at the time and my sister was 20. The two of us met up with a group of kids from NY onboard and we hung around with them for most of the trip. My parents would let us stay up late at night as long as we promised to stay with each other at all times. One of the last nights on the ship, the group that we were hanging around with decided to go hang out up on deck, but I needed to go to the bathroom first. My sister went up with the group and I told them I would meet them on deck in a few minutes. After going to the restroom, I went up on deck to where I thought I was supposed to meet them, but they weren't there. I figured that they must have stopped along the way and decided to wait for them. I leaned against the railing and was looking out to sea when two of the crew members from the lower decks came up and got on either side of me. They started speaking in Greek (and of course I had no idea what they were saying), when suddenly they each grabbed one of my arms and started walking me down the deck. I started yelling at them to leave me alone, but there was no one around to hear me. I kept struggling to get away, but they still continued to pull me along...heading for a door. Suddenly an officer of the ship came around the corner and hollered something to them in Greek and they both let go of me and ran off. The officer came and made sure that I was okay, and then took me to the other side of the ship where my sister and our friends were waiting. I have no idea what happened to the crew members that had grabbed me. My sister and I decided not to tell our parents because we had promised that we would stay together for the whole cruise and we knew they would be mad (yes, we were stupid). I didn't tell my parents about the incident until about 2 or 3 years ago, and my mother was absolutely horrified!

 

That is definitely the scariest moment I have ever had on a cruise ship!

WOW...that story gave me the chills... how horrible! You my friend are very lucky!;)

[massfriends]

This one isn't about rough waves or listing but, here goes.

 

We were on the Explorer a couple weeks after 9/11, I don't remember what day it was. I woke up and went out on the balcony to see 3 US Coast Guard boats. I'm like thinking what the....Oh, Sh*t I knew I shouldn't have done this...There were a few others looking out and everyone was yelling what's going on....No one knew...DH came back to the cabin and said people were running around upon deck..all kind of scared. The Coast Guard was on the other side of the ship also.

 

It seemed like hours before we finally heard that it was for security reasons only....and we didn't have any problems...They were only along side as an escort.

 

I was SCARED OUT OF MY WITS....with the ships TV's broadcasting CNN live reports for the entire week...

 

Under the circumstances we did have a GREAT cruise anyway...:)

[Micknmin]

Someone was watching over you. How frightening. Laura

 

WOW...that story gave me the chills... how horrible! You my friend are very lucky!;)

 

Believe me, now that I am a parent myself, I look back on that cruise and just shudder. There is no telling what would have happened if that officer hadn't shown up when he did.

 

We have only taken our daughters on two cruises, but before each one, I remind them of what happened to me and remind them that they always have to be careful when going anywhere alone...even on a cruise ship.

[Arizona Laura]

I have been on several cruises and experienced some rough seas, but this one trip terrified me and got me sick for the first time on a ship. I was on the Star Princess out of New York during the last week of October into November last year. During the first three days up to Canada we were stuck in a low pressure system that was causing all kinds of bad weather in the whole Northeast. We got hit with 25+ waves and winds gusting up to 70mph. We were told not to even go outside. Sleeping was almost impossible since you rolled back and forth and I even fell out of bed once.

 

On one sea day my fiance was playing in a ping pong competition in the solarium and the listing got so bad that you could see straight down to the ocean on one side of the windows in the solarium and only the sky on the other side . Then the ship would tilt back to the other side. It got so bad that the crew member that was running the competition started yelling for everyone in the solarium to sit down. Most of the water emptied out of the pool in there and a lot of the alcohol and glasses in the bar area there fell onto the floor. All of a sudden it got really quiet and she told us that they had cut the engines. The captain came on sounding a little nervous and told everyone to remain seated. The woman told us that he cut the engines since we were, "out of control." Those are not words I want to hear in the ocean.

Here is a picture I took from the top of the ship and from the library. I'm not sure what floor that is considered but these waves were way over that level.

 

 

 

Bring back my "scared to death" woman picture to place here. I know the more you cruise your chances increase of rough seas but this is not acceptable at all. I would land up down in the infirmary with the cardiac monitor on me and the ship doctor yelling "Sedate her now".:eek:

[corkpopr]

I had too much cough medicine one evening in the casino and accidently hit on an ace and a queen. boy was i scared!!!! drew a 10 and P.O. ed everyone at the table. Ah, the dumb luck of idiots!!!!!

[ondeckatsea]

We were on the Adventure of the Seas not long after 9/11 when everyone was very nervous. The next to last afternoon out, a sea day, we were somewhere off the coast of Cuba when we were buzzed by a gray, unmarked plane. We were up on the sun deck along with many other people. The plane came close enough to us that you could see the crew in the cockpit. It passed, went a few miles and came back and passed us again. No announcement was made. We later found out from the Captain at the Repeaters party that it was the Coast Guard checking us out. It was a pretty helpless feeling having that plane come so close to us.

[golfer1966]

I just read the thread on tendering and the dangers. It got me thinking of when I was on my first cruise in Jan on the Carnival Victory. Being in a balcony room whenever I woke up in the middle of the night I would go out on the balcony and look out over the ocean. Most of the time especially if no moon it was pitch black. It was a little spooky to me.

Also one night the ship was rocking some and I was hoping it did not get any worse. Thought about the ship tipping over.

So you see I am a worrier and get scared easy, but my first cruise was pretty uneventful. I loved it.

OK so now I am ready to hear of the times you were scared while crusing and what happened. Any good stories? :eek:

 

 

may have forgotten to load the lobster, I was afraid I was going to have to eat steak all week......:)

 

We were never scared on the ship but we missed the ship in St Maarten once due to traffic issues and when we were told we couldnt get a flight to St Thomas the next day we were scared we might have to fly right to SJ and wait for the ship to arrive so we could get our bags and go home, but we were able to catch the ship in St Thomas and all was well.

[GJClay]

I was on the Monarch in 1998. We had an inside cabin. It was a perfectly sunny and nice day in the Caribbean. It was the last day of the cruise and we were on our way back to San Juan. My friend and I decided to come in and pack because we both had bad sunburn. I was sitting on the bed and my friend was standing up. All of a sudden all of the drawers started opening. Then we heard glass breaking and my friend went flying across the cabin. The ship listed severely to one side. Once we sort of righted ourselves, we ran down to the showroom where they were playing bingo. The place was silent and the bingo board slid across the stage. Later we found out that the they picked up a naval ship on sonar/radar? and did not pick up the fact that the naval ship was towing a target. The captain made a sharp turn to avoid severing the target line. This was my 2nd cruise and I was just happy it happened on the last day. I stayed away from inside cabins for a while, but did not stay away from cruising. But my friend and I were pretty shaken up!

 

Is the reason for staying away from inside cabins since your experience because you want to be able to look outside to see what is going on, or are they more sensitive to motion?

[pepsicruiser]

Bring back my "scared to death" woman picture to place here. I know the more you cruise your chances increase of rough seas but this is not acceptable at all. I would land up down in the infirmary with the cardiac monitor on me and the ship doctor yelling "Sedate her now".:eek:

 

 

Those pictures were amazing.

[Andy99]

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=512990

[clearwaters]

Yes, it was the one my mother in law came on with us. One look at her in the early morning when we had to wake her up early for an excursion...and I was afraid. Very afraid....:rolleyes:

Now, now. :-)

[clearwaters]

Is the reason for staying away from inside cabins since your experience because you want to be able to look outside to see what is going on, or are they more sensitive to motion?

One thing is for sure. Big, big ships can turn one a dime. Pivot, as it were. (What I mean by "pivot" is the center of the ship stays perfectly still while the two ends roll and change places). I too am terrified of the balcony at night. The ship seems to rock a little harder at night and I was always afraid of falling over my balcony with no way to alert anyone I was in the water. Yeah, I know the railing is pretty high. I was just paranoid.

[Mark_from_Plano]

We were on the Adventure of the Seas not long after 9/11 when everyone was very nervous. The next to last afternoon out, a sea day, we were somewhere off the coast of Cuba when we were buzzed by a gray, unmarked plane. We were up on the sun deck along with many other people. The plane came close enough to us that you could see the crew in the cockpit. It passed, went a few miles and came back and passed us again. No announcement was made. We later found out from the Captain at the Repeaters party that it was the Coast Guard checking us out. It was a pretty helpless feeling having that plane come so close to us.

 

Story #1:

We booked our first cruise (Disney Wonder) about a year in advance. When the time came it was about 3 weeks after 9/11. As we were boarding the ship on Sunday the rumors started buzzing among the passengers that the bombing had started in Afghanistan. Everyone rushed to their staterooms to turn on the news on their TV's.

 

As we pulled out of Port Canavaral two Coast Guard boats, one on each side, escorted us out of the port with seamen manning the machine guns mounted to the back of the boats. The machine guns were trained toward the shoreline. Given the situation we were less scared than relieved to see them there.

 

When the ship docked in Nassau, there was a small protest going on in front of the US Embassy and Marines were there to make sure it didn't get out of hand. Several of the streets had to be blocked off around the Embassy.

 

Vacation was not necessarily at the front of most folks' minds during that trip.

 

Story #2:

On Splendor of the Seas we were doing a 5 day trip from Galveston to the Yucatan. On the last night of the cruise my brother-in-law and I are playing blackjack in the casino when the engines stop, everything goes quiet and over the loudspeaker we hear (something like) "Emergency Emergency fire personnel to the engine room." The ship stops. We keep playing cards. About 30 minutes later the Captain comes over the loudspeaker and says that there has been a small fire on top of one of the engines which has now been contained but will take some time to get the ship moving again. Eventually the ship limps back to Galveston down one engine which gives us an extra 4 hours or so aboard on the last morning.

[sunback2002]

You had a panic attack. It can sometimes happen when you feel crowded, overwhelmed, or stressed. I have Social Anxiety Disorder, so I have had many.

[sunback2002]

:confused:

I was a little scared on my last cruise. I was in the casino for the craps demonstration. (I just don't understand that game!) I don't know if it was the motion of the ship, the cigarette smoke, being in the middle of a big crowd of people, or what, but all of a sudden I felt REALLY BAD.

 

I started walking back to my room, and I almost passed out on the way there. As I got to the elevators, all of a sudden everything went fuzzy and I couldn't see! I sat down right there on the floor by the elevators and put my head down. I was aware of people walking around me. I'm sure I looked drunk or just plain nuts!

 

One man did ask if I was okay. I looked up and I could see him, so I said I was fine and figured I could make it back to my room. I almost passed out again getting off the elevator, but I managed to make it back to my room. I lay on the bed feeling really ill, and I was really scared that they would quarantine me to my room and my vacation would be ruined! Luckily, I felt fine after lying down for an hour and I felt just fine for the rest of the cruise. It was really weird!

 

 

You had a panic attack. It can sometimes happen when you feel crowded, overwhelmed, or stressed. I have Social Anxiety Disorder, so I have had many.

[bluecookies]

bump

[gill_boo]

Tahitian Princess for my honeymoon, and my first cruise. When we were tendering back in from Rarotonga the waters were so rough, they didn't think they were going to be able to get us all back in. So we got on the tender and sat like a friggin bobber on a fishing line up and down for like half an hour, I think the crew finally said screw it and headed for the ship. The swells were so huge in one instant you would be 6 feet below the step and the next you would be 10 feet above it. They had 2 crew members on the tender and 2 on the ship and they were basically launching us off the tender. That was scary.

[FL_Cruiser64]

Only once.:( Our first cruise. We were on a 17,000 ton ship. We hit Hurricane Hugo and tossed like a little bottle in the Seas.

I was too sick to care what was happening to us.

My husband is an ex Navy man from an even smaller Navy ship than the one we were on. During the night he thought we would crack in half at one point when the ship seemed to come up out of the water and land hard with an unbelievable cracking noise. He was very pleased that I was out like a light and didn't hear it. :o

I am happy to say 23 cruises later that I have never had any fear after that one. :D

 

17000? Oh my. Some yachts in Ft Lauderdale are bigger than that. :D

 

That must have been scary. What ship was it?

[FL_Cruiser64]

We were on a Princess cruise, when I decided to go to the shops while hubby was sleeping near the pool. I was there only a couple of minutes when the ship start listing to one side and kept going. I didn't start worrying until I saw the look of sheer panic on the shop's girl faces. Bottles of perfume and liquor were sliding off the shelves, all the racks were tipping over. One of the racks crashed into my back and knocked me onto the floor. The shop girl helped me up and then promptly put me into the lobby and closed and locked the doors behind me.

 

the pool water spilled out of the pools washing the belongings of many of the people up on the pool deck right off the side of the ship where there was a 6 inch or so opening around the deck.

 

A little while later the ship's captain came on the speaker and explained that there was a pod (family) of whales sleeping on their backs right under the surface of the water so they had to make an extremely sharp turn to avoid them.

 

Several year later, we were on a different Princess ship and we saw a crew member wearing a t-shirt that read "I survived the Whale tipping" and gave the ship and date. I so wanted that shirt!!!!

 

While it must have been scary I applaud the Captain for saving the whales.

Did you ask someone how to get that shirt?

[FL_Cruiser64]

I thought that the cruise lines would get OUT of the way of a hurricane. Hugo was talked about LONG before it hit. Why on earth would a ship be THAT close to the storm. Now, I know that when there is a storm in one area that the sea can be rough hundreds of miles from there but in this case it doesn't sound like that's the case. All I've been told is that for the comfort of the passengers and the safety of the ship, crew and passengers that they would sail around such weather.

 

Getting out of the way merely means "out of the way of the direct path". Gale force and tropical storm force winds as well as high seas can stretch out 100s of miles.

[FL_Cruiser64]

Wow. I have nothing to report. I did enjoy reading others replies, though!;)

 

I don't either but I enjoy the reading as well and make stupid comments just to keep this thread alive. Its interesting.

 

:D

[kborth]

On my first cruise on Jewel of The Seas I was afraid to get on the glass elevators that look out on the sea. I am very nervous of heights. Anyways I met this other woman who was even more nervous than myself and I talked her into getting on with me.She was shaking the whole time. When we got off she hit me in the arm.The next day we met and she apologized and bought us drinks and we hung out with this couple for the whole cruise. They were a riot.I can't wait to see those glass elevators in JanuaryLOL .