Greetings from the Golden

[hcs81m]

Hello Everyone

 

I am wrinting from the Golden. Barbados and St. Marteen were scratched from our trip. The first day was at sea. Yesterday was Curacao. We are about to leave Isla Margaurite Venezuela. Tommorrw is St. Lucia Friday is Antigua, and St Thomas on Saturday. Last Night was rough, we passed 120 miles to the south of Ivan. Every thing else is going well.

 

I will check my e-mail after dinner if anyone has any questions

[ryjen7]

Cool Cruiser,

Did Princess substitute Curacao and Isla Margaurite for Barbados and St. Marteen? What will happen to any excursions that you had scheduled in Barbados and St. Marteen? I'm wondering because we are suppose to sail on September 19, and with all the hurricanes, I'm afraid we may be rerouted too.

Thanks for the information.

Carol

[Host CJSKIDS]

I'm wondering what they will do with the port stops of places like Grenada which is an absolute mess from what we hear. One official report place the island being about 85% flattened, whatever they meant by that and that most roofs are missing. I guess sailing during this horrilbe hurricane season makes for an interesting cruise.

 

I hope you have a wonderful time and calm seas.

[Jan T]

Greetings. Glad to hear from someone on the Golden. We are due to sail on her on the 19th. Hope we have fair weather and calm seas and we wish the same for the remainder of your trip! :)

 

Did things really get rough last night? How are the passengers keeping busy? Is it too rough to go up on deck? How did Princess handle your missed excursions? Was it a mad house at the tour desk trying to book a tour at the new islands? I can only imagine what Curacao was like with all those people trying to prepare for a hurricane!:(

 

We appreciate any time you spend and answers you can provide!

 

Enjoy the rest of your vacation.

Smooth sailing!

 

Jan T

[hcs81m]

Any tours purchased through Princess for Barbados and St. Marteen were canceled and the accounts were not charged. They actually did a really good job putting several tours together for Curacao. No one seemed to be upset, and there was no mad rush to the tour desk. They actually handed us a letter when we arrived with the new itinerary, so everyone was prepared.

The boat rocked pretty much all night, in particular about 4 or 5 this morning. Tonight were are headed to St. Lucia. The boat is rocking a little but it is not too bad.

[cruise182]

I love the rocking!!! I like to know I am on the water!!! I can close my eyes and hear the creeks and feel the motion of the ocean!!

[wdonnieb]

Did you say that they had already prepared a new itinerary upon your arrival on board? Have you heard anything about their plans for the next few weeks? We are sailing on September the 19th as well. Are they going to be able to get back on course or are they revamping the itinerary for a while until this whole mess is over? I understand that Barbados was hit pretty hard. I am wondering if they will scratch it all together for a while. I keep watching the next system out there. It looks to be growing, however it doesn't seem to be organizing like Ivan and Frances did. Any word around the ship about any of these things?

 

Also, is it raining a lot or are they steering you around it for the most part?

 

Thanks and stay safe!

Donnie

[Mac Pete]

Donnie, you probably wont know your itinerary until you board. We found out we were going in reverse order as we came up the gangway, in fact it was a letter handed to us at security.

Once we had settled in our stateroom, the Princess Patter had us doing a completely different route due to Frances.

We later learned, the decision to go in reverse order was made early Sunday morning, departure day, and there was no time to reprint the Patter, so a letter was prepared.

With the conditions changing as rapidly as they do, I'd be surprised if they can nail down the routing 2 weeks in advance.

 

Consider it a surprise routing! Its all Caribbean, and unless you had your heart set on a specific island, it should be a great trip in any case.

 

We steered clear of 98% of the foul weather, saw rain one afternoon as we were reboarding in Isla Margarita. Refreshing after a day of 35C temperatures

[spongerob]

Thanks for checking in. I bet it was a bit of a rough night - we didn't come near as close to Fabian and we were still bouncing around a lot. We enjoyed, others...did not.