AhaOhio Posted February 20, 2022 Report Share Posted February 20, 2022 Well well... We were booked on the Liberty of the Seas cruise that is about to leave Galveston in two and a half hours from now. We will not be on the ship. First some facts about us: We live in southern Sweden and were booked on a flight from Copenhagen yesterday (Saturday 19th). We tried to follow all requirements so all vaccinated adults took the antigen test the day before the scheduled flight and our granddaughter had a PCR-test taken. We would get the PCR-result "some time" before midnight same day. Checked into the airport hotel at Copenhagen airport and waited for the result. Unfortunately this turned out to be Covid positive so all we could do was to cancel all reservations that we could cancel online, forget about the airline reservation (non refundable). Find no way to contact RCCL online so damn that. (But we bought a rather expensive insurance policy from the travel agent that covers sudden illness or similar). We seem to be able to recover most of our expenses but are obviously extremely disappointed about how it all turned out. I understand that there are rules but my conclusions are as follows: With a family it is far too risky right now to book any cruising adventure while the rules re testing and certificates are where they are now. The chances of any one in a larger party to be denied boarding are far to high to be disregarded. We will definitely wait until the situation returns to normal before even attempting again (but we have promised out grandchild who is totally devastated) that we will do this adventure as soon as it is safe. Also If you are living in an EU country and are looking for airfare to go on a cruise that leaves from the US (or anywhere else in the world) I would recommend picking an EU based carrier and not a UK based one. After brexit there is simply so many additional layers of reporting required for say British Airways that it is highly impractical to use them. I spent almost two hours attempting to enter a pre-entry registration form (courtesy of the British Government) where the website crashed seven times and some of the information that had to be filled in had to be mere guesswork due to the way the questions were set up. Imagine doing that for a party of five - anyone would go nuts. dr martini, Cruiser4Life, BowTieBrigade and 1 other 3 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WAAAYTOOO Posted February 20, 2022 Report Share Posted February 20, 2022 47 minutes ago, AhaOhio said: Well well... We were booked on the Liberty of the Seas cruise that is about to leave Galveston in two and a half hours from now. We will not be on the ship. First some facts about us: We live in southern Sweden and were booked on a flight from Copenhagen yesterday (Saturday 19th). We tried to follow all requirements so all vaccinated adults took the antigen test the day before the scheduled flight and our granddaughter had a PCR-test taken. We would get the PCR-result "some time" before midnight same day. Checked into the airport hotel at Copenhagen airport and waited for the result. Unfortunately this turned out to be Covid positive so all we could do was to cancel all reservations that we could cancel online, forget about the airline reservation (non refundable). Find no way to contact RCCL online so damn that. (But we bought a rather expensive insurance policy from the travel agent that covers sudden illness or similar). We seem to be able to recover most of our expenses but are obviously extremely disappointed about how it all turned out. I understand that there are rules but my conclusions are as follows: With a family it is far too risky right now to book any cruising adventure while the rules re testing and certificates are where they are now. The chances of any one in a larger party to be denied boarding are far to high to be disregarded. We will definitely wait until the situation returns to normal before even attempting again (but we have promised out grandchild who is totally devastated) that we will do this adventure as soon as it is safe. Also If you are living in an EU country and are looking for airfare to go on a cruise that leaves from the US (or anywhere else in the world) I would recommend picking an EU based carrier and not a UK based one. After brexit there is simply so many additional layers of reporting required for say British Airways that it is highly impractical to use them. I spent almost two hours attempting to enter a pre-entry registration form (courtesy of the British Government) where the website crashed seven times and some of the information that had to be filled in had to be mere guesswork due to the way the questions were set up. Imagine doing that for a party of five - anyone would go nuts. First, allow me to compliment you on you very excellent English! WOW. Impressed Secondly, I am very sorry to hear that your trip was ruined by COVID. What a disappointment. I think you have an excellent point on the current risks involved in both international travel and also with cruising, in general. The larger and more distant your travel party, the more chances there are to have everything utterly ruined. Thirdly, congratulations on the smart move of getting full coverage insurance. Imagine the devastation if you hadn’t taken that prudent step of protection. Hopefully you will be able to travel and cruise again without the hateful specter of COVID. Allen2 and fireclan 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FionaMG Posted February 20, 2022 Report Share Posted February 20, 2022 @AhaOhio I am so sorry to hear about your disappointment. I think it is probably a blessing in disguise that you got the result before your transatlantic flight rather than after arriving in the States. The spectre of a positive test is very real and I found it completely wrecked all of the pre-cruise anticipation and excitement for me. Thankfully we were fine and got to cruise but we stayed in Europe (we live in Portugal) and our two cruises this year will be on this side of the pond too, essentially for the reasons you mention. We are postponing a much-awaited trip to the Big Apple until next year to give things time to hopefully settle down I wish you and your family well and a speedy recovery for your granddaughter. BowTieBrigade 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
willowberry88 Posted February 21, 2022 Report Share Posted February 21, 2022 Thank you for sharing your story, I’m sure it will help a lot of families make their decision . So sorry it didn’t work out for your family but smart move on the insurance and being able to recover most of the cost! Wishing your granddaughter a speedy recovery, sending positive vibes from across the ocean from Canada! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Butch R Posted February 21, 2022 Report Share Posted February 21, 2022 6 hours ago, AhaOhio said: With a family it is far too risky right now to book any cruising adventure while the rules re testing and certificates are where they are now. @AhaOhio, I am so sorry your family did not get to cruise. We had our plans to visit U.K. lost to the pandemic. We had been planning a trip and had everything paid for for a May 2020 trip. As you can imagine, it was not to be. As you did, we had purchased trip insurance. Thank goodness we did! We are holding any plans to book travel outside the US until after at least 2023. We are planning a make good trip in 2024 ... four years after the original plan! I hope you are able to travel again soon my friend. I am so sorry about your trip being postponed. Take care and stay safe! PPPJJ-GCVAB 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AhaOhio Posted February 21, 2022 Author Report Share Posted February 21, 2022 I want to add a few comments regarding the insurance. Here you buy that through the travel agent and the cost of the policy is a percentage of the total you pay the agent. This in turn means that you will not be reimbursed for anything you book yourself on the side. For us this means a total of just around $1500. This is for: Transit from home to airport in Copenhagen and return All Covid tests Hotel stay at Copenhagen airport Hotel cancellation fee in the US (basically had to pay full price for the stay due to late cancellation) I managed to cancel the Limousine service in Houston w/o paying anything. This leads me to the conclusion that IF you are opting for the insurance it would be wise to have as much as possible included in the bill from the travel agent. Let them handle the hotel reservations and as much of the ground transport as possible. That way - if anything bad happens you can recover more of your costs. As for us our grand daughter quite enjoyed the Copenhagen hotel and the nice meal we had there. The only total loss (except the testing stuff) was that we had to pay full price for the hotel in Galveston that we never used. WAAAYTOOO 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jticarruthers Posted February 21, 2022 Report Share Posted February 21, 2022 Sorry for your experience and I agree that anything involving international travel is not worth the hassle at the moment, i am back to normal looking at US based options but there are too many different bodies involved when you start looking at flights, transiting different countries, etc. for me to be comfortable at present. WAAAYTOOO 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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