What's your epic cruise fail?

[Matt]

Forgot underwer? Went to the wrong city? Forgot a passport?

What's your top cruise slip-up?

[smokeybandit]

A few years ago we didn't check the expiration date on some of that Badger sun screen cream.

My poor son looked like an angry steamed lobster. Fortunately we had aloe.

[DoomSlayer]

Accidentally answered that my daughter was pregnant in the health section of check-in which got an instant denial of boarding message for her.  A phone call later and an explanation at the terminal fixed it all, but my daughter was worried they wouldn’t let her on.  Gave us something to laugh about later, but it definitely had my daughter worried that she was not going to be able to go. 

[Cruiser4Life]

We were once the dreaded pier runners.. in key west… our family has the largest plot in the key west cemetery so we took a walk there after our excursion to freshen up the flowers there… accidentally exited the wrong gate when we were done and got completely turned around heading back. In case anyone was wondering, the whole “the ship won’t leave you if you are on a Royal excursion” does not pertain if a) your excursion ends hours before all aboard and b) everyone else that took said excursion has long been back onboard. Oopsies

[KDK]

We flew out the night before our cruise to Europe. Horrible rainstorms shut down all of the flights out of New Jersey. We missed the first two days of our cruise and had to pick it up at the next port missing both the sail away and the first day at sea. 

[deep1]

Getting yelled at for fishing off my balcony...

 

[loki007]

we went on Celebrity Apex last December. My son lives in Daytona Beach and was meeting us in Port Everglades. He pulled up around 10PM and 1st thing I said to him was "got your passport"? The look on his face! He got back in his car for the 7 hour round trip to pick up the passport sitting on his kitchen counter. 

[Angel Mann]

25 minutes ago, deep1 said:

Getting yelled at for fishing off my balcony...

 

Omg did you really?! My husband joked he was going to bring a collapsible fishing pole on our last cruise so he could do the same. 

[ChessE4]

Forgot to pack dress socks once (for formal night attire), and I couldn't buy them on the ship or at any port.

Other than that, not taking enough $$ or Euros ashore when in port.  Food is always more expensive than you think....

[Srp431]

Forgot to bring my dress shoes, had to wear tennis shoes during formal nights.  My wife is still upset after all these years . 

[deep1]

51 minutes ago, Angel Mann said:

Omg did you really?! My husband joked he was going to bring a collapsible fishing pole on our last cruise so he could do the same. 

Twice... Once in Alaska and once at Coco Cay. Yes a collapsible spin rod. Yellow bucktail jig in Bahamas and a silver spoon jig in Alaska. They wanted to yell that I had no fishing license but each time I had obtained before getting there...

 

 

[She Sails Away]

This is a pretty big one. I went on a one week cruise of the British Isles. I flew to London and spent some days there first and then went over to Dover to catch the ship and cruise for a week. I put an extensive amount of planning into both halves of the trip and just planned and planned and planned.

 

So I do my London part and that goes well, and then I'm on the ship on about day three of the cruise with four days left to go when I suddenly realized I never booked a hotel room for the night before my departure back to the States. I had booked my flight for the day after disembarkation because it was such a long flight I wanted to take one early in the morning. That meant disembarking, getting back to London, and spending the night there.  Somehow I had forgotten to book a room, so I was looking at getting off the ship with nowhere to sleep. No big deal, right? Just book something. Well. It just so happened that the Queen had died a few days before and the day that I was looking for a hotel in London was the day before her funeral. Needless to say, there were no rooms, nowhere, (NOwhere), no nothing, and forget getting a taxi! ‍

 

 

[She Sails Away]

Part two: I forgot to buy travel insurance.

 

so what happened with my British Isles cruise is, after realizing I'd be spending the night at Heathrow (provided I could find a taxi on the day of the Queen's funeral… Good luck… ,) I thought, "hey, why not stay on the ship and just take the transatlantic back to the United States?" Sounded like a great idea. I went to guest services to do so and I forget why, but for some reason they just directed me to do it all on my phone. So I booked the cruise on my phone while standing in the atrium of the ship. Somewhere in the process, I either overlooked the offer for travel insurance, or it wasn't offered. (possibly because the cruise was only four days away.) And though I always buy travel insurance,  in the rush to get everything booked and settled, I forgot all about it.  

 

On day five of the transAtlantic, I thought to myself, "Wait....I never bought travel insurance." I figured it was too late and just hoped that would not need it.
 

On day six I needed it. I had all the signs of a detached retina and had to go to medical. We were looking at our very last stop on land the next day in Spain and then we would be at sea for a week. They arranged for me to go see an eye doctor in Spain the next day.

 

if it turned out I had a detached retina, they would need to do emergency surgery right away, and I would need to stay off an airplane for two weeks.

 

So I laid awake all night, picturing having emergency eye surgery in Spain, while the crew on the ship tossed my suitcases overboard onto the pier and sailed away without me. I was traveling solo and was wondering how much it would cost to have surgery, have my husband fly out to help me, and then how much it would cost to stay in a hotel room in Spain for two weeks and then find my way to the airport and then fly home. $$$$$

 

It turned out I did not have a detached retina and I made it back to the ship in plenty of time for sailaway and everything was fine. 

And now I never forget insurance or hotel reservations.

 The End

[RockerDom31]

My wife and I were so eager to go on vacation that we spent all of embarkation day basking in the hot NJ summer sun, sipping many cocktails.

…And not a drop of sunscreen was used! (Which we did bring with us!)

Unfortunately, we didn’t feel the consequence of this until the following morning when we both experienced some extremely painful showers. And with 3 sea days and the first port being Labadee, we had to live off of the vending machine aloe for 4 days. I’m pretty sure we emptied the vending machine!

Once we arrived to Puerto Rico, we hit up the CVS and bought more aloe, which is when we realized that the ship vending machine aloe was super marked up! We knew it was but we didn’t expect it to be that much!

Lesson learned!

[Montemy2419]

1 hour ago, Srp431 said:

Forgot to bring my dress shoes, had to wear tennis shoes during formal nights.  My wife is still upset after all these years . 

My husband always just pack tennis shoes, his are black.  He wears them with a tux and no one really looks at men's shoes.  People are usually distracted because he wears a LED light up bow tie and suspenders.

[deep1]

Almost made a really big one just yesterday while booking an Alaska cruise. I had been looking at a few and they all kind of blended into a mish mash. Finally picked one and went to pull the trigger.... Right cruise, right month and day. Wrong year  ! Caught it while I was on hold waiting for a booking agent. 

Had made a mistake booking last summer by a week from when I intended to go. What could have been a real mess they were forgiving with the next day. I got lucky. 

 

[Montemy2419]

Finally got our grown children all together for a 7 days cruise.  Rookie mistake (us being cheap) we flew the day of the cruise.   Yea, yea I know "what could possibly go wrong ?" I didn't book a non-stop so we caught up with the ship the next day in the Bahamas.

 

Since it's confession time two years before the family cruise my husband and I were cruising and weather delays caused us to miss the cruise.  So I really messed up by not just flying the same day once but twice. 

[Montemy2419]

18 minutes ago, deep1 said:

Almost made a really big one just yesterday while booking an Alaska cruise. I had been looking at a few and they all kind of blended into a mish mash. Finally picked one and went to pull the trigger.... Right cruise, right month and day. Wrong year  ! Caught it while I was on hold waiting for a booking agent. 

Had made a mistake booking last summer by a week from when I intended to go. What could have been a real mess they were forgiving with the next day. I got lucky. 

 

I booked a cruise one time late in the evening and we ended the call close to the time that Costco Travel closes.  I looked over all the paperwork the next morning to find that I actually booked the cruise for the wrong year.  I was so nervous until they opened and once they called RC is was no problem to correct.  There was no charge which I expected so that was a nice surprise.

[FireFishII]

My husband and I went on a cruise with another couple.  To save on parking, we drove to their house the night before our flights and drove to the airport in their car.  Since we were using different airlines, the plan was for us to be drop off first, for our friends to park their car, and go to another terminal. We got up at o-dark 30 in the morning. As we piled into our friend's car, I asked my husband if he had the black bag (ie: the bag with our passports).  He said, yes, right here.  When we got to the airport, as we were getting out of the car, I asked my husband for the black bag.  He handed me the toiletry bag, which was also black.  CRAP!  Change of plans!  Fortunately, our flight was not for another 3 hours.  So, using our friend's car, we dropped our friends off at their terminal, drove ALL the way back to their house (~1+ hour), grab the important black bag (that had been left in the bedroom, drive all the way back to the airport, part the car, and ran thru the terminal to catch our flight.

The only good thing about this story.  On our way to the airport the first time, we passed the Boston Garden - which was in the process of being dismantled, vertical slice at a time. I said I wished I had my camera out because it would have made for a great picture.  The second time, on our way to the airport, I got my picture! 

[BigKarl]

3 hours ago, DoomSlayer said:

Accidentally answered that my daughter was pregnant in the health section of check-in which got an instant denial of boarding message for her.  A phone call later and an explication at the terminal fixed it all, but my daughter was worried they wouldn’t let her on.  Gave us something to laugh about later, but it definitely had my daughter worried that she was not going to be able to go. 

Grats on the new Grandchild!   

[Ampurp85]

My most epic cruise fail happened recently. I was doing a S2S going from Oasis to Grandeur. My brother was on one leg but not the other. We had a carry-on, checked bag and backpack between us. He was taking the checked bag with him. I made a mistake and put my clean underwear in with the stuff he was taking back. Thankfully I always put one or two pairs in every packing cube. But I only had two clean pair for a 5 night cruise. Luckily, I had a bathing suit bottom and I always carry small laundry detergent packs. 

[BigKarl]

We booked a Baltic Cruise over two years ago because we wanted to visit St. Petersburg.  Needless to say that port was cancelled but the nightmare was just beginning. We made it to Heathrow from LAX when my wife noticed that the small bag with all of my medications was not in the carry on. I left the bag on the counter at home so that at the last minute I could put my Insulin in it so it would remain cold for the flight until I reached the ship (I forgot and left it on the counter). I was able to enjoy the cruise but my Glucose level Was averaging 500mg/dl and I had to watch what I ate and drank. When the cruise ended we were stuck in Copenhagen due to Bad weather in Canada. We were given a hotel room and they Booked us a Flight back to LAX the next day. To our surprise, when we arrived back at the airport to board the flight Air Canada did not follow through with the new flight booking and we were stuck for yet another day.  By Day three in Copenhagen they finally had us on a non-stop flight to LAX Confirmed. While waiting to board the flight I began feeling very bad and started hallucinating but was afraid to tell anyone for fear they would not let me board the plane. One of the ticket counter Agents that recognized me and knew of our plight grabbed our boarding passes and arranged for us to sit in First Class for the trip home.  To this day I do not know what my Glucose level was because the meter only reads to 800mg/dl and this time it just read "High."

[TexanTwoStep]

Fell asleep on my balcony after a long day with the tequila whistle lady at Senor Frogs in Cozumel -- at 1pm.

My wife left me there until about 4pm and the damage had been done -- I looked like Doug when they find him on the roof at the end of The Hangover (burnt to a crisp).  The last two days of my cruise were miserable lol

 

[CanHardlyWait]

In the summer of 2022 I booked (for May 2023) a Royal Caribbean Cruise. LOL.

I'm sorry, I had too. It was just too easy. A JOKE. Type Nothing. Really, remove your fingers from the keys and step away with your hands in the air. LOL.

[CanHardlyWait]

OK, I'll play.

In 2006 I took my Mother on her first Royal Caribbean Cruise (and my last. On to Disney). On Voyager of the Seas. We had a great first day at see, but there were lots of clouds. Never thought about it. Ended up with the windburn from hell. By formal night I was a lobster. Cooking in my black formal attire. Yes, we went all out for pictures. And I had more sunscreen with me then I'm sure most small cities pack. Never thought I needed it.

The up side of that night was my Mom who could start a conversation with anyone, got to the Captains cocktail party early. (They had a smoking section). Well, talking to the bar staff they gave her free drinks (scotch) not champagne. (Bubbles not her thing). She became best mates with everyone setting up for the event and they kept her in free scotch all night. When I arrived the champagne started flowing for me. And the same staff was everywhere we went all night long. We got blasted. Had some of the best laughs. Had a hard time standing for our 8x10 with the captain. He was nice but couldn't wait to get away. The next 24 hours I cooked and cooked. Slept on bathroom floor coz it was cold. Just cause you can't see sun, don't mean it ain't there. Sunscreen always use sunscreen. But we had a fun night as two dressed up drunks. It's a memory I have that time and cancer couldn't take away.

[JohnK6404]

For me (can't blame my wife ) my relatively "mini" blunder was recent and related to our January sailing on Wonder... 

We had booked a Beach Bungalow for $450 at Labadee since the over-the-water cabanas were too expensive this time around ($1,499 !). When the BF/CM sales hit last year, amid the IT disaster that week, I lost the bungalow!  I made the ultimate Cruise Planner rookie mistake and attempted to cancel and repurchase the bungalow (now on sale at $250) through the Royal App (since the website was wonky) and lost the bungalow in the process! What annoyed me most was there was never a low inventory warning… I made it to the last page and clicked to process the transaction and received the error that no more bungalows were available! Will NEVER make that mistake again! 

[smokeybandit]

I can just see Matt's headline now...

 

"Blog forum frequent cruisers show how absent-minded they can be on a ship, so for all the new cruisers out there, don't feel bad!"

[crazy4disney]

Another sunburn story here... My husband and I got married in 2017 and embarked on our honeymoon cruise. First stop was Roatan, and I don't know if we were just exhausted and not thinking straight after all the wedding craziness or what, but my husband's spray sunscreen didn't "land" right on that windy day and I just didn't pay enough attention to my application period. We ended up with horrible, blistered sunburns and couldn't even bear to hug each other. It was the most chaste honeymoon in history, lol.

 

[Johnson84]

I have four, First cruise ever 2006 we took my son's friend with us & we were not aware that we needed to have a notarized letter from a parent that we could take her, we arrived at long beach port trying to fax docs back home to get signed & notarized so we could board the ship,2016 boarded our ship in port Canaveral after many Miami vice drinks needless to say I passed out during outside muster drill practice missed the whole thing, Husband & brother-in-law on the same trip had to many drinks on day 2 at sea and by day 3 they both were covered in blisters from their sunburn luckily we could purchase aloe on the ship, June 2022 Alaska I bought new dress shoes for formal night that I could not wear comfortably, I spent the next couple of days looking for shoes in port with o success I ended up wearing my water shoes lol!

[USFFrank]

Forgot to pack a tie to wear with my suit on formal night. The ship didn't have any for sale either, so I had to go tieless that night. 

The big one was accidently leaving my regular camera and camcorder at home. Found out when we got to the port and didn't have enough time to drive back home to get them. My wife talked me into spending a nice chunk of change for a GoPro on the ship.

[Cakemeister]

We had a snafu with our Covid tests. They would not take Mrs. Cake's test result. She had to take a taxi to the nearest testing place, get tested, wait for the results, then bring them back to the ship. 

We don't arrive at the terminal until 2:00 or so since we drive in on the day of the cruise, so there was a time scramble.

She arrived with her test results 15 minutes before the doors closed.

[Va4fam]

We missed our excursion boat back to the ship in Nassau.   We were at Pearl Island snorkeling and enjoying the sun.  Beverages may or may not have been consumed.  

We clearly heard the announcement for guests leaving at 2 pm to gather at the dock.   My wife and I both thought our boat back to the ship left at 3 pm.   So we stayed.   Everybody but a few workers had left the island.  We ended up giving one of them a large tip to take us back to Nassau.

[TexanTwoStep]

22 minutes ago, Cakemeister said:

We had a snafu with our Covid tests. They would not take Mrs. Cake's test result. She had to take a taxi to the nearest testing place, get tested, wait for the results, then bring them back to the ship. 

We don't arrive at the terminal until 2:00 or so since we drive in on the day of the cruise, so there was a time scramble.

She arrived with her test results 15 minutes before the doors closed.

New achievement unlocked:  Pier runner on the first day!

[RoseofTX]

A simple one, but everyone can feel the pain.  I had put all of our booked excursions in our calendars on our phone.  The one in Cozumel left at 11:00 so letting my wife sleep in before a casual stroll to the meeting point. I happen to look at the app, and notice that the excursion is at 10:00 ship time (11:00 local).  No more sleeping in, waking up soundly sleeping wife and hurried departure to the excursion. But it was especially painful since we had been talking about the difference between ship and local time and everything make it clear what time it was including the app and the paper tickets.  And then we get there and she says, did you bring the tickets?  Quick trip back to the room to fetch them, good thing the pier is short there and we hadn't gone out past security....

[Bowen]

My mom forgot her passport because she thought she could board with just her driver’s license. We were in another state, in line to check in when she realized what she’d done. Thankfully they let my dad send her a picture of her birth certificate and Royal printed it out and allowed her to board.

[Bowen]

I thought of more:

On a sailing out of Bayonne we disembarked and got all the way to the airport where I was fishing our tickets out of my bag and realized I’d left my MacBook in the state room. It had fallen between the bed and the wall. I left my mom and the kids at the airport and took an Uber back to the pier where I had to go find the dock workers to get someone to go back on the ship and retrieve it. This is why I never ever complain about getting to the airport a few hours early.

 On another sailing my husband and I went and rented a jet ski in St. Kitts. We had to leave photo ID with them and all I had were our passports. After much fun and many drinks we got all the way back to the ship only to realize our passports were still at the beach place where we’d gone jet skiing. The husband took a taxi back and did the pier run while I stood near the ship and cheered him on.

[Mturk]

My wife booked the wrong week for spring break. We realized a couple of weeks later when we were looking for hotels in San Juan and she casually mentions that my brother and his family will be in San Juan at the same time and maybe we could meet up for supper the night before both families depart on their separate cruises. This caused some bells to ring in my head as I knew we didn't have the same spring break. How can this happen you may ask, well the answer is when researching dates for spring break she saw the calendar for Concordia University in St. Paul instead of Concordia University in Montreal. Luckily we were still far enough out that we were able to make the necessary changes with RCCL and the airline.

Another time, I forgot my iPad in the airplane after disembarking and only realized a few days later on our way to Aruba. It was a sea day and figured i would check on some work emails but couldn't find my iPad. At first i was convinced that i left it at the hotel in Fort Lauderdale but checked find my device on my iPhone and it kept showing that it was at the Fort Lauderdale airport. Once we got back i checked with the Air Canada desk agents and sure enough they had it in the lost and found!

[D Alt]

I forgot my phone cord to charge my phone.  the ship didn't have any android cords for sale and most of the crew used Iphones, but thankfully by day's end GS found one for me to use for the whole cruise!  needless to say I bought one in Nassau for cheap and gave theirs back. 

thank god! I would have had no phone!

[SweetPea]

Not knowing about the "tunnel of wind" when your cabin door and balcony door are opened at the same time ...

The DND sign had fallen off our door. Our cabin steward came in just as I, in my bathrobe, was opening the balcony door to chat with my hubby and I hadn't heard the steward knock.  We were docked in Nassau at the time, directly across from, of all ships, the Disney Wonder, who i managed to flash full frontal as my bathrobe totally opened in the tunnel of wind. 

I was too afraid to get off the ship in Nassau and half waited for the authorities to greet me upon our return to Fort Lauderdale... 

 

[asquared17]

^^ the way i am gasping in horrified laughter right now!!!!