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When Ms. Georges returned my call, I expressed my concerns and asked how we would go about having Carnival pay for our counseling. She stated that she could not confirm whether or not Carnival would pay for the counseling, and would not have an answer on this for a few days. This infuriated me even more, thinking that if it had been THEIR 10-year old girl, who had a gun shoved in her face and forced to plead for her life, they would have immediately said, es to my counseling request. At this point Carnival began handling this incident as trictly business There was no compassion whatsoever! hotel booking

My wife continues to shake at times, so much that she has been unable to return to work. My son claims that he sometimes sees one of the gunmen in our house. My daughter has broken out in hives. I, for one, get so angry and upset that I physically shake and then cry. I go back and forth. I am nauseated just writing this story. We all have nightmares in relation to this incident. It is ridiculous and totally neglectful on the part of Carnival that we were not given the true facts and information about Jamaica. I would never have subjected my family to this if I had received this valid information, in advance, and I will now live with that decision forever. travel agency

I wish to strongly encourage anyone, who is considering traveling to Jamaica, to STOP! It is not worth the risk. They prey on the tourists, knowing that they carry money and other valuables. Unfortunately, the local citizens earn approximately $50-$100 dollars a week. The two gunmen, who robbed us, escaped with approximately two to three thousand dollars. This is the equivalent to someone robbing a bank in the USA. This will only continue. They have no choice. The poverty is too bad. cheap hotel

I am hoping to get this information out to the public and caution all tourists, who are contemplating a cruise or trip to Jamaica. It not safe! I want to warn you, because Carnival will not. flight booking

StoneGirl (# 23 of 25) 02:47am Sep 21, 2007 EST Mr. Williams: I feel for your family and the fear you, and especially your children faced in Jamaica. If indeed Carnival is neglectful, then they should be exposed. I too, know the fear you speak of; however, this happened a few hours from you in Austin, Texas. As I approached a popular restaurant on IH-35, I was held up in broad daylight by two 17 year old young men with guns. I had a gun to my back and my side. There are unexpected pockets of crime everywhere it seems. Although I too had nightmares, we are the fortunate ones. The other people my two assailants attacked were left in the trunk of a car, and pushed into Town Lake, letting them drown in the trunk of the car. The other female was raped repeatedly, with intentions of killing her, but she got away. You sound like a very good father and husband, and your family is fortunate that you are protective and caring. I ve come to believe that violence can show its face almost anywhere, although some places are known to harbor trouble. Hopefully, Carnival is taking a serious look into this episode. I m leaving this next week on the same trip you took. Although I feel some anxiety, I m trying to look forward with a positive, but cautious attitude. With what happened to me, and the violent disruption and fear it made me feel, I ve tried to become smarter, but also to not let the evil and violence totally rule my life. I ll be thinking of your family, as I KNOW the terrible effect it can have on you. PS...the two young men who tried to hold up and kidnap me were caught and both sentenced to life in jail. dlubbes - 08:57am Sep 7, 2005 EST

NCL Dream (Nightmare) Alaska cruise, 7-21 sailing travel agent

Just received a form letter saying no compensation due for cancelling port call in Sitka. Surprise! No mention of NCL s ongoing engine problem and the fact that other cruisers (on other dates) received at least a minimum compensation for the inconvenience. But they do hope I will sail with them some other time. hotel chicago

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Write a Message Beth Crossan (# 1 of 41) 02:32pm Sep 12, 2005 EST My husband and I have been on about 15 or so cruises. Some were on budget cruise lines that no longer exist. We have never had such an unhappy experience. We got off of Norwegian Cruise Lines brand new ship, the Pride of America on September 9, 2005. I have never been so glad for a vacation to end. 12 hours before we were to leave home, the cruise line left a message on our home phone that the Radisson Hotel, where we were to stay, was overbooked and we were being moved to a much cheaper budget hotel some distance away that is due to be renovated this year for the precruise part of our package on Oahu for 2 days. It was nowhere close to being a comparable hotel. On Saturday, September 3, we boarded and there was a buffet awaiting. It included large shrimp with cockatil sauce. We expected to settle in and enjoy paradise. We got to our high priced balcony cabin on deck 10 and discovered that we could only see straight out. The balcony had a large overhang of about 10 feet past the rail and walls that came down from the roof that kept it dry in the rain but also prevented us from seeing to either side at all. We could only see straight out. It was much like having blinders on. By the second day, the chairs and rail were salt encrusted and stayed that way the remainder of the cruise. We were handed a schedule for the day as we boarded. Inside was a letter saying that we would not be sailing past the volcano on Sunday evening. That was one of the chief reasons for booking this particular cruise. We were supposed to sail past the erupting volcano on the big island after dark and turn around and come back so that it could be viewed from either side of the ship. Within an hour of reading the letter, we happened to run into the Captain on deck and asked him why were losing a part of our trip that was so important to us. He first told us that there was an engine problem that prevented us from reaching top speed and we would have been late arriving in port on schedule. After pressing him a bit, the Captain, who has now left the ship, told us that it was too costly to sail up the coast and back, a distance of about 30 miles. We all know what has happened to the cost of fuel but it was the biggest reason to book this particular cruise and was a MAJOR event on the cruise. They should continue to do it until they have notified all passengers of the change and allowed them to cancel their cruise without penalty. They sell you overpriced shore excursions in port. Keep in mind that we are seasoned sailors and have taken many cruise line shore excursions in the past and have enjoyed most of them. If you want to see the port, rent a car. They run about $27-50 and that is way cheaper than the cheapest shore excursion is for one person. Car rental shuttles meet the ship at every port. We didn t have advance reservations but you might get an even better price. NCL passengers can t buy reasonably priced tours on the islands from local operators. They have a deal with the cruise line. You need a hotel key to get the normal, reasonable price. If you are on the ship, you pay double or even triple the advertised price. These vendors are not about to risk their contract with the cruise lines by selling you the tour at the price hotel guests pay. We found this out when we tried to buy a tour at the advertised price. I don t think that is legal but it is the way it worked. This ship has no casino to generate revenue as the international ships do. A single photograph is $13. They take photos regularly as most ships do. We usually buy several for $6-8. We bought none. The price is a bit high and we already felt gouged. This ship is staffed by Americans. Unfortunately, instead of tips, you are billed a service charge of $10 per person per day. We are good tippers and have always had wonderful service on every single ship we have sailed on in the past. On this ship, we were charged the service charge but didn t get the service. Our cabin was filthy. It had not been vacuumed before our arrival and there was a dirty paper napkin and toothpick on the floor when we arrived on Saturday that was still there on Tuesday afternoon when I had the Assistant Executive Housekeeper, Diane Clark, come to our cabin to see the condition it was in. Our mirrors were splattered, the dust was several weeks old on every surface, the glasses were dirty and it took us two days to get ice in our room. We suspect that the bedding was not changed from the PREVIOUS passengers before our arrival. It took until Tuesday to get it taken care of. Diane Clark had our room competely cleaned under her direct supervision at dinner time on Tuesday but our room was NEVER cleaned again after that and our bedding was never changed again. The service to our room after our contact with Diane Clark, was limited to clean towels and ice. WE GAVE UP. The cabin stewardess and HER BOSS were called on the carpet for the condition of our room and IT MADE NO DIFFERENCE. That s pretty typical of the attitude on this ship. Ours was not an isolated incident. Passengers from every area of the ship were complaining long and loud about the condition of their cabins on this ship that was on its 7th or 8th cruise. I was in line behind about 8 of 10 people at the front desk complaining about their rooms to no avail when I asked to see the Hotel Manager and Diane Clark was summoned. The others never did get their problems resolved. The doors of the elevators look as though food was thrown at them and they never were cleaned while we were on board. I did take Diane Clark to see them. She notified the department in charge of them but they were never cleaned before we left 4 days later. The brownies and robes that Diane Clark left in our room could never make up for the condition of our cabin before and after she had it cleaned and the effort it took to get it taken care of. I took pictures of the ship to send to the corporate office and was told by previous NCL passengers that were on board that corporate would not care. I will send them anyway. I can t imagine sailing again on a line that didn t care about the kind of conditions that exist on this ship that I will provide them evidence of. These previous passengers said that they continued to tolerate the conditions because no one else offers Freestyle Cruising . Take my word for it, it isn t worth not getting dressed up to put up with these conditions. Every ship we have ever been on has some alternative to eating in the main dining room at set times at set tables. Buffets are availble at all meal times and most offer room service as well. The Dining Room staff is poorly trained overall but we found one excellent waiter, Greg, and stuck with him thoughout the cruise. He was the bright spot in our cruise and he was tipped in additon to the service charge that was billed to us and every other passenger who got lousy service. The food is adequate, at best. We had veal that was so tough, it was hard to chew. Our Prime Rib, the first night out, was overcooked. Our expectations dropped after that and we let Greg advise us on what was the best offering. Menus at each meal were meaningless. There was always at least one item that was not available. They didn t run out of it, there simply wasn t any. All fish is frozen in this seafood paradise. To get wonderful fresh fish, we ate ashore. Papaya grows wild in Hawaii and I was really looking forward to eating my fill. We saw papaya offered one time as an appetizer at dinner in the dining room. For two days, there was no pineapple in Hawaii. They ran short of butter and put only margarine on the tables. I really enjoy yogurt and it is usually readily available. I enjoy a large variety of flavors. I had never had watermelon or green apple and that was what was available. I skipped the yogurt. Upon leaving the ship, my husband approached an NCL employee on the pier to ask a question and she turned to him and told him in a very nasty tone that they don t answer questions. We had found this to be true of the shore excursion people on the ship as well. We had had enough and skipped our prepaid transfer to the airport and took a cab. I will never sail on NCL again but my husband said never is along time so I guess he may go again with his next wife.
malonesu01 (# 2 of 41) 12:41pm Mar 9, 2006 EST I also had a bad experience on the Norwegian SPIRIT ( 19 DEC 2005 - 29 DEC 2005). The staff was rude. The people cleaning the rooms did a poor job and were slow. On day I had left a piece of paper on the floor under the chair in my room. Two days later I had to pick up the paper I had left on the floor myself because the staff just only cleaned limited things and the floor wasn t one of them. The food in the two dining rooms was horrible and since our cruise was more than seven days the menu was just repeated for the last week of our cruise. The resturant called the Blue Lagoon served Fried Rice without any soy sauce, duck sauce to go with it. Americans like hot wings, chicken fingers, etc. Nothing like that was on the menu. The desserts in the main dining room lacked imagination. Everyone doesn t care for mousse or ice cream that was half melted by the time they brought it to the table every night.The service I rec d on this cruise line was a definite thumbs down. If NCL doesn t improve their service that line will be like PREMIER out of business.

Susan L. Malone online booking

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