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Normally, the previous cruise gets in around 7am and allows for a few hours to disembark, for the ship to restock and to clean. Today, it was not normal. The issues, Sea Fog.
Why would that matter? Well, as you can see, the Sunshine Skyway Bridge can be obscured. These ships are huge and if they were to strike the bridge, it would be catastrophic.
Today, three ships were supposed to come into port, including the NCL Dawn. Last night, the US Coast Guard (USCG) closed the bay causing all three ships to anchor offshore. This caused many issues.
I had checked in on-line a few days earlier (as instructed) and I chose a 1pm time to clear and board. The Coast Guard had not even cleared to cruise ships to come into port by 1pm.
Now, I want to talk about a failure. Look, things happen and I get that. But at my age, with my experience, NCL had failed. I find no fault with the ship’s crew. The fault here is corporate and corporate communications.
Many passengers were on social media and there were issues about WHEN boarding would start, where passengers could leave luggage, when we would be setting sail, etc. People were getting mixed messages from security, port personnel, and NOTHING from NCL. Some people were told an email went out, but no one ever claimed to have gotten it. NCL sent ONE text around 1:30pm which was an hour and a half AFTER boarding was supposed to start. The text asked people to show up to the port no earlier than 7:30pm.
To top it off, some passengers of the previous cruise were posting that NCL Dawn had to close the bars and restaurants (no reason was given). (Note: I heard this was NOT the case on the other ships.)
The result, chaos and angry people.
Now, unlike the passengers that flew in, I live here in Tampa. I was able to stay home and watched the drama, the lack of communication from NCL, the webcams and sea ship-tracking websites, and left my house closer to 7pm.
It should be noted that when the USCG did open the port, an email went out from a current passenger said the Dawn’s captain announced that the Dawn was third in line to get a pilot to guide them in. This could take hours. However, I noticed only ONE pilot ship in the area (via several tracking websites). I also noticed two other smaller ships approach the cruise ships (they were not designated “pilot”, so I am not sure). After a few minutes, all three cruise ships were under power and being led in line into the bay and to the port.
As stated, it takes 3.5 hours to get the ships in, arriving around 5:30 pm or so. By the time I got there close to 7:30pm, the line was long and people were clearly tired, upset, confused, and more.
Since the staggered boarding was out the port hole, it was organized chaos to get everyone on board. As the line was queuing up, as groups were moved around, former passengers were still getting off. I think it was close to 10pm before I got on board. Announcements were made that many cabins were not ready, but that food and drink was being served. I made my way to my cabin though and found it to be cleaned and ready. I even found my friends had delivered 2 dozen cookies to my room, along with chocolate dipped pineapple. How sweet, literally!
I dropped my day and medical bag and headed down to grab something to eat.
I set out and found “The Aqua”. I was seated and the waitress introduced herself as Donna. She was surprised when I told her I was cruising solo. She explained that the crew was exhausted, but here to serve. I ordered light and she took good care of me. I knew I would come back to see her again when she was rested.
Now that I had eaten, I decided to explore the ship a bit. It was 11:30pm and we still were docked, but it looked like we were going to “shove off” soon. I found many of the public areas and finally headed to bow of the ship and past the the Bimini Bar. I met and talked with several people, many were soured by the boarding and the lack of NCL communication throughout. I stayed up there as long as I could, wanting to maybe catch some photos of the Dawn going under the Skyway at night. However, I was tired and decided to get back to my room and find out how comfortable my rack will be for the next 11 nights. I get to my room and find my luggage has not yet arrived. That’s okay, I had what I needed and went to bed. The day tomorrow (later today, actually) will most likely be a “Day at Sea”.