We arrived at Port Canaveral one hour (10:30 a.m) before the last bus to Miami was expected to leave.

Upon arrival at the Port, no Port policeman nor any Carnival person could tell us where to park. We had no directions as to which terminal to go to either. After going in circles three times, we just acted on our own.

Everyone was at the Fantasy terminal. Some of the Fantasy people were in the Carnival Glory line. Two ladies scheduled for the Fantasy cruise got really upset after waiting for hours in the Glory line. Carnival officials made to attempt to correct their situation.

At that time, about 300 people were milling around. The Carnival staff was clueless about what was going on. It turns out that some people (not us) were told to check in. We should have been given these directions much earlier.

There were no people accommodations. Restrooms were available in the terminal, which had no power. No Carnival people were inside the terminal. There were no visible direction signs. The terminal was unbearably hot and dark. There were puddles on the floor. Some wet floors were very slippery. The restrooms were on the second floor, and we had to walk up a stalled escalator.

Later, while we were waiting, we were told that we were going to Cozumel, instead of the Bahamas. This was information that could have been posted out on the Carnival WEB site.

As time passed, there were an increasing number of Port Police. They were standing around and doing absolutely nothing.

We were then told that Carnival was going to use buses that were carrying passengers from Miami and these buses would arrive in 30 minutes. This was at 11 a.m.

Ultimately, the Carnival officials had no credible information. No one could figure out how to get credible information.

Then a severe storm developed. One Carnival official had us run to the same building for shelter. Lightning was striking nearby. The number of people involved in this was closer to 1,000.

Everyone got into the building. Some of us were on the water-logged rugs.

We watched the Disney people being bussed some place. It appeared they were not having these problems.

After a total of five hours, a couple of buses appeared. Carnival had no plan for getting the people on the right bus. We all had numbers; however, there was no way of knowing which bus was the correct bus. No one had any paper to make a sign. All we could do is count the buses. The police were watching the proceeding and not helping with crowd control.

After our wait, we had a 4 plus hour ride on the bus. We were lucky and had a stop for food. Many others did not.

We finally arrived at the ship at 8 p.m. This is well past dinner time. By the way, Carnival saw fit to charge us the gratuities for this day.

We were physically exhausted after standing in the heat and on concrete for all those hours.

The problems continued when we debarked. The Glory docked at a different dock. Our car was at another. We went to the Information Desk to find out what the "plan" was. We were given bad information. Also, no one in the post-Customs area seemed to understand that there was a problem. We got lucky.

So for this cruise we can say: (1) The Carnival WEB site is not kept up to date; (2) The people making phonecalls do not have accurate information; (3) We were put in harm's way by the way the crowd was managed -- heat exposure and exhaustion after standing for five hours on concrete; (4) They really should have backed off the gratuities for that day; (5) Carnival has a major problem with communications with their management. It is not the passenger's duty to straighten out their problems.

I by the way was on the Fantasy last week for what was to be a three night cruise from Pt. Canaveral. It turned out to be a five night cruise to nowhereand ended in Miami in place of Pt. Canaveral.

Prior to the cruise Carnival offered anyone that wanted to cancel the opportunity to cancel with a full refund, cancel and rebook at a different time or go and receive a $100.00 per person on board credit and 50% off a future 3,4 or 5 day cruise. Due to the high number of cancellations Carnival also offered the locals that were in the area to book at the last minute for $90.00 per person. A lot of locals did this that had to evacuate the area. I found that Carnival did a great job all the way around considering the amount of changes that were going on. I had to pick up my car at Pt.Canaveral the same day that the Glory folks were there and there were two people to help with the parking of the cars at around noon. We chose not to wait for busses to bring us back from Miami to pick up our car.

In closing it seems that Carnival offered the folks on the Glory the same type of deal that we were offered. For the price and compensation I do not see how one can complain with the constant changing circumstances that surrounded the storm and her changing path. Carnival and the port authority had a lot of their personnel affected by the storm in the Cocoa area and were running on a shoe string crew.

[ 09-12-2004: Message edited by: joe at travelpage ]

I say to that person that we made every attempt to deal with Carnival to keep current on what was going on. We followed their "information" to the letter. The problem is that their information was flawed, inconsistent or non-existent. There was no organization or coordination between the people in charge.

The person also stated that all buses stopped for food. This is also incorrect. A number of buses went straight through and the drivers refused to stop.

Nor was anyone that I knew informed about the sitution about the buses being needed for evacuations. We were told that they were being used by people being returned to Port Canaveral.

I'm glad that person had a good time. There were many of us who had major difficulties.

I still don't think the cruise was worth the trouble. We had two days dealing with troubles. I have had a total of four vacation days this year. So, the problems hit us hard.

I also wanted to add that we live right in Frances' path and had spent 72 hours dealing with hurricane issues.

[ 09-18-2004: Message edited by: fondaenergy ]