This blog post is long- long in length and long overdue. I am finding myself at a point where too many kind readers of my blog have emailed asking me what is going on and whether G and I are okay to be able to answer them all individually (but thank you so much for your concern!). Anyone who is an active Cruise Critic follower knows what happened to us on the Ruby Princess cruise to Hawaii, but I forget sometimes that many (probably most) people who read my blog posts aren’t on Cruise Critic, some because they never have been (I picked up a lot of followers after a written news source linked to my Incoming Missile Alert post from Hawaii a few years ago) and others because they have been forced away by the nastiness (I get it).
But I need to attend to unfinished business. I couldn’t say more here initially because I didn’t want Mom to worry. Poor Mom, who thought we were still partying on the Hawaiian islands long after I was home. I kept texting her…”too busy to blog, but all is well!”. I’m bound for hell, I’m sure. When I finally filled her in, she admitted she was getting suspicious. 😉 Never was any good at keeping secrets from her!
Luckily, I can use my Cruise Critic blog posts for reference to write this post, because it feels in some ways like a lifetime has passed. In other ways, it feels like it all happened last week, mostly because I am still dealing with the virus I came down with while on the Ruby Princess. But that’s a whole other story that I’ll get into later. Meanwhile, let me dive into what happened just before I stopped posting in late March.
I was ready to leave home for my cruise that started March 27 when I found out about the COVID issues that had just flared up on the cruise preceding mine on the Ruby Princess (Fort Lauderdale to San Francisco). It was the first cruise where Princess had dropped their mask mandate and also the first cruise where they dropped interim COVID testing. Guests had to show a negative COVID test not more than three days old when boarding, but that was it. On the two 15-night cruises preceding that, guests had to do that, but were also tested on embarkation day and a few days into each cruise. COVID was well under control.
The easing of COVID protocols while simultaneously allowing the buffet to become self serve had the unsurprising result of a huge uptick in cases at the very end of the cruise a couple of days before I flew to San Francisco and boarded the ship. Already there were complaints from passengers who were placed in quarantine cabins on the ship, and those complaints continued as they were moved to quarantine hotels in San Francisco at the end of that cruise. G tested negative on the last day of that cruise when he tested with other in transit (back to back) guests. We decided that we would proceed as planned. G’s reasoning was that he had stayed safe for 45 days on the ship already. We would wear masks (he had been wearing his except while dining and drinking) and stick to ourselves, at least for the first few days, to see what happened with the number of cases on board.
Let me just inject here that it is SO nice to be able to relate what happened to us in this format, without facing a barrage of criticism and accusations and Monday morning quarterbacking. This is my diary and our reality and it’s nice to be able to tell it unimpeded.
Along with everyone else, I waited, standing in line for hours before boarding the ship on embarkation day, March 27. I put on an N95 mask that morning before I was picked up by my driver and didn’t remove it for nearly 12 hours until I entered our cabin. Most people in the line either weren’t masked, or weren’t wearing their masks correctly or weren’t wearing effective (N95 or KN95) masks. I was fairly confident in my mask to keep me safe. We were never told exactly why our embarkation was so delayed but it was rumored that there was an unclaimed suitcase on the ship (which makes no sense at all).
It’s now obvious that the embarkation delay was because of the number of quarantined people Princess had to get off the ship and either send home with an approved driver or move into a quarantine hotel. I can easily believe that there were luggage issues there, with quarantined guests not allowed back into their cabins to pack. Delays in boarding in San Francisco started with our cruise and lasted exactly how long the Ruby Princess’s serious COVID issues lasted, which was until their shorter, less than 15-night cruises began. People were (and are) still contracting COVID; it’s just that most don’t know about it until they return home and test positive. Since symptoms (if there are any) don’t usually show up for 4 days, it’s not a surprise that longer cruises result in more on board cases.
We did exactly as we planned the first two days (really, day and a half) of our cruise. We only dined alone, and we went to no on board entertainment at all. It wasn't the kind of cruise experience we’d enjoyed pre-COVID, or even on the 36-nights of post-COVID cruising we did, but protocols were stronger then, at least after the first 7 days of cruising on the Nieuw Amsterdam when masks were not mandated (we wore ours anyway). We definitely felt safer on our earlier cruises than we did on the Ruby Princess. The second night of the cruise, we returned to the cabin to find a letter stating that G (as an in transit passenger) needed to be tested the next morning. They obviously believed they had an issue on board.
I spent 45 hours in close contact with my husband before he was tested on Tuesday, and was in the dining room for lunch at our little table for 2 in the corner, waiting for him to show up saying he had tested negative and for my chicken korma to be set in front of me when someone from medical appeared at my side and told me I needed to return to the cabin. I did not know at that point the results of my husband’s test (but I suspected).
There are few things sadder than leaving chicken korma uneaten.
Medical called the second I returned to the cabin to tell me I had to be tested. I insisted on a PCR test. G, who had stayed in the cabin awaiting his test result was told he tested positive. He asked to be re-tested with a PCR test, which took about an hour. I tested negative, and was given a letter telling me that I had had close contact with someone who tested positive for COVID and would be re-tested every day for 5 subsequent days. While that was happening, I was free to leave my cabin but I had to always be fully masked. I was not allowed to eat anything outside my cabin. I could drink only if I sipped and covered.
The extent of the written communication I received
The letter also said I would receive information separately about room service, water and beverages, mealtimes, housekeeping services (such as laundry, garbage, cleaning and disinfection), internet, maintenance, drills and safety and disembarkation. Thinking I would get a letter or phone call about those things, I remained in the cabin, trying to spend as much time as possible on the balcony, but it was cold and grey. When I did come in the cabin, I left the door open to get some fresh air.
G quickly packed a few things (this was difficult, because we had a lot of shared items, like charging cords and toothpaste) and was immediately accompanied to an isolation cabin (deck 12, a balcony cabin). A sanitized isolation cabin. I remained in our dirty cabin with the detritus of his illness, his pillows and bedding and used towels and trash. G’s letter was waiting for him in his quarantine cabin, and he did receive a second letter from the hotel department. Nowhere in these letters were the conditions of his quarantine period spelled out (inexcusable!) but he was told that he would not be tested again until Day 5 (that first day was Day 0) and again on Day 6, and if he tested negative both of those days, he would be free to leave but would have to spend the remainder of the days through Day 10 dining only in his cabin (like me). But he was warned not to get his hopes up, and told that most people didn’t get released from quarantine until Day 10. In fact, he might possibly test positive for up to three months.
G was taking names and numbers. Life in quarantine was not good.
And that Onboard Guest Services Teammate, the go to person for everything and anything?
Um, no. He never heard from them.
And, 45 hours after I joined him on the ship, G was gone and we didn’t reunite for over three weeks. It was a strange time.
About 3:30pm I did go the buffet to get some food. I was pretty hungry. I was told there were no trays available for me so I brought back a salad in a bowl and some fish and rice. By the time I returned to the cabin and scrubbed up, the fish and rice were cold. This was the start of what would be a trend, and, unfortunately, I’m one of those people who likes their hot food hot and their cold food cold. Then I was faced with a conundrum: was I allowed to return my dirty dishes to the buffet? I didn’t know, so, to be safe, I left them in the cabin.
I tried phoning room service to request something for dinner but gave up when the hold time was excessively long (I think I held for close to an hour that first day. I was so new at this and naive. I actually believed someone was looking out for me. 😉).
Around 8pm I started thinking about going to sleep, but didn’t want to sleep on our dirty sheets. Our steward Joao knocked on the door but I told him what was going on and that I wasn’t sure he was even allowed in the cabin. Another close contact on Cruise Critic had reported that her cabin had been disinfected when her husband was sent to quarantine and I expected that would happen with my cabin but didn’t know why it hadn’t been done yet (more than 6 hours after G had left it). It was clear to me that I was far more concerned about Joao’s health and safety than Princess was, or that they were about mine.
I finally used the Crew Chat feature on the Medallion App to ask when I was going to get the information about the promised details and was told there was no further information forthcoming (exactly contradicting my letter) but I was free to chat and ask any questions I’d like.
Within about 30 minutes a hazmat team arrived. I went on the balcony (and only about 51 hours out of San Francisco, it was a COLD balcony), while they disinfected the cabin. I then went to sleep. Except for the brief trip to the buffet, I had not left the cabin since I was told to return there around noon.
The next morning (Day 1 of my 5 day “not a quarantine”) I went to the International Cafe about 6am and got a cappuccino and a breakfast sandwich. I also got a double mimosa to go (I had Princess Plus). I carried these back to the cabin and stayed there until late afternoon. Somehow (I’m trying to remember how), Loyd from room service came to the cabin sometime that morning. I *think* I used the medallion app to order another cappuccino and he delivered it. When I told him what was going on, he said that he would bring me menus from the dining room and not to wait on hold for room service. I could have hugged him. Instead I tipped him.
He called for my lunch order, and it was delivered about an hour later. I learned to accept that I was not going to get a hot meal under this program. It just wasn’t possible. Maybe if we were big room service users, I would have already known that, but I can count on the fingers of two hands how many times we’d used room service in the past. But with the buffet being self serve, and the food from the buffet definitely being cold by the time I brought it back to the cabin, room service was really my best option. Loyd also took my dinner order around 5:30pm and that was delivered about 6:30pm or so. Things were looking up.
I spoke with our steward Joao through the door that morning and told him the cabin had been sanitized and left it up to him whether or not to come in and service the cabin. He said it was ok to do so, and I told him there’d be a lot of dishes for the next several days. He also called G to check on him and tell him he was thinking of him. We were both really touched by that. Joao was a saint. Unfortunately, that was the last time I talked with Joao. By that evening, he had tested positive for COVID. Yes, despite what many were saying on Cruise Critic, COVID was alive and well on the Ruby Princess March 27 cruise to Hawaii.
Finally, about 4pm that day, I had heard nothing from anyone (other than my husband. He had plenty to say) and went to the buffet for some chips and salsa. I took these onto the Terrace Deck, and ordered a mango margarita to take back to the cabin.. I hadn’t even left the bar area when the bartender’s phone rang. He looked at me and walked over to tell me medical wanted me to go to be tested. Finally, a specific instruction. I knew I had to be tested daily but no one had told me how that was going to happen (In cabin? In the medical center? Timing?). Regardless of the Medallion app’s many known issues, as a people tracker, the Medallion device works really well!
I took a pic because it looked so good, but that was as close as I
I went to the Medical Center and was chided for not coming down in the morning to be tested. Um…you didn’t tell me I needed to do that. I asked to speak with the senior doctor about what care G could expect in quarantine because we were both shocked to find out he was getting none. Nothing. The same Medical Admin who was upset I didn’t show up someplace I didn’t know I needed to be was assigned to call all quarantined patients once a day “to check on them”. That was it. Although we didn’t know exactly how many people were quarantined on Deck 12, G said that the rumor that was going around the balconies (they could talk to each other but not see each other due to the partitions) was that there were already over 100 (it quickly climbed to about 150). 150 largely older people dealing with a virus that most of them had never had before, with uncertain repercussions, and not one of them was asked about medical history or medications. I mean, I can’t get my teeth cleaned without that information being taken.
The senior doctor confirmed that quarantine was just that - isolation- and unless medically necessary guests were not medically checked out (how would they know? They’re old and alone, and Princess was counting on them to self monitor?). I asked if they could at least stop by once a day to take G’s blood pressure (I could tell from our phone conversations it was not low) and she said they would (they never did, despite me asking two additional times). I then asked about what would happen if I tested positive, with my asthma and autoimmune issues. She promised me that they had two ICU beds and she’d successfully treated guests with far more health issues than I had.
The senior doctor had me nearly convinced that I would be okay, but one more night’s sleep (or sleepless night) left both G and I thinking that I needed to get off the ship when it arrived in Honolulu. Though I tested negative that morning (that was my Day 2 test of my 5 day “not a quarantine”), I woke up with a sore throat and fully expected to test positive at some point and end up in isolation myself. I held out some hope because I had received my second booster shot a month earlier, but when the wife of another quarantined guest tested positive on her Day 4 of testing, I was fairly resigned. She and I were staying in touch through a post I had started before I left home on Cruise Critic, and it sounded like she and her husband were getting no better care or room service in quarantine than G was. I was not looking forward to my turn in “Ruby Princess jail”.
After being tested that morning, I stopped at the International Cafe for a cappuccino and breakfast sandwich to take to the cabin (it was fully allowable for me to do this). I saw the bar waiters looking at me, and a supervisor took me aside to say that they thought I was supposed to be in quarantine. When I explained that it was my husband in quarantine, they apologized for the mix up and got me my beverage. The senior doctor told me I should be going to shows, and enjoying the ship, fully masked of course. That’s not the way this works. First, I was fairly convinced I would test positive eventually and didn’t want to inadvertently spread this to anyone else. Second, it’s not a lot of fun to have Princess Plus and be elbow to elbow with people drinking and having fun and not be able to. And third, this whole thing was stressful. This was not fun. I was not having anything close to a normal cruise.
My only moment of enjoyment happened that morning when I left the International Cafe carrying my coffee and breakfast sandwich. I joined three other people on the elevator going up from Deck 5. None of the others were masked. On Deck 6, three more people tried to enter. I stopped them and said that this was unacceptable and I would get off. They said they’d wait. After the doors closed again, I told the three others in the elevator that my husband had just tested positive for COVID and was in quarantine. They all suddenly got off on deck 7 and I had the elevator to myself. 😆
There was no doubt in G’s mind that I needed to GET OFF THE SHIP (I hear you, dear, but may I at least wait until we reach land?). He was, frankly, worried sick about me (and I was worried about him…and me, oh what fun we were having). I had picked up a virus (at the MTG luncheon, I’m sure of it) on the Majestic Princess in August, couldn’t shake it, never tested positive for COVID but ended up in the ER and then being admitted to the hospital more than a week after we returned home. G knows that me and lung viruses are a tough combination, and he felt I was safer being treated on land than on the ship if I got sick.
I understood what he was thinking. His medical care to that point wasn’t abysmal. It was non-existent. We are also well familiar with Oahu (G had done military duty at Tripler Army Hospital in Honolulu), and, as a military retiree spouse, we knew several places I could access good health care on the island if I needed it. But I was still resistant. I pictured myself getting off the ship and making it as far as a hotel on Oahu, and being there alone and sick. That didn’t sound like much more fun to me than being sick in Ruby Princess jail (and after all is said and done, I’m convinced that being alone and sick at home really was the best option of all).
Still undecided, and using the intermittent internet, I booked two flights home for the next day from Honolulu. I knew I was not going to stay on Oahu by myself. If I didn’t get sick, I was just delaying the inevitable, that I’d need to return home soon, because, after all, I would then be paying for a cruise AND a hotel on the same nights, plus an unexpected flight home. Nope, if I got off the ship, I was heading home as quickly as possible
One flight I booked was on Southwest using points. I didn’t like that one for two reasons. The connection time in Oakland was crazy long, and I would be arriving at our home airport at 2am. Taking an Uber at 2am to a dark and empty house by myself didn’t sound very safe. The other flight was first class on Delta. Both flights were fully refundable, and the first class fare was only $250 more than a refundable coach seat on the same flight, a splurge that seemed very worthwhile by that point, since it was an overnight flight. It would also get me to our home airport the next day about noon, and made a lot more sense than the Southwest flight. The Delta first class flight was $1600. I also learned I had to pay a PVSA penalty (it’s complicated. Google it) of $873 for not visiting a distant foreign port. This was a $2500 decision, plus the fact that I would receive nothing back on my cruise, and couldn’t claim a medical reason for leaving the ship if I didn’t test positive for COVID.
PVSA violation penalty gets charged to the onboard account
Actually, it was quite a Catch-22. If I did test positive for COVID, I wouldn’t be allowed to get off the ship in Hawaii. If I didn’t test positive for COVID, I would have to pay the PVSA penalty. I was feeling a bit rougher each day, but I didn’t know if it was from impending COVID, lack of sleep or something else. That’s why, even once we had pretty much decided (or should I say it was decided for me?) that I’d be leaving the ship in Honolulu, I still felt I had to pay extra for a refundable air ticket. A positive test result on Day 4, the morning of Honolulu, and I’d be packing not to go home but to join G in quarantine.
That last full day on the ship, the room service system I thought I had in place went to hell. My lunch order was taken, but I never received anything. My dinner order was never taken, and when I waited over 30 minutes for room service to answer, I finally gave up and called Guest Services. I had read from Joy on Cruise Critic that she had finally done that and her food delivery system improved quite a bit. Well, that did the trick. I ordered soup and a roasted vegetable salad from the Crown Grill (oh yes I did!) and it was delivered about 30 minutes later. It was 7pm and had been a very long time since that breakfast sandwich from the International Cafe early that morning. This was no way to cruise.
I kept remembering that G had been told that if he was released from quarantine on Day 6, he would have to spend the remaining four days dining in our cabin. This meant that even if I didn’t get COVID, and even if he got released on his Day 6, I’d still be eating the cabin, albeit with him, until nearly the end of the cruise. Ten long days of struggling with food delivery. Sounds fun, no?
No.
The next morning (Day 4 of my 5 day “not a quarantine”). I had to present myself, my passport and a customs form at guest services at 6:30am as the Ruby Princess arrived in Honolulu. I asked what would happen if I tested positive that day and couldn’t get off the ship, and was assured that it would not be an issue with customs. I stood with the crowd of people on Deck 4 waiting for the ship to be cleared and was personally taken from that group, escorted down the gangway, met by a customs agent and then walked back up the gangway. And when I did, I heard the familiar “The Ruby Princess has been cleared by the local authorities and guests are free to proceed ashore” announcement. I guess I was the gatekeeper to that for once!
I went to the Medical Center for the COVID test that would determine whether I was leaving or staying…and it was once again negative. What the what? I hung out in the cabin until mid afternoon, packed up a few more things to be picked up for G in quarantine, once again called Guest Services and asked that they call Medical to get G’s blood pressure taken once a day (it never once happened. Shameful!), and had hoped to stay on the ship until about 7pm (it was in port until 11pm) but someone (not me) just wanted me off the ship. I think he wasn’t going to relax until he knew I was safely off and, if not in a hotel, then on my way home. I appreciated his worrying; he’s the best at it! I left the ship about 4pm and took an Uber to the airport.
I still had several hours after I checked my suitcase before I needed to go through security, so I went to the very familiar USO in the Honolulu airport. There were only three of us there, and I was wearing an N95 mask, so I found a comfy chair in the corner, plugged in to charge my electronics and sent a text to our driver Michelle. I told her that she no longer needed to pick me up on April 11, and that I was arriving the next day instead. She is such a sweetheart. She texted back that she was dropping someone off at the airport around noon, and did I want a ride home? I told her that sounded great but- full disclosure- G had COVID and was quarantined on the cruise ship and I wasn’t sure that I wasn’t getting it, but that I had tested negative earlier that day. I’d be wearing a mask, but did she want the potential exposure? Apparently she didn’t mind at all. God bless her; I was getting home during daylight and being driven there by a familiar face. That meant a lot to me…because I was fading fast. I still wasn’t messy sick but something was definitely off.
Thankfully, I got to experience my first “lie flat” seat on my flight from Honolulu to LAX. And because I was flying first class, I had no one sitting immediately around me. As soon as the plane reached 10000 feet altitude, I was lying flat and asleep, and slept until the initial landing announcement in LA. Now THAT is the way to travel. If the flight had been a non-stop to home, I’m certain I would have slept the entire way. Unfortunately, it wasn’t (because a non-stop coach ticket was more expensive than my connecting first class, and the non-stop first class ticket was exorbitant, $2750!). I put on a fresh N95 mask in the restroom at LAX, and continued on my next flight. Arriving at my home airport less than a week after I’d left reminded me a great deal of our Pacific Princess shipwreck cruise, when we arrived back home ten days into a 100+ day trip. But, honestly, this felt even worse.
The first thing I did when I got home was take a COVID test, expecting that this would be the one…and it wasn’t. Negative! How could that be? I had already scheduled a PCR test for Monday morning at the local hospital as a backup. But there was no doubt I was full blown sick by then. The cough started that evening, and the headache intensified and, to make matters even worse, I was walking upstairs to bed a few hours after I got home and passed out, waking up on the foyer floor. I’ve done this before when I’ve been really sick, but never when I’ve been alone. I was initially thankful I hadn’t broken anything…until I stood up and realized I’d done something to my ribcage.
And thus began about three of the most miserable weeks of my life. It didn’t matter that my PCR test was negative, I was hella sick. Coughing a thousand times a day with torn cartilage in my ribs was pretty painful. Frankly, I was glad I was home alone. No one except G knew I was there, and, though I would have loved to have someone making me my morning coffee, or my daily liquid greens drink, or my ramen (all I ate for a week), I would have then wanted them to leave. The house, if not the county. I was not fun to be around, and it was best that no one was. I didn’t want the TV on, I didn’t want to talk, or listen to anyone. A week later, when I was diagnosed with pneumonia, I was told I should have been in the hospital, but I didn’t want that either. I just wanted time to pass quickly until I could feel better.
Meanwhile, back in quarantine on the Ruby Princess, G sounded considerably happier that I was home, sick or not. Though WiFi on the ship wasn’t nearly as good as it had been on the Ruby Princess on the same itinerary in Fall, 2019, the ship was in the Hawaii ports for a few days, so G and I could talk using the cellular network. My first few hours at home we were talking and I heard a strange sound in his cabin. He was alone, what could that be? He explained (and this part I already knew) that his next door neighbor in quarantine had been extremely ill, coughing nonstop all day and night. Well, apparently this man had been transported to the hospital on Maui that day, and his cabin had been opened up and cleaned. They must have opened that balcony door when G had his opened, and G said he felt a huge whoosh of air through the connecting cabin door when that happened, which means that air had been freely going back and forth all along. He looked and there was no gasket at all between the doors between the cabins. In a quarantine area. I was furious. G had asked that they duct tape over the gaps before the next guest moved in, and the sound I heard was someone there ripping duct tape.
Germ transmission prevention between quarantine cabins.
Pitiful.
This, in a nutshell, is what it was like in COVID jail. No medical observation, difficulty ordering food and supplies (G twice asked for tissues and twice got rolls of toilet paper), and a lack of communication. The day after I got home was G’s Day 5, and he was finally tested again, but not told the outcome. They said it wouldn’t make any difference and they would tell him the next day if he was staying in quarantine for the full ten days or getting out after six, but again told him that most people didn’t test negative and were in quarantine for ten days.
Then Monday (Day 6) he called me. He had tested negative two days in a row and was being released. Oh, and remember what he had been told about needing to eat only in his cabin for the remainder of ten days? Just kidding. No, now he was told he was free to eat and drink anywhere he wanted, and he didn’t have to mask because he was no longer contagious to anyone else and couldn’t get sick again himself for 90 days. So if he cruised again in that timeframe, he wouldn’t even need to take another COVID test.
While he was shouting “Free at last!”, we were both highly skeptical. Suddenly, several quarantined guests in a row of cabins (per the balcony newswire) tested negative. Lots of them. We were convinced it meant one of two things: Princess was going to perform testing on all the passengers on the way back to California and needed the quarantine cabins (this didn’t happen), or Princess had given up. They realized they couldn’t take care of 150 guests in quarantine plus their close contacts and then provide them with room service meals for up to four additional days, and decided to cut their losses after six days of quarantine (which would have been adequate per CDC rules on land). So many people reported online that they tested positive after they had returned home. It’s clear that giving up doesn’t work any better than having too many people in quarantine does.
We had a decision to make then. G was booked on the ship for one additional cruise after that one, a 5-night California coastal cruise ending on April 16. I had possibly been going to stay on also; I was awaiting word from McGee about whether he was going to race on April 16 or take a bye week after running at a meet in Arcadia, California the week before. G had no idea just how sick I was, and Mom still thought I was happily sailing around Hawaii or she would have made sure he knew. G asked if I wanted him to return home and I said, frankly, no. By then I knew I had pneumonia, but still just wanted to be left alone.
G was also given a Future Cruise Credit (FCC) for the per diem cost of his cruise times the number of days he was in quarantine. It appeared in his Captains Circle account the day he was released from quarantine, and was the one and only thing that went smoothly in all this. I told him to add the next 7-night cruise, which worked out to be exactly that value, as I wasn’t sure he’d ever get me on a Princess ship again and that FCC might go to waste, and so he did. My hope was that, by the time he returned home on April 23, I’d be feeling a lot better.
And I was. But still far from 100%. And I’ve kind of stayed at about that same place (we’re calling it long notCOVID). I have been left with quite a reminder of my very few days on the Ruby Princess and am not at all anxious to get on any cruise ship anytime soon. It’s actually been a little hard to hear from people who, along with G, tested positive for COVID on the Ruby Princess at the beginning of April and who have now fully recovered, while I didn’t but am still struggling. However, COVID isn’t the only game in town, and, after two years of careful living, my resistance was surely at an all time low.
As for G, he excitedly texted me from the Ruby Princess as soon as he was out of quarantine that he had successfully run two miles on the ship. I wasn’t surprised that that was his chief concern. You might remember that every July 4th weekend he does an 8 mile run up Vail Mountain to over 10,000 feet altitude. It is the non-negotiable highlight of our summer. He’s training hard for it now. I’m so happy that COVID didn’t put a stop to that for him. Still, I may need oxygen just to watch. 😉
His virtual Great Aloha Run t-shirt arrived home before he did, and I sent him a pic.
I was browsing the Princess Passenger Forum Facebook page one day while G was still gone, when I was shocked to see a post mentioning him. Shocked and just a smidge proud. Did G miss me while he was cruising? He would say of course he did, but he is a social creature; whether he was inviting people to join him at MTG luncheons or Captains Circle parties, or delivering his award bottles of champagne and mini bar items to the Veterans Get Togethers, he stayed very engaged. I think he’d cruise alone again. He might have to. 😉
That’s my guy!
I’m not on a walker…but I have spent years on crutches (THAT foot!)
Meanwhile, I had a purpose in mind, to relate what we were going though to a cruising audience so that people would know what they were getting into if they caught COVID on a cruise ship. Everyone thinks they do, we did also, and knew all about quarantine cabins and what might happen, but, like everyone else, we thought we’d stayed safe for two years. Surely on a fully vaccinated ship we’d be okay. Yeah, no. Even I, who woke up with symptoms on the Majestic Princess last August and was quarantined to our cabin for 24 hours until I had two negative tests, thought I knew what to expect. That was easy! I got flowers from the HGM! I spent one rainy Juneau day in the cabin and moved on!
This was not like that.
Every time a friend would text that they were taking a longer cruise, particularly the spring transatlantic cruises back to back with another cruise, I’d almost cringe. I knew exactly what was going to happen on those long cruises…and it did. One of the saddest stories I read was on Facebook about someone in his 80s who had been traveling with a small group of friends. He ended up in quarantine on a Princess ship and then was moved to quarantine in a hotel on land in Europe. His friends had all flown back to the US and he had no idea what to do next. The Princess support he was promised never materialized and he had no smart phone to re-book his flight or research his situation. Other quarantined guests were trying to help him. I wouldn’t want my mom going through that! But, unless someone was aware of what quarantine meant, they might cruise with a false sense of safety.
So I began posting the facts of our situation on Cruise Critic and while most people seemed very open to receiving the information and considered it in terms of their own vacation choices (which was what I really wanted people to be able to do), a few cheerleaders took great offense that I dared to speak our truth. I was accused of trying to monetarily gain from my complaint (that is seriously laughable. My 45 good hours on the Ruby Princess had a several thousand dollar price tag), of having unrealistic expectations and of not treating the crew nicely (otherwise we’d be getting treated better, doncha know?). Even when others chimed in that they were going through the same thing, even when the news media started publishing reports of hundreds of COVID cases and poor quarantine care, my posts were attacked. Oh well, you always get that on online forums, but one poster, with the Cruise Critic moniker AnyMajorCruiseDude went too far. He was on one of the later cruises with G, stalked him and posted photos of him not wearing a mask. G didn’t need to, he had recovered from COVID and tested negative. He was no different than all the other people going maskless. No, in fact, he knew he wasn’t contagious; most of them didn’t. This act was downright creepy and I was angry that my husband, with only the purest of intents and because of what I had truthfully reported, was going through this. Luckily the Cruise Critic moderators took the pic down…every single time AnyMajorCruiseDude tried to post it. Truly bizarre that someone felt that was the right thing to do.
I guess I don’t understand why people take offense when, after ten years of posting glowing truths of Princess on my blog, I am given cause to be more critical. I think the bigger sin would be to not speak up about our experiences and to let others cruise unprepared. I’m thankful for this blog where I can do that. (And don’t mess with my husband. Say what you want to me, but I’m quite the mama bear when it comes to people I love).
Documenting this for myself, here are some of the news articles about the COVID cruises on the Ruby Princess. The first one really says it all in a nutshell.
Passenger’s COVID quarantine: ‘We are in Princess cruise jail’
Ruby Princess cruise ship docked in San Francisco with 143 cases of COVID-19
In other, non-cruise news, I put off my Mother’s Day trip back to see Mom. I wasn’t well enough to travel, but it’s just as well. COVID swept through her retirement community and I might have gotten caught up in that too. She has stayed healthy (thank you God) but no one who got sick there got too sick. It just sent them into lock down for 12 days. I’m hoping to get back later in the summer.
And I watched McGee run for the last time in high school last weekend at the State Track and Field Championship. He finished third in the state in one event! It was a huge week for him and McGuy; they graduated a couple of days earlier (a few tears were shed). Their sister graduated just yesterday from the United States Air Force Academy and will enter pilot training this summer. OMG, what a ceremony that was, what an event, how proud we all are of her. We have one more graduation party this weekend and this busy season will be over. In future plans, McGuy accepted that nearly full ride academic scholarship offer he received back in August (when we were on the Majestic Princess), and will start at a major out of state university in August. And McGee…well McGee will begin basic training at a Military Service Academy himself in less than four weeks (his appointment has something to do with that “decently urgent” request he texted to me my first night on the Ruby Princess). He’ll be on the cross country and track teams there, too. Is anyone surprised? I didn’t think so. 🏃🏽♂️ Never believe that kids have to be related to be part of your heart. I’m proof positive that they don’t. Parts of mine will be walking (and running…and flying) around all over the country, and eventually the world. I’ll need to get used to it.
This was the heart stopping hat toss moment when the Thunderbirds appeared out of
nowhere and flew right over our heads. I have no idea how that is so perfectly
timed with fighter jets going 800mph. Unforgettable!
As for future cruise plans, there is naturally little to report. We really thought we were safe booking cruises just weeks before sailing date, but that was all the time it took for Princess to jettison their COVID protocols which left thousands of cruisers vulnerable. Our trust level is very low right now. We do have a Diamond Princess cruise from San Diego to Tokyo booked for next February, with the original intention of adding two Japan Cherry blossom cruises right after. And that’s only because of the $1 deposit promotion Princess offered a few months ago. Yep, after years of having tens of thousands of dollars on deposit with Princess at literally all times, our comfort level is now $2. I guess that kind of says it all. All things COVID will have to change dramatically for us to be on that ship when it sails from San Diego.
Antarctica is still at the top of my bucket list. We’ll get there someday, with a perfectly timed cortisone shot in my knee to allow me to climb in and out of inflatable rafts for ice landings. Just not yet. I’m not willing to make large deposits for any travel right now. Someday. And when it happens, I’ll be back here to bring you vicariously along with us. In the meantime, thank you again for your emails and concern, your encouragement when I was faced with detractors and for your long-held interest in following what we did for a full decade of post-retirement life, living the dream while wintering on cruise ships around the world. We knew (we really did, and told ourselves with some frequency) that it was all too good to last. It provides little solace knowing that we were right about that.
Wishing you ~
Safe travels.
Healthy travels.
Good lives. 💕
