The passengers of the cruise ship MSC Meraviglia were not offered the mild vacation they expected.
The ship, which was scheduled to sail to the Bahamas this week, instead headed to New England and Canada “due to unseasonable and rapidly deteriorating weather that would have made it impossible to safely reach the southern Atlantic from New York City.” said Field Sutton, director of communications for MSC Cruises USA, told CNN via email.
The last-minute change caused excitement among the guests.
Lakeya Allen of Bloomington, Illinois, told CNN she was informed of the itinerary change around 8:30 p.m. Friday, just hours before she was scheduled to fly to Chicago with her three children for an early flight to New York City gain weight.
“After I received the notification, I rushed to Walmart to try to get some winter clothes for my family. I grabbed what I could, but Walmart was closing early that night, so we only had to bring what we packed. We still carry shorts, swimsuits and sunscreen,” Allen said.
“If there was anything in the email about a refund or credit, it was in the fine print because I didn't see anything. I was hoping they would reroute the ship once we got to New York.”
The cruise line's statement said guests would have the choice of canceling their trip at their convenience and receiving a future cruise credit or choosing the new itinerary.
“The only alternative would have been the even more extreme step of canceling the cruise – and the vacation of thousands of people – completely. “The complexities associated with obtaining last-minute berths for unplanned stops and resupplying the ship along its new route made sailing to Canada and New England appear to be the only viable option,” the statement continued.
A huge change of plans
Allen said she had been planning her family's trip to the Bahamas since February as a Christmas present for her children and was already expecting relatives on the island and in New York City.
“I told myself that this year we would do something different and instead of buying gifts, we would travel and make memories,” Allen told CNN.
“At first everyone tried to make the best of it. So in the video you see kids jumping in the outdoor pool, even though we were in New York and it was 40 degrees (4.4C), but we were all gathered together. “The indoor pool is overcrowded now,” Allen said.
Allen and her family spent the first two days of the cruise in Boston, where she said they spent Sunday on the ship because it was raining. The next day, they got off the boat with other passengers to look for sweaters and coats.
“We're in Portland now trying to figure out on TikTok what to do in Portland or what's in this area because we didn't plan that,” Allen said. “The boat is beautiful, but I didn't want to leave the cold weather to go somewhere else with cold weather. I just wanted to be in the sun.”
According to a social media post from Port Saint John, the MSC Meraviglia is scheduled to arrive in Saint John in the Canadian province of New Brunswick on Thursday after stops in Boston and Portland.
The weather forecast there calls for highs of -3 °C and lows of -11 °C for Thursday.
TRAVEL PLAN CHANGES
Cruise ships often skip or change ports of call and reserve the right to do so in their contracts of carriage.
MSC says: “The owner does not guarantee that the cruise ship will call at any or all announced ports or follow any particular route or schedule.”
Itinerary changes often occur in the same region and require diversions depending on weather conditions.