https://www.cnn.com/travel/cruise-sh...ada/index.html
Total fail.
MSC Cruises USA, one of the mid-size cruise lines, decided they were too greedy to cancel a Caribbean cruise departing from NYC. The weather along the route was going to be too rough and unsafe to sail. Instead, at 8:30 the night before boarding, MSC informed passengers that the itinerary would change to a "New England and Canada" cruise -- which otherwise only goes during the late spring, summer, and early fall. Many had already traveled to New York and did not have access to their warm clothes at home, and the stores were closed to buy new ones.
It visits places such as Boston, Portland (Maine), New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, and even a stop to see DJ Chaps in Halifax.
These are nice stops during the summer, but they're cold in mid-December, with not much to do.
Passengers were allowed to cancel and get a "future cruise credit" for the amount they paid, or take the new itinerary. There were no refunds allowed.
Those who took the new itinerary were miserable, especially since most leaving from NYC were living in cold weather areas, and had booked the cruise specifically to get away from that for a week.
Some people chose to take the cruise because they had already paid for flights.
I've always felt that the ports are very important when selecting a cruise. Even on the nicest ships, you eventually get tired of being there and want to get off and do things. If the places you visit suck, the cruise sucks overall. I actually cancelled my last scheduled cruise -- 2018 -- because a hurricane wiped out our itinerary, and the new islands we were visiting either sucked or were places I had been many times. The last cruise I took was 6 years ago.
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Originally Posted by Daly
