A DREAM Caribbean cruise quickly turned into a holiday from hell for two Lockerbie couples after they were forced to disembark a week earlier than expected.
Dot McGuiness and her husband Tom booked the fortnight’s voyage aboard Tui’s Marella Discovery 2 – comprising a pair of one-week back-to-back cruises – along with Dot’s brother Peter Giesecke and his wife Susan to celebrate Peter’s 70th birthday.
The foursome boarded the ship at Montego Bay in Jamaica on January 24 and over the next few days it called at Cozumel in Mexico and the Cuban capital of Havana.
But halfway through their holiday, there was a shock in store. Dot said: “Six days into our holiday we got a letter to our cabin telling us that we would be sailing back to Montego Bay, disembarking with all passengers getting off and we’d be going home. The boat was in uproar about it.
“We were told that it was because of technical issues on one of the bridges so food couldn’t be delivered to the different parts of the ship.”
Passengers were offered the choice of staying in Jamaica until they were due to come home or flying back on planes sent to airlift them back to the UK. The Lockerbie quartet opted to come home early but were not able to fly back to Glasgow as they originally planned and instead were flown to Manchester.
When they arrived in Manchester Tui offered them a 50 per cent “pro-rata per night refund” and a £300 holiday voucher “as a gesture of goodwill”, but the couples were not inclined to accept the vouchers as Dot explained: “We don’t want vouchers because we’ll not be doing a two week cruise ever again.
“It would be better if they gave it to us in vouchers we could use for another two week holiday rather than to book another cruise. It was a £6000 holiday and supposed to be a celebration for my brother’s 70th birthday, but now I feel like I’ve not had a holiday. This whole thing has put us off.”
A spokesperson for Tui said: “Due to a technical issue with our catering facilities on Marella Discovery 2 we took the difficult decision to cancel the Pride of Panama cruise.
“We understand how disappointing this will be and would like to apologise to our customers who have been impacted, and thank them for their patience and understanding at this time.
“Our customer teams are already in contact with those customers impacted and are supporting them with their future travel plans.”
Dot, Tom, Susan and Peter finally arrived home on January 31 after a five hour bus journey from Manchester to Glasgow, after being told they couldn’t be dropped off closer to home.
Dot describes it all as a “long drawn out affair”.
However, she is now counting down the days until the next trip abroad to Turkey in May, which they hope will be smooth sailing by comparison.
