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Originally Posted by kathyspear
As some of you may know, cruise lines have tired of waiting for the CDC to give them the guidance that was promised months ago to get them sailing from U.S. ports again. They are moving ships to international "home ports" and starting up round trip cruises in June. Crystal is doing 7-nights in the Bahamas R/T Nassau and Bimini, stopping at 4 or 5 islands that are normally only visited by private yachts. Royal Caribbean has a ship sailing R/T from Nassau, another sailing R/T from Bermuda, and a third home porting in Cyprus for trips to Greece and Israel. Celebrity is sailing R/T St. Martin. NCL is expected to make a similar announcement any day. Carnival is hopeful that cruising from U.S. ports will be allowed sometime this summer so they are holding off on home ports outside the U.S. for the time being.
So far, all sailings require pax to be fulling vaccinated. (Crew will also be vax'd.) Pre-trip covid tests will likely be required for most if not all cruises this summer but that is because they are required by the countries where the ships are docked or where they will visit. The mask issue is up in the air right now. Some folks are worried about not being allowed to go off and explore in ports on their own. They didn't want to be limited to ship excursions only. So far, it looks like that will not be an issue.
The cruise lines have done a lot to ensure that people don't get sick (or get others sick) on board. I'm vaccinated and I am not worried in the least about getting covid on a ship. My only concern -- the only reason I have not yet booked a cruise -- is that I ***REALLY*** don't want to do a covid test. The idea of having a 10" swab stuck up my nose does not appeal to me for some reason. But I really want to get back on a ship. I have a milestone birthday coming up in August and most years I book a 4 or 5 night "birthday cruise" to the Bahamas or Caribbean. (This is in addition to one of our bigger trips every year or 18 months to Europe or someplace.) So I keep thinking about that 10" swab ... We shall see.
kathy
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Royal Caribbean and Celebrity so far have said that only ship-sponsored excursions will be authorized. But, we're still a couple months from the restart anyway.
By the way, they quit doing the brain swab about July or August of last year....