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Yorkie:
As it happens me and 'er indoors should now be on our way to Scandinavia and St Petersburg on Mr Olsen's good ship Boudicca.  Having heard rumours, I had enquired about outbreaks of Norovirus on the ship on its previous two cruises.    I received an email from a member of the management 5 days before we sailed, saying that everything was OK.

2 days before we sailed we received a "special" letter and an e mail, advising that departure would be delayed due to an outbreak of Norovirus  on the incoming cruise, and the need to carry out some sanitising of the terminal building and the ship.   The delay was shown as 30 minutes - not much time for a deep clean, me thinks.

After a bit of a tussle with them ending in me having to point out the piece of Legislation that applied, I was allowed to cancel with a full refund.

Since then I have found numerous references to the illness on this vessel and others.  Some have been reported as high as 27% of the passengers with the crew unable to cope and even the medical staff being ill and unable to help the situation.

I have never come across Norovirus before on any cruise, and my thought of further cruises will demand much investigation before I book.
 ZXZ

Blongb:
We had it on the Ocean Village a few years ago, on a Caribbean Cruise. I have never seen a ship’s crew work so hard to bring it under control. The naughty boy who brought it on board knew he had it before he and his wife boarded the ship but they didn't want to miss out on their holiday. The wife didn't see the need to obey the quarantine order that meant she had to stay in the cabin and as a result the outbreak went on a lot longer than it should have.

Yorkie you should have booked a Gateway priced cruise with P and O. We have just come back from the Baltic, 14 nights on the Aurora. £750 each and a balcony cabin to boot. Southampton - Stockholm - Helsinki - St Petersburg - Tallin - Warnemünde - Copenhagen - Zeebrugge - Southampton. Fantastic weather, calm seas and great travel connection, with Easeway picking us up outside the Killer in Llandudno Junction.  We had to wait 16 years before we were able to go on it but it was well worth it, every day had something really special.
 

Yorkie:
Some ports of call as we should have had.    Ours cost us under £800 each, although cost was not the problem!  Had we known the Boudicca was full of Noro we would have probably gone off for some Sun in Portugal.  As it happens we got every cent back within a couple of days and plan to spend it on something special later in the year.    ZXZ

Yorkie:
Apparently on a Scandinavian Cruise in September on Boudicca, almost all the passengers were confined to their cabins for the last few days due to sickness.  It left the same day as it disembarked passengers on another Cruise.

How irresponsible is this after all the problems with Norovirus that the Boudicca and Fred Olsen Cruises have had?
 :rage:

Ian:
And it seems to happen a lot on cruise lines generally.

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