My wife and I decided that for our 20th and my parents 50th Wedding Anniversaries we would all take a cruise with our children (ages 13,16). I searched and found a cruise I really liked, the Western Caribbean sailing on the Carnival Dream August 4, 2012. I picked this cruise because of the stops in Roatan Honduras, Costa Maya, and Belize. My wife reseached these ports and excursion in these ports, mainly because we had been to Nassau and Freeport and vowed never to return, or so we thought. We had booked excursion to go cave tubing in Belize and a private all day snorkeling trip in Roatan.

We watched the track of Ernesto while prepping for the trip. On the Friday before sailing on Saturday it was obvious to me that we needed to be rerouted. Watched for information from Carnival, called them, nope, everything was as scheduled. Checked with them again Saturday morning, everything as scheduled. After our first port of call in Cozumel we got back on board to the news we were being rerouted. In Carnival's defense, it was absolutely necessary for us to be rerouted. I was not surprised that people complained they rerouted when we learned of the ports we would be visiting. Any ports would have been better than Progresso, Nassau, and Freeport. Lets see Galveston, Key West, Jamiamca, St. Martin, St. Thomas, St. Croix, Turks and Cacicos, hell New Jersey would have been better and probably safer than the three ports choosen be Carnival.

What I lost with the rerouting was the chance to intro my kids to cave tubing and snorkeling. This may have been the last chance to do this type of trip with my kids and more than likely it is the first and last time my parents will ever go on a cruise. It was like getting drunk in Cozumel and then waking up shanghaied on the Carnival Nightmare. Read more