Biggest Tragedy you ever had

[low-key]

while on vacation ?

I hear all these horror story's, but I guess my worse would only be when I was real young and headed down to Fla my car broke in the middle of no wear, some place in West Virgina

 

[luvmarypoppins]

My dh and I got a call that my dad passed away of a heart attack

 

[MIGrandma]

It actually happened a couple days before our vacation, my Dad passed away. His funeral was the day we were supposed to fly to Florida to meet up with other family to go on a cruise together.

We still did go, just a day later. But it was such a stressful week, and to top it off the morning we were to leave the hotel and get on the cruise we'd taken our luggage to the car and wanted to take a walk around the grounds to take a few photos (beautiful landscaping) and I left my purse on the table in our room. Didn't think anything about it, as we had not checked out yet.

But when we came back all the doors of the rooms were open, apparantly the housekeeping staff had begun cleaning them. Our door was open too, and my purse was gone! I immediately had a melt down. Our passports, money, credit cards, etc. were gone!

DH went outside to find housekeeping, found one around the corner and he explained the situation and she had my purse, in a laundry bag. She said she thought we'd left without it. I was so glad to get it back. So, it could have been much worse had I not gotten it back.

 

[PrincessShmoo]

while on vacation ?

I hear all these horror story's, but I guess my worse would only be when I was real young and headed down to Fla my car broke in the middle of no wear, some place in West Virgina

Well, we were robbed as we were transporting our suitcases into our motel room in Miami. We kinda got the last laugh on the robber, though. We had arrived late, so we didn't make the ATM stop we thought we were going to make, so between DH & I (robber only demanded my purse and his wallet) he got $20. Oh, yeah, and my hormone pills (I hope he enjoyed them). What he didn't know was our youngest had not spent any of the money he had saved for the trip and was carrying about $100.00.

 

[low-key]

Well, we were robbed as we were transporting our suitcases into our motel room in Miami. We kinda got the last laugh on the robber, though. We had arrived late, so we didn't make the ATM stop we thought we were going to make, so between DH & I (robber only demanded my purse and his wallet) he got $20. Oh, yeah, and my hormone pills (I hope he enjoyed them). What he didn't know was our youngest had not spent any of the money he had saved for the trip and was carrying about $100.00.

, he probably got a case of beer with your money, went back to his room and took your pills and wondered why he was crying over sad commercials

 

[minkydog]

, he probably got a case of beer with your money, went back to his room and took your pills and wondered why he was crying over sad commercials

You just made my night!

Our worst vacation, hands-down, was 4 years ago. We were coming back to Atlanta from a week-long camping trip to Savannah. We lost control of our SUV & trailer and flipped 3 or 4 times. It was horrible, like it was in slow motion. Thankfully, none of us had life-threatening injuries, although DD21, Christian and I had concussions and whiplash. But we were darn lucky. When we went out to the wrecking yard the next morning to see what we could gather, I about threw up--the car looked so much worse than I remembered and the camper...well, that was a total loss, too. We managed to salvage a few clothes and a crock-pot that miraculously sat upright on the floor with a few sticks and a purple jelly bean inside.

 

[okeydokey]

I fell and broke my wrist, really broke it, outside of It's a Small World. Spent all night at the ER, finally had it re-set and splinted. The guy there told me I would need surgery to fix it. We got home a couple of days later and the doctor here said I could skip surgery and re-cast it.

 

[superme80]

My dad got really sick and we had to leave early. I had never seen my dad so sick. Then my mom was driving the 1963 truck, which is a stick shift, and she is REALLY scary when she drives. Amazed we made it home. My poor dad ended up passing a kidney stone. At least it was not as bad as it could have been.

 

[E&Cmom]

We got into a car crash in California. Right near the Santa Monica pier on the Pacific Hwy to be exact. Luckily except for some soreness we were OK.

 

[barkley]

well, there was the Disney cruise that had the captain dealing with the "tropical storm" (hadn't hit land yet) that had been newly categorized as a hurricane that was hitting florida when we disembarked. then there was the Alaska cruise where on the last evening one of the crew members didn't see me standing in the hallway when he gave a big shove to the massive luggage cart he was filling, and ended up hitting me in the back-ended up with a wicked bone bruise on my leg and whiplash (probably wouldn't have been so achy if I didn't have a long plane trip from Canada to California the entire next day). neither were particularly tragic, but not the best of vacation memories.

 

[discat73]

I had an allergic reaction to a medication I was on during a road trip and wound up in five different ERs covered with hives and my eyes swollen shut. I've never spent so my time on the phone with an insurance company in my life.

 

[ilovepcot]

Went to visit family in Nashville 4 years ago for Christmas. Got out of our car and fell down a 35 foot concrete driveway. Several breaks and doctors *just knew* I had a bleed on the brain when they saw me in the ER. Nope...just a horrible wreck. Nurses dug gravel out of my face and cleaned it best they could. Pretty much ruined Christmas that year.

 

[Tinker'n'Fun]

Mine was on a flight home after our Disney trip. We were delayed two hours due to storms in Orlando. We had a layover in Atlanta. We finally took off and were were about 2/3rds of the way to Atlanta when we hit clear air turbulence. It was the worst I have even encountered and we dropped several times causing a lot of distress.

Once we got closer to Atlanta we were unable to land due to storms and just taxied because we could not get around the clear air turbulence or storm. After 2 hours, the pilot who was unaware he was on speaker notified the plane we were out of fuel and had to make an emergency landing. Our daughter heard and hyperventilated. Took the stewardesses a bit to calm her down as nothing we said she believed after the horrible flight.

We landed in a field in the middle of a small town in GA. Trucks came with fuel we re-fueled and were able to land in Atlanta about 6 hours late. Obviously we missed our connection.

I had insurance and the airline covered some things but you have to pay out of pocket, save receipts, get reimbursed. We got a change of clothes from the airport, they taxied us to a hotel that gave us toothbrushes, toothpaste and a few snacks. It was in a horrible part of Atlanta. We slept for a few hours then back to the airport. We were able to fly back together but our seats were all separated and we had two little ones. The only person who would move so that my husband could sit with the children was the last row, which caused major ear problems with both children.

We were reimbursed all our out of pocket expenses and I think an additional $250.00, but I would have just rather had a flight that got us home the same day.

I have not flown with a layover since. This was in 2005.

 

[jdb in AZ]

On our trip three months ago we lost an envelope with $800 cash in it, and that was just the beginning.

DH posted pictures of France on Facebook and I pointed out he had just told all our "friends" that we were out of the country. DH thought I was worrying about nothing, but we came home to identify theft problems on three bank accounts that we hadn't used on the trip -- the largest had over $10,000 fraudulent charges. Yes, the accounts are insured, and we were issued new checks, credit/debit cards, account numbers, etc, but we're still dealing with the aftermath. We had to change the outside door locks, and removed the keypad by the garage door. We also submitted fraud reports, and had to send a notarized copy of my "autograph" to prove my genuine signature isn't anything like those on the forged checks.

 

[DawnM]

Well, I think of tragedy in terms of a horrible illness or death. However, in terms of just a big issue with traveling......I got stuck on an island with no money and no way off for a full week.

I was traveling from Singapore to Nairobi and Air Mauritius only had one flight out per week from Mauritius to Nairobi. I missed it due to a delay in flight from Singapore to Mauritius.

I was about 21 at the time. I had no credit card and not many traveler's checks left (I was going to see my parents in Kenya so I thought I was good.)

Thankfully the airline put me up in a hotel on the beach and I had 2 meals included per day. I tried to eat a late breakfast and then a good dinner so I wasn't starving. The hardest part though was that I didn't speak French. An American was traveling with his Zambian girlfriend and they were so nice to me and helped me out a bit. Part of the reason they were so kind was that I was 21 but looked about 16 and they were worried about me!

Now I look back at it as an adventure!

Oh, and I almost missed my next flight out, which would mean another week's stay. The owner of the hotel personally decided to take me to the airport as he was worried about me too (he was from South Africa and spoke English). His car broke down on the way! ARGH! He flagged down a taxi and I ended up making it within 25 min. of my international flight.

Dawn

 

[NewRVLady]

To my friend Cheramie's parents...(Could have been a tragedy)

Her parents were in NYC with friends and had a scheduled NYC tour planned
All the major stops...first one was World trade center
The bus had problems and made them wait over an hour-boy they were mad
They finally boarded when....
yep......
you guessed it.......

the first plane hit the World trade center 9-11

Then all the craziness started....they had to get to NJ and rent a car to drive back south home

 

[bigbabyblues]

Didn't end in tragedy but could have. We were on vacation in Nags Head. My husband was swimming around in waist-deep water and got caught in a rip current. He was pulled out about 125 yards and had to be rescued. Luckily, he knew to just float on his back and wait, as he was too weak to swim back in by that point. We were a couple miles past the last lifeguard stand, so it took a little while for ocean rescue to get there.

 

[NFLDERS]

First, was losing the sight of my right eye at 20 yrs old. I'm a senior now so I've been pretty much legally blind my "whole" life.

Second, was fighting a Strep flesh eating disease infection at 23 yrs old. Penicillan administered in large does beat it back. It took 8 months to do it.

This wk end I'll give a prayer of thanks to all the Doctors and Nurses whom helped me through these equally frightening times.

 

[Coonhound]

First, was losing the sight of my right eye at 20 yrs old. I'm a senior now so I've been pretty much legally blind my "whole" life.

Second, was fighting a Strep flesh eating disease infection at 23 yrs old. Penicillan administered in large does beat it back. It took 8 months to do it.

This wk end I'll give a prayer of thanks to all the Doctors and Nurses whom helped me through these equally frightening times.

Those sound awful, I'm so sorry you went through those. But just curious did these happen on a vacation? The thread topic is tragedies that happen on vacation

 

[sets14]

Two years ago my family was vacationing with my parents in Myrtle Beach. My dad scraped his arm on a water slide and ended up with flesh eating bacteria. Had 6 inches of tissue scraped out down to the bone, spent 9 days in the hospital there on every antibiotic possible, wound vac on arm, then had to ride 11 hours in the back of my sisters SUV to get home to Ohio. In the midst of all that, I came down with strep throat.

I will never go back to Myrtle Beach again.