dreamer17555
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Dec 17, 2007
- Messages
- 3,841
So there is so little info on side by side sailings I thought I would share mine. I was on a 4 night Wish sailing and moving to a 5 night Magic sailing.
Pre Cruise- No information given, people also doing a side by side mentioned "linking" sailing but DCL reps I spoke with had no idea about that
During Cruise- Meet lovely ladies in terminal who shared their previous side by side was not well handled and to verify with DCL they had us listed as a side by side. Went Night 2 to guest services and the guest service rep said only one person on the ship handles Side by Side sailings and could provide no information on how they worked but I did ask if we could still have luggage put out in the hall the night before departure and was told yes.
Afternoon of the final full day received a letter (and no luggage tags) indicating we should meet at Nightingales at 8:45 AM and bring all luggage with us and we would be group 2 for the Magic sailing. Several people spoke to guest services and were given different answers about luggage (some were given character tags, others not, characters on the tags varied). I overpack so I was not thrilled with this but did lug all my luggage to Nightingales at 8:35 AM to find everyone else nicely waiting but no DCL rep. There was literally no CM in the room (also no juice and pastries like on my b2b on the Dream but not a huge deal). A few minutes before 8:50 AM a gentleman appeared and read off names and verified us. He said those taking the bus he would lead down and those with cars should move them from Terminal 10 to Terminal 8. I did ask him (as we had cruise friends moving their car) if the garage at Terminal 8 would be open as it normally does not open for new guests until after 10:30 AM. He said yes that everyone was aware and waiting for us we all just had to say our name and back to back.
We quickly followed him off to a disembark line where he left. We all signed off but other guests also were signing off and there was no "being lead off" as other guests mixed in and he was no longer leading us (I even had a family between myself and my son). As we moved all our luggage down there was clearly no reason we could not have set luggage out as once down the ramps there was no even semblance of us staying as a group. I was directed to passport line and I kept asking every employee where to go for Side by Side (none of them knew). Once through customs I asked again (they did not know and most thought we meant back to back). One did however ask if we were driving to the terminal and when I said DCL said they would have a bus directed us to the Terminal 10 DCL buses. The workers loading the buses did have a line set up for us and seemed to understand more about the side by side. Luggage was loaded under the bus and by 9:20 AM.
Bus made its way to Terminal 8... who would not let the bus in. They did not understand (or care about) the side by side. Eventually calls were made and the bus allowed to pull into terminal and park... We watched as the driver (very nice) got off and unloaded the luggage only to come back quickly to tell us we would need to wait longer on the bus. Via the chat log we were all still sitting on the bus till after 10:15 AM (and likely a bit longer). And those driving were given bad advice and the parking garage was not open until 10:30 AM (despite what we were all told). A few minutes before 10:30 a DCL rep came to the bus, the intercom was broken and she spoke directed away from us and gave the basic (no open liquids, passports not in checked luggage, etc) list (which I loudly repeated once she left for others as no one outside the first 4 rows could hear her)
Apparently the port workers (and porters) were not ready for us. They did let us get get off and then there was this strange thing where they wanted us to "claim" our luggage but that basically meant to grab it (or point to it) and show it had a luggage tag. We were given large purple tags indicating we needed to check in and lead straight to security and upstairs. Once upstairs the workers printed QR codes with orginial boarding groups. When we pointed out the letter said group 2 we were told to show the letter, or the purple tag (some workers took them during check in, others did not) or some CMs crossed out the BG on the printed slip and wrote a 2. It seemed like they had no real training from DCL on how to handle this and there were none of the normal colored cards you get when doing a B2B.
From there it was just a normal boarding process but it did not start until almost noon (b2b were let on right after 11:20 AM so a good gap). Overall I would expect this level of disorganization if it was the first one but they have had more than enough side by sides that DCL should have a set protocol and train their CMs on it. The CMs overall were wonderful but did not know what to do with us. I think maybe they should have also held us on the Wish with the B2Bs vs being made to sit on a parked bus with no information for well over 45 minutes. DCL has many more of these opportunities for side by side sailings coming (including out of Ft. Lauderdale) and needs to do better informing both guests and CMs on what to anticipate. As it stands right now I would not recommend the experience.
Pre Cruise- No information given, people also doing a side by side mentioned "linking" sailing but DCL reps I spoke with had no idea about that
During Cruise- Meet lovely ladies in terminal who shared their previous side by side was not well handled and to verify with DCL they had us listed as a side by side. Went Night 2 to guest services and the guest service rep said only one person on the ship handles Side by Side sailings and could provide no information on how they worked but I did ask if we could still have luggage put out in the hall the night before departure and was told yes.
Afternoon of the final full day received a letter (and no luggage tags) indicating we should meet at Nightingales at 8:45 AM and bring all luggage with us and we would be group 2 for the Magic sailing. Several people spoke to guest services and were given different answers about luggage (some were given character tags, others not, characters on the tags varied). I overpack so I was not thrilled with this but did lug all my luggage to Nightingales at 8:35 AM to find everyone else nicely waiting but no DCL rep. There was literally no CM in the room (also no juice and pastries like on my b2b on the Dream but not a huge deal). A few minutes before 8:50 AM a gentleman appeared and read off names and verified us. He said those taking the bus he would lead down and those with cars should move them from Terminal 10 to Terminal 8. I did ask him (as we had cruise friends moving their car) if the garage at Terminal 8 would be open as it normally does not open for new guests until after 10:30 AM. He said yes that everyone was aware and waiting for us we all just had to say our name and back to back.
We quickly followed him off to a disembark line where he left. We all signed off but other guests also were signing off and there was no "being lead off" as other guests mixed in and he was no longer leading us (I even had a family between myself and my son). As we moved all our luggage down there was clearly no reason we could not have set luggage out as once down the ramps there was no even semblance of us staying as a group. I was directed to passport line and I kept asking every employee where to go for Side by Side (none of them knew). Once through customs I asked again (they did not know and most thought we meant back to back). One did however ask if we were driving to the terminal and when I said DCL said they would have a bus directed us to the Terminal 10 DCL buses. The workers loading the buses did have a line set up for us and seemed to understand more about the side by side. Luggage was loaded under the bus and by 9:20 AM.
Bus made its way to Terminal 8... who would not let the bus in. They did not understand (or care about) the side by side. Eventually calls were made and the bus allowed to pull into terminal and park... We watched as the driver (very nice) got off and unloaded the luggage only to come back quickly to tell us we would need to wait longer on the bus. Via the chat log we were all still sitting on the bus till after 10:15 AM (and likely a bit longer). And those driving were given bad advice and the parking garage was not open until 10:30 AM (despite what we were all told). A few minutes before 10:30 a DCL rep came to the bus, the intercom was broken and she spoke directed away from us and gave the basic (no open liquids, passports not in checked luggage, etc) list (which I loudly repeated once she left for others as no one outside the first 4 rows could hear her)
Apparently the port workers (and porters) were not ready for us. They did let us get get off and then there was this strange thing where they wanted us to "claim" our luggage but that basically meant to grab it (or point to it) and show it had a luggage tag. We were given large purple tags indicating we needed to check in and lead straight to security and upstairs. Once upstairs the workers printed QR codes with orginial boarding groups. When we pointed out the letter said group 2 we were told to show the letter, or the purple tag (some workers took them during check in, others did not) or some CMs crossed out the BG on the printed slip and wrote a 2. It seemed like they had no real training from DCL on how to handle this and there were none of the normal colored cards you get when doing a B2B.
From there it was just a normal boarding process but it did not start until almost noon (b2b were let on right after 11:20 AM so a good gap). Overall I would expect this level of disorganization if it was the first one but they have had more than enough side by sides that DCL should have a set protocol and train their CMs on it. The CMs overall were wonderful but did not know what to do with us. I think maybe they should have also held us on the Wish with the B2Bs vs being made to sit on a parked bus with no information for well over 45 minutes. DCL has many more of these opportunities for side by side sailings coming (including out of Ft. Lauderdale) and needs to do better informing both guests and CMs on what to anticipate. As it stands right now I would not recommend the experience.
