[nagdu] Traveling with a guide dog out of the country and on a cruise ship

cheryl echevarria cherylandmaxx at hotmail.com
Fri Nov 18 15:59:09 UTC 2011


State to state here on the Continental US Boarders you are correct, we don't need a health certificate lets say if you are flying or driving from NY to FL or Nebraska, but you are leaving the Continental US. Same thing applies to the US Virgin Islands such as St. Thomas, St. John and St. Croix, you don't need a permit just a Health Certificate.

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  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Julie J.<mailto:julielj at neb.rr.com> 
  To: NAGDU Mailing List,the National Association of Guide Dog Users<mailto:nagdu at nfbnet.org> 
  Sent: Friday, November 18, 2011 10:51 AM
  Subject: Re: [nagdu] Traveling with a guide dog out of the country and on a cruise ship


  I could be wrong here, but isn't Puerto Rico part of the U.S.?  Isn't it 
  a territory or commonwealth or something?  I think the same rules should 
  apply as traveling from state to state.

  Julie
  On 11/18/2011 9:18 AM, cheryl echevarria wrote:
  > Good morning all:
  >
  > Now that I have some time, I will be posting my reviews and experience of my recent cruise and excursions.
  >
  > This particular post is in reference to cruising with a guide dog from the prep work, to the onboard experience, this is also in reference to leaving the main land of the US.
  >
  > Before I start, yesterday, as I had posted, someone asked me about traveling with their guide dog to Puerto Rico.  Well, since I have yet to take Maxx to PR with us, it was an awakening to the fact, that whenever you leave the mainland of the US, which also includes Canada and Mexico (some people may not have had this issue in the past, but these are the rules per the USDA.) that you must have in your possession a Certified USDA Veterinarian Health Certificate, now when you call your  vet and let them know you are going out of the country, you need to ask if he/she is one, if not they will know where your closest one is, if not there is a listing on the United Stated Department of Agriculture website.
  >
  >    Which I am willing to send to NAGDU/travel and tourism the information so that everyone has the link to the as well.
  >
  > The link is: http://www.aphis.usda.gov/import_export/animals/animal_import/animal_imports_states.shtml<http://www.aphis.usda.gov/import_export/animals/animal_import/animal_imports_states.shtml<http://www.aphis.usda.gov/import_export/animals/animal_import/animal_imports_states.shtml%3Chttp://www.aphis.usda.gov/import_export/animals/animal_import/animal_imports_states.shtml>>
  >
  >
  > When traveling especially with a service animal, in this case, a cruise.
  >
  > Planning ahead, if you know you want to cruise in April starting planning as early as possible.  For those that have cruised before the staterooms are sometimes smaller than a hotel room, and having the room for the dog might be limited.  In this case, even though I will not be doing this again, I asked for an accessible stateroom, some of this might repeat when speaking of traveling period for someone who is disabled.  Because this was a travel agent graduation cruise with Norwegian Cruise Lines, all us travel agents had balcony accommodations, and every level of the ships have an accessible stateroom and no they are not more or less money then those for everyone else.
  >
  > When planning your cruise with a guide dog, you need to call like I said way in advanced if you would like an accessible stateroom, there are many people I am glad to say that are traveling, and these rooms go very fast.
  >
  > You need to let your travel agent, know you are bring your guide, they will accommodate you but if you don't tell them, they will not know to make a box for your dog to do his business.  Also, they do not put the box in your room, it is a health issue, and no they will not put the boxes on the balconies if you have one.
  >
  > On Norwegian Cruise Lines, what they do is they will ask you what kind of stuffing you want in the box, it is a similar box to what we do at convention only smaller.  The placing of it is in a crew area only area.
  >
  > Explanation here:  On a cruise, there is an area every few staterooms in between that the crew move between to take there carts or need to take an elevator to get to the next floor, basically behind the scenes, so near our stateroom there was one of these doors and we were shown the box for the dog.
  >
  > Again, depending on the floor you are staying will determine where this is.
  >
  > Maxx was confused at first because it was inside and not outside the box, and when Maxx is away anywhere, it takes him at least a day to go do his business, but he finally liked it and all was good.
  >
  > You also need to do your homework on where you are going in my case it was Orlando, Great Stirrup Cay (which is Norwegian's own private island in the Bahamas), all the cruise lines have them, and Nassau (Paradise Island) in the Bahamas.
  >
  > Orlando is a US State so there is no worry in that of where you want to go on an excursion, we decided not to go anywhere in Orlando, and stay on the ship, and check out the rest of what was available to do.
  >
  > We didn't go to Great Stirrup Cay because at the island they bring ship tenders to the ship and that day their was 9 and 10 foot swells and the manager of the island said it was to dangerous to bring the boats out, so we had another day at sea. Also in the same area was Disney and Royal Caribbean and they couldn't get into there islands as well. These private islands are to shallow for the ships to have a pier to port to.
  >
  > In the Bahamas, we did have an issue with one of the excursions we wanted to do.  I did call the excursion department with the cruise lines prior to what we wanted to do, and they told me we never had a problem with services animals and our excursions.  Well, I did and the cruise line has been informed, I did give a report back to the Access Department and management upon my return, the good, the bad and the ugly.  They are on it, so that these issues never happen again.
  >
  > Anyway the issue we had was, I wanted to go swimming with the dolphins, my sister and brother-in-law, niece and nephew, were cruising with us, and they were going to this.
  >
  > So when I registered for this on the ship they had no problem with it, but the following day I was told that I couldn't bring my dog.  This was not from the cruise lines but the people who run the program.  They were going to allow it this once just for me, since I was a travel agent. I said no, and that we were going to do something else.  I have the e-mail from the company themselves of the excuse of why they didn't want to dog there. I mean Maxx was not going to go in the water with the dolphins, the supplier was concerned, since afterwards that in the same area that they have sea lions and that they have a less tolerance for illness and that they were concerned that they would get sick from the dog.
  >
  > In either case, I don't do anything that all of you cannot go and do.
  >
  > We went to the Atlantis Resort and it was well worth it, had an awesome time:
  >
  > To read more go to:
  >
  > http://www.echevarriatravel.wordpress.com<http://www.echevarriatravel.wordpress.com/<http://www.echevarriatravel.wordpress.com%3chttp//www.echevarriatravel.wordpress.com/>>
  >
  >
  > Leading the Way in Independent Travel!
  >
  > Cheryl Echevarria
  > http://www.echevarriatravel.com<http://www.echevarriatravel.com/<http://www.echevarriatravel.com%3chttp//www.echevarriatravel.com/>>
  > 631-456-5394
  > reservations at echevarriatravel.com<mailto:reservations at echevarriatravel.com<mailto:reservations at echevarriatravel.com%3Cmailto:reservations at echevarriatravel.com>>
  >
  > For daily updates read our blog at
  > http://www.echevarriatravel.wordpress.com<http://www.echevarriatravel.wordpress.com/<http://www.echevarriatravel.wordpress.com%3chttp//www.echevarriatravel.wordpress.com/>>
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