[nagdu] reposting full article again

Sun Nov 20 22:49:33 UTC 2011

Some asked me if I could repost this since they didn't want to read the blog 
for the rest of the story. I hope it goes through this time.

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

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 their 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.

Also you need to bring your own food for the dog, and no you cannot forward 
anything to the ships. When a ship is entering port, they are letting off 
passengers from the previous cruise and getting ready for the next group of 
passengers to travel, so sending anything ahead is impossible.

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 there was 9 and 10 foot swells and the 
manager of the island said it was too 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 their 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.

When you leave the ship, please remember to bring your permit for the 
country you are visiting and the health certificate, eventhough the cruise 
lines have it, you need to carry it with you, because as soon as we got to 
the pier and walked towards our shuttle, there was a customs officer asking 
for the dogs paperwork, you must have them when you are asked for them, or 
you will not be allowed to enter.

This comes back to planning, again depending on where you are traveling to 
you must do your homework.  Some countries will not allow a dog from another 
country to enter their country.  Case in point, the Bahamas is independent 
from the United Kingdom, but suppose you were to go to Jamaica or Barbados, 
you would not be allowed to enter with your guide dog unless you went 
through quarantine in the United Kingdom.

If you are unsure, use a professional, someone like Echevarria Travel, who 
will do the homework for you.

We had the Atlantis and Lagoon Day.  Which included a lounge chair at the 
Lagoon with a towel for the day if you wanted, also you had full access to 
all of the resort accept for the water park is.

I know this is alot of information so when traveling each person and 
situation is different.

Do's and Don'ts:

Do's:

Do, plan ahead, do not wait until the last minute to arrange a cruise with a 
guide dog, you need to get all permits and paperwork in order to travel.

Do, ask questions do your homework.

Do, see you USDA  Certified Vet for health certificate

Do, contact the country of destination or contact your travel agent to do 
this part and find out if you can and cannot bring you dog to that country.

Do,  bring food, bowls, toys for the dog.

Do, have fun

Do, remember you are a visitor of a country outside the US when cruising. 
Not all countries recognize service animals everywhere.

Don'ts:

Don't wait until the last minute to book your cruise.  You may not have 
available staterooms you want especially if you are traveling with more then 
one dog in your room and want a bigger room or accessible stateroom they go 
fast.

Don't forget your paperwork when leaving the ship to go on excursions, you 
might be asked by customs to show it and if you don't have it, you will be 
sent back to the ship.

DO NOT leave your dog in your stateroom!  The cruise lines do not like it, 
they have to clean your rooms, they also have emergency fire drills on the 
ship when you are off the ship for the crew, they clean your rooms, and they 
are not responsible for your dogs.

I also have on youtube.com videos of my trip, still posting them.

Leading the Way in Independent Travel!

Cheryl Echevarria
http://www.echevarriatravel.com
631-456-5394
reservations at echevarriatravel.com

For daily updates read our blog at
http://www.echevarriatravel.wordpress.com 