[Travelandtourism] Cruise Lines and the Blind

[cheryl echevarria]

Good morning all:

I now have a very good friend who called me last night, and was asking about the Cruise for NAGDU, by the way there is only 2 more months left to put a deposit down or you will have to pay in full after June 1, 2010.  By July 1st, the cruise lines can take back their block of rooms.

When I had mentioned that it was on Norwegian Cruise Lines, she had mentioned that the NFB has a lawsuit against Norwegian as well as other cruise lines that were not follow ADA laws.

Well I am here to say that in 2010, and I cannot full say for myself since the Norwegian Cruise is going to by my first cruise ever, but can rest assure you that all of the cruise lines that sail within the United States full comply, they no longer to show proof of blindness or ask that you not come or ask you to bring someone with you on the cruise and stay in your cabin.

Again it wasn't just Norwegian.  From working with a number of the cruise lines they have stated to me when I am on a webinar or have posted this question to the CLIA which is the Cruise Lines International Association on the matter, that if they find any staff member from the reservationists to anyone on board not following the laws, will be reprimanded, some of the cruise lines definitely do not have braille menus or daily activities in braille, but all are there to assist, including with my group, NCL has a department called the Access department who e-mailed me and offered any assistance prior during and after the cruise.

Meaning we can arrange for our own person to help us in the life boat drills, we all would meet as a group, and we will have as much time as possible to do it properly, if anyone wants to be able to assist if there is a real emergency blind and sighted will be asked to assist and not put to the side.  Also we can have individual group tour of the ship, and private part and accessible part of the ship for guide dogs to go to the bathroom since they realize that the boxes in the rooms are to big, but they do insist that if the dog does go to the bathroom in unassigned areas, to let a crew member know ASAP so that other passengers will not step into a mess.

Also, if you are in a wheelchair, you need to let your travel agent or person doing the cruise for you up front there are limited handicapped rooms, but they are available.  Also there are certain oxygen tanks that are not able to be taken on the cruise ships

But especially, Norwegian Cruise Lines now have training for all employees and anyone selling there products as well as most of the cruise lines that I have taken there training course has training for people with disabilities.  After to speaking and twittering and e-mailing with Andy Stuart (Executive Vice President of Global Sales and Passenger Services) has assured me of all of this.

My only issue here is that in the past a few people will refuse to go anywhere near NCL, they told me there stories, but never informed me of the lawsuit that the NFB and a number of other organizations had with the cruise lines.

Which I am surprised that my NFB family never made mention of until yesterday.  Thank you Maryann,

We have also had lawsuits with target and other products, and I am sure we either tried them out to see if they changed there way of thinking or there services are working better, etc.

To which I have posted before something that happened years ago can change, and we don't know if they changed unless we try them.

I was interested to learn that in the January 2009 Braille Monitor that the NFB of Oregon had a group cruise as well, and have sent an e-mail to Art Stevenson who is the President of Oregon to see how this all went.

Sorry for the long post.

Cheryl Echevarria 
Independent Travel Consultant
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