A recent high school graduate took to Reddit this week to ask a popular community if it was wrong to leave the parents at a Caribbean cruise port.
The unidentified teen says the cruise was a birthday gift for turning 18. It was also supposed to be a family vacation.
While the parents were accustomed to all inclusive resorts, the OP said, “I have always wanted to go on a cruise.”
According to the post, the teen made clear to the parents that cruise excursions were different than a land-based vacation and that they must follow the schedule. In other words, “Make sure you’re back to the ship on time.”
But the parents didn’t heed the warning.
“Well it was a week-long cruise and they would not head back to the ship when I said it was time to go. They were busy shopping and bargaining with the locals. I finally said that I was heading back to the ship. My mom waved me off,” the post said.
The parents were late by about 45 minutes and tried to contact the teenager through WhatsApp, asking why the ship didn’t wait for them.
The teen, frustrated by the lack of awareness on the part of the parents, said, “I wanted to scream that they were not going to inconvenience 3,998 people because two could not understand what a schedule was.”
According to the teen, the parents then had to book an expensive flight to the next port to reunite with the ship, and they were upset at their child for leaving them behind.
“I don’t know what I was supposed to do. They literally told me that they knew what they were doing. I wish I had never asked for this. They are making me miserable because I left without them,” the Redditor said.
As over 2,000 comments flooded into the post, most users on the platform were supportive of the teen.
Some comments were in disbelief about the parent’s reaction to the situation, with one user saying, “they seriously think the ship will delay for 45 minutes, yea no. The docks and ship have a schedule to keep.”
Others wondered what the parents expected of the child. “What precisely do they think you could have done? Kidnapped the captain? Staged your own drowning? You didn’t abandon them, they abandoned you, don’t let them weasel word this around to being your fault in any way, shape or form,” said another comment.
We have said this many times on Cruise Fever. Cruise ships will not wait for you if you booked an excursion through a 3rd party or just want to spend an extra hour shopping in port and are late.
The expenses of finding transportation to the next port are on you, and it’s often not cheap.
Sometimes a captain will wait a few extra minutes or half an hour if there is knowledge of a late-comer trying to get back to the ship. But the comments in this post hit the nail on the head.
The captain and crew will not make everyone else late to the next port because of someone who lost track of time.
Additionally, if a ship leaves a port late it means it will have to travel at a higher speed to get to the next port on time. This burns extra fuel and makes for a bumpy ride as well.
Read more: What to do if your ship leaves without you
