Sometimes things go wrong on a ship. It is a big mechanical conglomeration of parts that is beat around by high winds and seas that rise 30 feet. Parts of it pop out of the water and slam down again in high seas. A ship has to undergo a lot of torque. So things sometimes go wrong. This week it was our turn.
Friday we had a drip from our cabin ceiling. It was not a leaky roof from the rain — there are 5 decks above us. I called the front office. Our room steward came, saw the drip and put down a towel to keep the rug dry, we discovered it early before the carpet got too wet. Then a man in a suit came, noted the drip and called the plumber. They told us it would be fixed when we got back to our room after our visit to Kangaroo Island.
When we got back to the room it was not just one drip, it was raining. The red message light on the phone was lit. I picked up the receiver and got a recorded message from the front desk telling me that someone looked for a drip and didn’t find one. I called back and told them to get down to my room because the drips were pretty obvious and we had some soggy stuff. The guy at the other end happened to be the guy in the suit who checked my room in the morning. He listened to the recorded message and said he needed to talk with his colleague but assured me that he believed me, there had been a drip and if I said it was raining in my cabin he believed that too. A man in a black uniform gold braid on his sleeves came this time, along with the steward and a plumber and they ascertained that, indeed, our cabin was wet. They told us to go to dinner. It would be fixed when we got back. When we got back here’s what we found.
The plumber showed us where there had been a leak in a pipe. It had been fixed with waterproof tape. That tape gave way. Now they will replace the pipes but that will take a little time. They gave us a loaner cabin. It’s about a quarter mile, round trip, from OUR cabin, on the same deck on the exact opposite corner of the ship, in the bow. This is not a desirable location. There are reasons that the steerage was put in the bow. Our room was just below the theater, just above the anchor chain and just aft of the winches. When we docked in Adelaide the room felt like we are in a washing machine.
We had taken just a few things with us to the new room like my computer, meds, toothbrushes and a change of clothes. The rest of our stuff was in our regular cabin in dry drawers, closets or covered with drop cloth. Saturday morning we trudged to our old cabin to get our cameras. It was locked open (I suppose for the convenience of the plumbers) and no one was in it. I grabbed our cameras. Anyone could have. I was not happy and left for Adelaide in a really bad mood hoping the city would improve it.
(Post Script, when you get on or off the ship, security scans your key card. That way they know who’s on and who’s off. We were among the last on in Adelaide and when my card scanned a message popped up telling us to report to the front desk. When we did we found our cabin was ready. Well not quite, I am tying this with a big blower behind me speeding the drying of the carpet, which they shampooed. Suzi and I are still trying to find stuff because they kindly put stuff back where they think we would have wanted it. Despite the locked open door thing they handled things pretty well.
All Fixed!
Oh, my! What a time!
But what a hilariously written post. Made my day, but obviously not yours.
Hope all will be well by now. Ship happens, but you took it better than we would have. Impressive!
We are doing fine. And Adelaide more than made up for it.