On our recent cruise to Mexico, there was an outbreak of the stomach flu. It spread rapidly throughout the ship, and this factored into many of the shipboard happenings.

 

The illness factor weighed pretty heavily over everyone on the ship. Everywhere you went, there were ship personnel shoving hand sanitizer at you. I've never used so much of that stuff in my life. I would guess that I averaged 20-25 pumps per day. I'm not kidding!

 

If you're familiar with shipboard eating, you know that much of the dining is done cafeteria style. (Don't misconstrue. On most cruise lines, the food is very good, even outstanding - - not at all like "cafeteria quality" food!) So, you go through the line and pick and choose what you want. You serve yourself a pastry, some jam, some eggs, bacon, fruit. You can get cooked to order omelets and Belgian waffles, and they dish those up for you, of course, but if you want to add something to the top of the omelet, that would be there for the taking.

 

Well, after the "Ship of Death" announcement, all of that ended. We couldn't get so much as a glass of water on our own. We couldn't help ourselves to a packet of salt. We couldn't pick up a spoon or even a tray. The waiters weren't even allowed to leave a plate of butter on our own private dining table. By the end of the cruise, this had become a little tedious- - for both passengers and the crew, to be sure.

 

One thing kept killing me, though. As I mentioned in a previous post on cruising, my husband's and my trick to not gaining weight while on a cruise is to take the stairs everywhere we go. Our cabin was on 4, and the Lido deck was on 9. We took the steps every time we went up there. Anyway, for all of the attention being paid to cleaning, we never once - - not one time - - saw anyone cleaning the handrails on the stairs. That really grossed us out...to the point that we tried not to touch them. This was easier for my hubby than for me. He wasn't wearing heels to dinner!

 

My sister did wind up getting the stomach virus, but not as bad as her husband. After they had both recouped, they had somehow conned each other into playing the "Marriage Game" (think Newlywed Game from the 70's). "Backstage", members of the crew were discussing Captain Olaf van der Olaf's announcement that they'd had the fewest newly reported cases of the virus that day. The crew reported that in fact that meant that there were still 85 newly reported cases that day. 85 passengers out of about 1,800 onboard. Gross! And that was a major improvement!

 

The day we disembarked, my husband ran back to our room to make sure we hadn't forgotten anything. My sister's room had been next to ours. There was a guy wearing a mask with a 4 gallon tank strapped to his back, misting everything in their room. Lovely. Kinda' gives you the creeps, doesn't it?

 

Would this prevent me from returning to the high seas? Not for a minute! It's just too much fun!

 

For more info on cruising with your family:

Prepping Your Family for a Cruise
More Tips for Your Family Cruise
Bon Voyage on Your Family Cruise!