PROBLEMS WITH OUR SHIP

We are experiencing some major problems with the ship. It has nothing to do with the rogue wave that slammed our ship. ( Apparently the event was mentioned in the London newspapers.) The ship is run by two propulsion engines and one of these is not working. After Adelaide, one of the propulsion engines broke down and we were cruising at half the speed. They were trying to fix the problem and couldn't and therefore we arrived a day late in Perth. At Perth, we were met with 4 Rolls Royce experts who flew in to work on the problem the day we were in port. They could not fix it and therefore stayed on board the ship as we cruised at half speed and were told we would be missing Broome. While at sea yesterday, the captain said not to worry but they were shutting down the other propulsion engine so the men could safely work on the other engine. We were to be floating in the Indian Ocean for 4 to 5 hours while they worked. Apparently, they could not fix it for after one hour, we were cruising again at half speed and told that we would be missing the port of Komodo Island and heading instead for Bali where we would be arriving a day late because of our slow cruising speed. At Bali, we are to be met with 4 more experts who are flying in, so that is a total of 8 people who are working on the engine. We are to do our usual tours onshore, and then we are heading directly for Singapore, a day late, and missing another port of Semarang, Indonesia. The worst case scenario is that our ship would have to go to dry dock in Singapore to be fixed and I don't know what would happen to all of us.

Some of the passengers who came only for this leg, are going to miss 3 ports and are understandably upset. We received a letter from the president of Crystal Cruises and have a choice of monetary reimbursement to our visa or a discount to our next Crystal Cruise. Unfortunately, we may not be in this part of the world again and are missing some good ports. But this cannot be helped so we are not complaining.

The poor Captain is getting the brunt of the complaints and we feel for him and told him we are not upset and he was relieved at least some of us are not angry at him.

I will keep you informed as to what is happening, but for now, we are cruising very slowly to Bali.

PS. Saw two elderly people with black and blue eyes and faces from the falls after the rogue wave hit the ship. Many have bruises that are not visible but no broken bones, thank God.