Rumors of Windjammer Demise

[CanadianCruiser]

Rumors are out in the press and online that Windjammer cruises is in deep financial trouble, cruises passengers are not allowed to board the ships, and that crewmembers, who have not been paid, are stuck living on ships with no power or air conditioning.

The situation has deteriorasted to the point where there are reports of passengers arriving to find ships left empty by the crew because the fuel had run out. Why something was not done sooner to protect the company, and to prevent the continued sales of tickets when it was becoming obvious the cruises would not be taking place cannot be said. In any case, a survey of travel agents showed that they were all well aware of the situation months ago and had stopped selling Windjammer cruise already.

Windjammer Cruises is a cruise line that honestly never got much coverge by the mainstream cruise press, although the line had a core following of advocates who loved the extreme free-style nature of their cruises, of which one aspect soon became synonymous with their name - barefoot cruising.

Windjammer has a fleet of four small sail-ships. Their program appealed to young singles with no singles supplements, and beer and wine included with the cruise fare. If you didn't like your assigned roommate you were welcome to grab a blanket and sleep out on the deck. The ships also never docked in the U.S. presumably because they weren't like to pass the Coast Guard and CDC inspections.

Still, if you were to go to the Windjammer devoted message board site jammerbabe.com, where you used to see all kinds free-spirited people making plans for future voyages on these escapist ships, the messages are all about people asking each other if they have heard anything new, and wondering if their plans are falling through. Unfortunately, many cruise and travel insurance providrers stopped covering them months ago.

A visit to windjammer.com now leads you to a holding page by the web services provider NetworkSolutions. The second most visitied page after a Google on Windjammer leads you to consumeraffairs.com - full of messages from people reporting they bought tickets but are being denied boarding because the crew is on strike for not having been paid.