Türkiye & X TA 2022

We are finally at MIA. We have checked our bags. We have gone through security. We have gotten a bite to eat at La Pausa, one of the eateries at the food court. All in less than an hour. We are now at our gate, waiting for boarding to be called.

We’ve been cruising since 1999. That’s 23 yeas of embarking and disembarking ships of all sizes — from 5,000+ to 50-passenger — at various ports all around the world. I can categorically say that today’s disembarkation is at the top of them all … as the WORST EVER. And this on a one-ship day at the terminal where we were berthed.

C’mon people. This is not something new. Miami disembarks thousands upon thousands of passengers practically every day. It’s time for all the parties involved — from cruise lines, to port personnel, to CBP — to stop blaming each other and solve the problem.

OK … off my soap box … moving on with the story.

It’s not that we minded the delay leaving the ship. No, we wanted a late departure anyway so when our number was called at 11:15a, we were happy that we got our wish.

The problem? The unknowns once we stepped off the air bridge into the terminal and found ourselves in a molasses-slow moving line. Even that wasn’t a problem per se. The issue was that there was no one around to advise people of what was ahead as we inched our way down the corridor.

Getting to the baggage claim area 35 long minutes later, we found ourselves in the midst of total chaos. People were getting out of line to collect their bags and then rejoining the line for immigration. Bags were halter skelter … all over the place. What happened to lining up bags by disembarkation number? Yeah, right. We eventually found each of our three bags in three different rooms.

Here’s where we got smart. Noticing that people were flagging down porters who were then leading them off to immigration without having to join the long queue, I snagged one and off we went. About 5 minutes later, we were showing our passports and being welcomed back to the USA.

We were going to Uber it to the airport, but once outside the terminal, we saw that there was no one in queue for taxis, so we switched plans and hopped in the next cab. This turned out to be a really smart move as the ride-share pick up area was swarming with people waiting for their rides.

It took us about 15-minutes in mid-day Miami traffic to get to MIA … but we made it. Whew!

More later …Read more