OCEAN CITY, Md- An Ocean City couple is back home after a harrowing few days at sea. Due to COVID-19, they were stuck on a cruise ship with nowhere to go.
Ed and Dottie Pinto of Ocean City were aboard a cruise ship right when the global pandemic took off The ship left from Australia in late February and made stops in multiple places within French Polynesia.
But due to COVID-19, their trip was cut short. The cruise liner first headed to Tahiti to disembark -- but the ship was denied entry.
Dottie Pinto said, "They closed all their ports, all the really neat places, so we made a turn and went to New Zealand. New Zealand closed its ports, we went back to Fiji, they closed their ports."
The Pintos say the cruise ship sailed aimlessly in the South Pacific for days -- despite no reports of COVID-19 on board.
Ed Pinto said, "we have nothing aboard this ship, we have checked, the doctors are getting no one with fevers."
Stuck on the ship, the Pintos scrambled to find ways to get home, unsure where they would disembark.
"We were told to make plane reservations home from New Zealand, from Fiji from Tahiti, from Honolulu, and then have to cancel them. We received a 900 dollar phone bill from Verizon," Dottie said.
The ship even tried to disembark in Hawaii -- but still no luck.
"There was a point where some of us were thinking that we needed to get an American flag and take the last star off it. If they weren't letting Americans on to American soil," Ed said.
But after the ship broke a propeller, Hawaii allowed passengers to unload, ending their COVID-19 disrupted cruise.
The Pintos don't plan on traveling anytime soon.
"We have decided we're not going to travel this year. Until this thing is contained, they really shouldn't go," they both said.
