Another Travel Adventure

Now, I just know that you think I'm writing to you to tell you about what went wrong with our Philippines cruise, but you'll never believe it! Frank and I had a great time with no disasters happening to us AT ALL! On the other hand, my friend Estelle is a whole other story. She and her husband were part of our group and while we were out to sea the poor man had a heart attack!! I thought Estelle was going to have one too since she was so panicked. Luckily, a few weeks earlier I had talked our group leader into getting travel insurance with Travelex.

When I called the 24/7 travel assistance customer service hotline, they got right to business for me. Once I told them the situation they immediately told me which hospital he should go to and then wanted to know if I needed an ambulance to help him get there. Wouldn't you know it, I pulled a "Frank" and had forgotten to tell him that I was still on the boat! Sometimes I think that man is wearing off on me. Well I couldn't believe it when the man on the phone told me that a helicopter evacuation was part of our trip insurance. Not only that, but he was going to get it for us and coordinate it all with the ship's captain! Sure enough they had one sent out and Stewart was whisked away to a hospital in Manila where they took wonderful care of him. Thank goodness too, because the cruise workers originally wanted to have him taken to a hospital at our next stop, which was a tiny village with a less than adequate medical care facility, according to U.S. standards.

So Estelle obviously didn't stay on for the rest of the cruise but she wanted me to send a big THANK YOU to the emergency travel assistance service people. They really got her husband out of a jam and the reimbursement they received for the medical bills and airline tickets to Manila kept them from making it a financial crisis as well. Now Frank and I are considered big heroes for insisting that the group get the travel insurance. Although Frank shouldn't be taking too much credit, all he did was carry my bags!