Tony Rice wrote:

(R&M) wrote in
. com:

Just was told that on Diamond Princess 10/16 cruise there will be 11
blind peolple with their seeing eye dogs...have been given the option
of cancelling...what does the group think???

If you are deathly alergic to dogs then you should cancel. If not, I have
no idea why you would even consider cancelling.

Assistance animals will be far better behaved that most people on the
cruise.

AOL does not bring up the original Google post from sdcruisers just the post
from Tony Rice.

To respond to sdcruisers:

There was a cruise to Alaska on the Regal Princess on May 26, 2004 that
included many "seeing-eye" dogs, though I recall the number was more like 20+
dogs. It was a 10-day cruise, round trip from San Francisco. That's twice as
many dogs on a smaller ship. I would not have chosen that Regal Princess
sailing, and would have cancelled it had I been booked, not because there is a
dog or two on the ship, but based on the numbers of dogs present. However, it
may have been OK. It was simply a big unknown. I think that cruise was the
first to have so many dogs onboard.

My suggestion would be to get some feedback from passengers who actually
cruised on that sailing to see what the impact on their cruise experience was.
It may have been moderate, and it may have been significant. I would try all
of the following: Google, Cruise Critic, CruiseMates, and Cruise Addicts.

I have cruised and dined with blind people before, but they did not bring their
dogs along. They got along just fine with their cane and their loved one with
them, including on shore excursions. In fact, one of the most active cruise
participants on one of our cruises, a 10-day Caribbean cruise with six port
stops, was a blind man. Nothing slowed him down. Based on that experience, I
tend to feel that for most blind people, the service animals are not REQUIRED
on vacation if they have a traveling companion with them, though I realize they
would miss their dog.