Man spent £17,000 on dream cruise and it left without him

A bloke was left stranded in the Philippines for weeks after the cruise ship he had been on left without him while he was undergoing medical tests. Ouch.

Christopher Chapel, 72, forked out £17,500 for a once-in-a-lifetime, round-the-world trip that set off earlier this year.

But halfway through his trip, Chapel began to feel nausea and lightheaded, so paid a visit to the ship’s doctor who told him he would not be allowed back on board and sent him away tom undergo some tests.

Fortunately, Chapel was told that he had nothing more than a mild case of heatstroke, but decidedly less fortunately, by the time the tests had been carried out the cruise had left the port.

Chapel and his concerned niece Karen Williams, 51, contacted cruise organisers P&O and travel insurers Nationwide, and were told that Chapel had a critical medical condition that made returning the absent passenger difficult.

Doctors deemed him unfit to fly to Manila, so he took this part of the trip back by boat but could be brought the rest of the way by plane with medics escorting him.

He finally arrived back in the UK on 7 April.

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Chapel, a retired youth worker, from Swindon, Wiltshire, said: "The doctors who brought me home were lovely, I could not fault them, though they weren't sure why there were required because they just gave me Diazepam to calm my nerves and there wasn't anything else wrong with me.

"It seems like a comical cock-up. The person who sent me away from the ship didn't even examine me and must have known that the hospital tests would have taken longer than the ship would be at the port.

"If there is a critical medical situation, as P&O keep saying, why haven't I been told more about it or shown their medical report?

"They have failed in their duty of care, first by leaving me on the island and now with all this secrecy about my health.

"It does worry me, and I will book a full medical examination very soon, but I feel alright, just a little achy and feeble."

The unlucky holidaymaker began feeling unwell when the ship docked on the island of Palawan on 4 March, and says the onboard doctor sent him to the hospital.

freeartist / Alamy Stock Photo

By the time medics had carried out all their tests and given him some antibiotics for heatstroke, the cruise ship had already gone.

"It's been an absolute nightmare, and terrifying at times," he said.

"I kept telling the nurses 'I need to get back to the ship' but they kept taking more tests and asking about my breathing difficulties and chest pains when I didn't have either of those symptoms. I don't know what they had been told by the P&O doctor.

"When I went into a coma, I wondered if that was it, that might be the end, but I came around the next morning.

"I was then stuck in a hospital bed with nothing wrong with me, it was ludicrous. I should have been allowed back on board, it wasn't a serious health issue.”

Now back home, Chapel has said he’s just waiting for his luggage to make its way back.

A P&O Cruises spokesman confirmed that they will cover the costs of returning his luggage.