Hi all, first time posting to this board, but I was there when this happened! Sorry this is long:
This happened during my stay at Fantasy Island, Jan 25-Feb 1. We were doing our final dive Friday Jan 31 and a group of Canadians who had just arrived Thurs joined our boat. After the dive ended and we got back to the resort, one of the DM's got on the boat and announced that all Canadians were leaving Sat Feb 1. Of course this was news to everyone and all of us were just shocked. They were able to do the second dive at 11am and then that was it for them. I questioned them, because they were talking in French, and all I was able to learn is that some people had gotten sick and the tour operator was pulling ALL Canadians out of Roatan and it was being closed as a destination to Canadians from that point on.
That evening in the main building, we were able to get the scoop. The Canadians had a big meeting that night at 7 with their trip reps and of course they were all in the bar afterward taking last-minute advantage of their all-inclusive drinks. The pissed off drunk Canadians were only too happy to share their awful story! The deal was: The group of Canadians staying at Barcelo resort were the ones who got food poisoning--there was talk of supposed washing of the fruit in the pool, meats sitting out too long and being undercooked, etc (all hearsay--nothing confirmed). The guests at Barcelo had been there only a few days, all of them were violently ill (that WAS confirmed) and called the tour operator demanding to go home. Well hearing this, the tour operator decided to send down a big DC-10 and bring ALL Canadians home at once, no matter when their departure date was. The couple I talked to was supposed to stay until Feb 10! Long story short, they had no luck dealing with the Canadian embassy from Roatan and basically they all had to leave Sat with only an offer of a night or 2 in Cancun at a 2-star hotel and $500 back on the total trip cost. Small compensation for losing out on an entire vacation!
I should make it absolutely clear here that NO Canadian guests staying at Fantasy Island got food poisoning--it was only the guests at the Barcelo resort. Fantasy Island did their best to help out with the last-minute arrangements and even offered some, if not all, Canadians a voucher for a free stay on their next visit. Canadians basically now have to book through the US if they want to return to Roatan unless another tour operator steps up to the plate. The whole deal stinks and even all of us from the States were up in arms over this situation. I think this was a rather extreme action on the part of the Canadian tour operator especially since no one from any other resorts in Honduras had a problem! There was talk of suing the tour operator, contacting embassy reps and other things in an attempt to get proper compensation for losing out on the trip, money and time. I haven't heard an update since we got back, so if anyone else has any details on the progress of this case, I'd be interested in hearing about it!
