Part of the pleasure of cruising is the cuisine. Sometimes we get a chance to enjoy dishes that we may never have tried. Or we welcome old familiar standbys.

On my cruise aboard the S. S. Legacy for UnCruise Adventures, one of our favorites was the cookies that were served every afternoon. Fresh baked and delicious, the cookies always seemed better than the ones I had at home. Read more...

Each time we leave the Legacy for a shore excursion, we look for our cabin number on a large magnetic board and move our little magnet from the “aboard” column to the “ashore” column.

If there are two of us sharing a cabin, there are, of course, two magnets – one for each passenger. One person might go ashore and the other might not.

When we return to the Legacy, we move our little magnet again. The board also has a separate list for crew members.

Does it work? “We’ve never left anyone behind,” said Julie Kehr, assistant heritage leader on the Legacy. “There is usually a crew member around to remind you to move your magnet when you’re coming or going.”

On larger ships, the tracking system is usually done via computer. When passengers leave a ship for a shore visit, each passenger slides a personalized cruise ID card through a machine. A crew member is always there to make sure no one leaves the ship without sliding the card.

Upon return, a passenger goes through a security check and slides the personalized cruise card again.

At boarding at the beginning of every cruise, passengers on the large vessels have their photos taken and are given a cabin cruise key must like a credit card.  The “key” is used to enter the passenger’s cabin as well as to exit the ship (and often to charge important items aboard ship, such as cold cocktails or beer). That way, the computer knows who is aboard and who is ashore, as well as what that person looks like.

Does that work? A carnival cruise director told me it is an excellent system but there are sometimes still cruisers who are having so much fun ashore that they lose track of time.

If passengers are not back at the well-publicized time that the ship is set to leave, those tardy passengers are on their own.  Sure wouldn’t be fun to have to find a way to get to the next destination where the cruise ship is due to dock.

Story and photo by Jackie Sheckler Finch