Oracle Online

The ads are a simple lure, akin to the Corona TV commercials that feature nothing but a landscape of clear, rolling waves hitting the sandy beach, a bottle of beer, and the sound of the ocean.

It’s a complete picture which offers students hoping for a memorable spring break the chance of respite from studies, work, authoritative control, sobriety and all the corresponding inhibitions.

With the endless possibilities for location, hotels, and recreation, designing a superb spring break POA seems to be an insuperable challenge.

Travel deals advertised by travel agencies are convenient, especially all-inclusive ones where meals, accommodations, and drinks are provided as part of the pre-paid package.

As spring break’s latest “out-of-control” behaviors have prompted safety concerns and lawsuits over injuries. Travel agency packages can be effectual in providing a safe environment with tour assistance representatives, lifeguards, and specialized staff available, said Kari Richtsmeier, who is part of Hamline’s Off-Campus Programs staff.

Although noting the common danger of getting less than one expected from a trip, she thought certain travel agencies to be “reputable.”

Lenore Miller at Wayzata’s Minnetonka Travel also mentioned the possible cost/benefit of using an agency, though not necessarily a packaged spring break deal, instead of personally booking accommodations online.

Contact with tour operators enables agencies to offer clients a “negotiated” rate, which Miller claimed is very often lower than online prices without a travel representative. She deftly highlighted the customer service advantage of having a travel agent, someone who could be called to help and attain refunds if an emergency occurred while on vacation and events had to be cancelled.

Although travel agents are supposed to be readily available to contact, Hamline sophomore Sara Robertson had a much different experience.

Towards the end of a cruise she took with some family during spring break a few years ago, the cruise ship became delayed by one person and arrived late at their final destination.

“It was just mass chaos,” Robertson said. “We were left to fend for ourselves.”

The cruise, originally offered as a package deal by a travel agency, left Robertson and a few hundred other people stranded in hotels. Passengers had to collectively wait for the travel agency to arrange new flights for everyone to get back, unless they wanted to pay extra for other transportation than what was already included in the travel deal.

That meant waiting, as the short-tempered crowd found the delay a little too long. There wasn’t enough room in the hotel she was at, Robertson said, which “looked like a squatter community” with people spread around the hotel lobby.

Before that incident at the end of the trip, Robertson said she had enjoyed the cruise and was happy with the travel agency’s arrangement of the cruise package.

“The trip was still pretty amazing,” she commented. Like a “spring break from hell” story meets blissful Corona commercial.