Vancouver cancels floating hotel

The Olympic Games are due to be held in Vancouver this year but hundreds of travelling visitors hare desperately trying to find alternate accommodation after plans to use a cruise ship as a floating hotel were reassessed and cancelled. The travel agency called Newwest Special Projects that is based in Edmonton, Alberta, blamed the cancellation on high costs and slow bookings. Among those reorganising travel plans are 11 seriously sick children from the Make A Wish foundation who had planned to stay on the boat for the Games.

Earlier this month there was much speculation that the project was in trouble as rooms that were originally being retailed at 1,000 Canadian dollars per night were being offered for as little as 275 Canadian dollars at the start of January. The president of Newwest Special Projects refused to comment after the statement was released explaining the cancellation and customers will find a recorded message on the telephone line that once took bookings.

Refunds will be given according to the recorded message and customers have been asked to be patient while the company works through the bookings to organise the repayments. Currently it has not been reported how many people will be affected by the cancellation but it is known that the cruise ship called Norwegian Star has 1,119 rooms that should have been filled by 8,960 guests. Some news channels in Canada have reported that around 1,000 people will be affected but nothing has been confirmed to date.