FUNNY HONEY? Federal authorities at the Port of Miami removed six unidentified
passengers from Carnival Cruise Line's Carnival Victory prior to its scheduled
departure Jan. 6 after the group carried 160 bees aboard the ship in bottles.
The passengers aroused the suspicions of crewmembers by leaving and reboarding
the ship several times after checking in, each time returning with more bees.
"[The bees] were in bottles and [the passengers] maintained that they were
intending to use them for medicinal reasons, said a Carnival spokeswoman. The
passengers were removed from the ship "to err on the side of caution while we
investigated what they were up to," said the spokeswoman. All six presented U.S.
passports upon boarding, said the spokeswoman. The incident caused Carnival to
delay the Victory's departure on a seven-day western Caribbean jaunt by nearly
three hours.

(Travel Weekly Jan. 8 online Cruise Letter)

Wow, this is truly weird. Saw nothing at all about this in the general press.

I learn a lot of great stuff at flyertalk. My hands-down favorite was about Sooty the amorous guinea pig. For new flyertalkers who need a good laugh, there's the ticket. I have no idea where it's archived.

I saw a news report on TV some time back about this new medical use for bee stings. There is some group somewhere that is promoting this as a healthy way to cure everything. This women first started it and it has grown. People come from all around to these so called clinics set up in peoples homes. There the person in charge purposely puts a bee on the clients arm with tweezers and makes him sting. This is done several times depending on the persons symptoms. I am just wondering if now they are trying to import foreign more potent bees for this use. Weird huh? But they claim it cures everything from allergies to arthritis. Wouldn't cure me---I am allergic to bee stings. Smallworld

Just read this - actually, there is some credible research going on w/ this as many MS sufferers seem to go into remission after one of these "treatments"..

Do a google search on the newsgroups, there were dozens and dozens of messages in rec.travel.cruises when it happended, and I believe there was another discussion thread in Omni about it.

It received general press coverage a day or two after it happended, both network and local picked it up, as did the local papers, at least here in New York.