Flight out of San Juan not till 5:30 pm

[Nightengale212]

I am cruising on the Golden 7/11, and my return flight out of San Juan is not untill 5:30 pm. Any suggestions on what to do to pass time. We are doing taxi not ship transfers.

TIA for your replys

Shirley

[meyerhaus]

We are on the same cruise! Our flight is not until 4:30p We are looking into places to store luggage and tool around for the afternoon. Maybe we could meet during the cruise too and see if we might want to hang out together!

JON

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Golden Princess 7/11/04
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Celebrity Zenith-1993 (Jon)

[Jacqueline]

Usually there are last say excursions. on Celbrity with a late flight you could do a trip to the rainforest, for exampke, then they drop you off at the airport... Princess also tends to do these.

Jacqueline
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[klauer]

We took a tour of Old San Juan after our Princess cruise one year. There was free time to look around the fort and so some shopping. You could probably do something on your own too, but booking the Princess excursion was easiest for us.

[klauer]

Sorry for the typo above! I should explain that what made this easy is that we put our luggage on the bus when we got off the ship,took the tour, then the bus took us to the airport. So the cost of would be the shore excursion price minus taxi fare.

[surfnsun]

We were on the 5/2-5/9 Golden out of San Juan and had the same dilemma with a late flight. The gentleman loading the taxis as we got off the ship suggested we either take an excursion (he recommended the rainforest) or we could store our luggage at Barrachina Restaurant (home of the first Pina Colada) and do our own tour around Old San Juan. We chose the latter. Took a taxi for about $10.00 and was pleasantly surpised the restaurant was beautiful, staff was friendly and helpful, Pina Colada's and food was good, and I was comfortable the luggage was safe to leave while we did our own tour. They charged $5.00 for the luggage, we had four pieces and were given a receipt/ticket claim for the luggage. Taxi to San Juan airport was $20.00. I can e-mail a couple of pictures of the restaurant, if you want to post your e-mail address. Other pictures of our cruise can be found at the following link:
Golden Cruise Pics (http://www.johnsonmen.us/peggycruise)
P.S. Sorry if this is repetitive for some of you...I've posted something similar before, but it's several pages back.
P.S.S. Meyerhaus - Great idea on the patters!

[aquatic]

We took the rainforest excursion post-cruise for the same reason. It was lovely, we toured the island and saw the beautiful rainforest, got some of the best pictures of the cruise there. They loaded all the luggage onto a truck (after we departed the ship's customs) and the truck met us on the curb of the airport where we were dropped off. It was worth it because we would have paid almost as much to take a cab to the airport, didn't have to worry about storing our luggage, and had a nice time seeing some of Puerto Rico. http://messages.cruisecritic.com/infopop/emoticons/icon_wink.gif

[nhcruiser]

If you are a member of Wyndham by Request, (their preferred customer club) you can stop by any Wyndham hotel in the world and the Bell Captain will store your luggage for the cost of a tip. You can sign-up on line before your cruise if you wish.

As for things to do in San Juan, the Forts are interesting, as is Old San Juan. The Rain Forest is a good take as well. Another idea would be to take the Baccarti factory tour or for that mater just enjoy walking the Condado area.

Remember that for a 5:30 flight you need to be at the airport NLT 3:30

[kitty555]

Does anyone know exactly how many tours are offered post cruise and how much they are in San Juan? Do you only have a choice of 2? Rain Forest and Old San Juan?

which one do you recommend?

Thank you

[larsen]

Princess used to offer a day excursion at one of the hotels that we have used several times. They take you and your luggage to a lovely hotel on the beach, stow your big luggage for you at no extra cost, and have a secure area for your hand luggage. You get to use the hotel swimming pool, casino, beach and etc. just as if you were a guest there. The hotel provides several 'day' rooms for use so you can shower and change clothes after a relaxing day at the pool or beach or just to freshen up before your trip home. A very nice lunch is also provided. Princess will gather your flight time and advise you what time you will need to be in the lobby to take the provided transportation to the airport. We have not sailed to/from SJU for three years so I guess this tour could have changed but I doubt it. I think the last time we did this it was about $22 per person and a bargin at that. And, if I remember correctly it was one of those tours that could not be booked until you were on board the ship so I doubt you will see anything on-line about it. We always considered it our 'extra' day on vacation and always arrived rested at the airport. You do not, I repeat, do not want to spend your day waiting in the SJU airport.

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[Nightengale212]

Thank you all so much for the info. Next question, where does Princess advertise these last day excursions, and how do you book them?
A peaceful quiet rainforest excursion sounds great to me for for last day, since no doubt Frank and I will be wiped and want to veg out in as much peace and quiet as we can.

Shirley

[larsen]

It should be on one of the many many pieces of paper Princess gives you once you board. But, feel free to stop at the tour desk anytime to inquire about them in case you don't get the sheet.

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[10X]

We once took a city tour of Old San Juan as a time killer. It was on a small bus and they loaded our lugagge on the bus and took it with us. The tour ended at the airport so everything worked out well.

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[GKR]

When we had a similar flight out of SJ last year, I asked the purser's desk for suggestions. They handed me a slip of paper with the name and address of Barrachina Village, as mentioned by a previous poster. We took a cab there and unloaded all our luggage. They put it in a back room storage area, where there was already a lot of baggage stored. They said "no charge", just present the claim slip when we wanted to pick it up. It worked out perfectly, we had the day to explore Old San Juan without lugging stuff around. And yes, because they were so "nice" to store our bags without charge, we did go back there for a very nice lunch. Then picked everything up later in the afternoon, and had no trouble finding a cab to the airport. I'd do it again in the same situation.

[PeabodyNVL]

You can't book the excursions until you get on the ship. The San Juan excursions are available on Wednesday. They will not give you the San Juan excursion forms until then.

Our flight was at 3:50pm. We arrived at the airport around 12:30pm. It took us a while to get through the Spirit Air check-in time. By the time we got to the gate, we had about 1 1/2 left to wait until boarding time.

Pea

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[Travel Angel]

Here is a link to a company that stores luggage VERY reasonably that we have suggested to clients who have been well pleased. I have used them one time and having a late flight worked out great since I found this company for storing luggage, transfers (yes they will do r/t at the beginning of your cruise too !), tours and then wisk you to the airport.

Personally I have found that late departures from San Juan are LESS HECTIC at the airport so this works great for us !\

http://www.audioguiapr.com/pageii/

Curtis...
Waiting patiently for MY ship to come in !!!