Anyone flown into San Juan the day of the cruise?

I'm considering doing this, since the hotels in San Juan are pretty pricey. The cruise is Feb 2-9. I live in Atlanta, so it SHOULDN'T be bad weather (average temp around the beginning of February is usually 50ish), but I'm just afraid of being delayed. Even then, I don't have to be on ship until 8:30 that evening.

I did think about doing this for ours, but coming from LA, too little time.

But you from Atlanta.... if you get a flight early enough, you may be OK.

And then, San Juan is beautiful, it is nice to spend some extra time there.

Go in early, find a hotel deal in OSJ and enjoy!

My $.02

B

We've done it before... from Minnesota... in January. We're doing it again in March. :)

I live in ATL. Although I personally feel that flying on the same day is an ill advised idea, (specially just to save $200 for a hotel), a morning NONSTOP flight on DELTA would be my plan of action if I decided to fly on the same day.

Keep in mind that Southwest/Air Tran doesn't have ANY interline agreements with other airlines and only a handful of flights into SJU. If your flight is cancelled or delayed and no other flights are available on them, you'll be stuck, which us why I'm recommending a Delta nonstop.

We did it from Minneapolis in February and made a connection in Atlanta with no problems. This was many years ago in our early 20s and we had no clue about the thought of delays or cancelations but all worked out!

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We did it, from Baltimore in January. Non-stop morning flight, and we were on the ship at 2:30 on the afternoon. :cool:

We went down the same day in the Spring from DC area, knowing there were lots of options if there were any flight issues. We are going down the day before from Maine in January... You should be fine from Atlanta. I would do early am, know all the possible alternatives and have the airline phone numbers built into your cell phones.

We are doing it in May.

Did on my very first cruise back in 92 :)

San Juan, with its late departures, is the one place where I wouldn't be quite as nervous about flying in on the same day. I'd book as early a flight as possible, to leave a little time for booking a later flight if something went wrong. I'd also make sure I had trip insurance.

Did it from Vegas back in 2011. We had no problem getting in the day of the cruise.

Did it once flying in April from Newark Liberty, Will never do it again. Airline overbooked the flight and thank goodness we arrived and checked in early. They kept asking for volunteers, finally they started calling names and I'm guessing those people didn't make the flight. Now we never fly in the same day, way to stressful for me.

We just did it in Sept, flying from Indy, changing planes at Dulles. It was not my preference, but we had no choice, due to DH's work schedule. I think we were on the ship by about 2pm and that was with a delay leaving Dulles.

I will say we were completely exhausted the next day! We met up with a large group of friends once on board, so there were no naps or early-to-bed the first night. After 2 Painkillers at Magen's Bay that next day, all the exhaustion caught up with DH and they hit him like a ton of bricks! He went to sleep once we were back on board (about 3pm) and didn't get up until the next morning!

So plan your day in St Thomas accordingly if you fly in same day. :-).

Always. More than 5 times. Never had an issue.

Not a money saving thing for me at all either. People have crazy work schedules.

We flew in the day of the cruise. We flew from Omaha to Miami, then to San Juan. Schedule was to arrive in San Juan at 2pm with the ship sailing at 10pm.

Got to Miami no problem, boarded the flight to San Juan and the pilot announced a problem with the plane. We finally arrived in San Juan at 9:40pm. Carnival held the ship as several guests were on the same flight.

We no longer fly in the day of the sailing.

Im from Puerto Rico, Rio Piedras. You can come early and spend some time by the port area where you can see the door to San Juan, our Capitol is like the "White House" and el morro. Plus theres too many stores and restaurants around. Walking distance. Just make sure not to loose nothing on the airport or port the lost and found its the worst they never find nothing and then you find out a employee took it. :rolleyes:

NO WAY!

Don't do it...

San Juan is far to nice and being there a day early is a lot of fun.

Go on price line and pick up a four star hotel for around $100

Who wants to start the vacation worrying about..."what if"

We flew from SFO to San Diego one time same day, flights were delayed, nearly missed the cruise...NEVER AGAIN.

Yes, but from the West Coast... Took a "red eye" and arrived in the morning. However, I wouldn't do it again because I walked on the ship "bone tired".

I'm considering doing this, since the hotels in San Juan are pretty pricey. The cruise is Feb 2-9. I live in Atlanta, so it SHOULDN'T be bad weather (average temp around the beginning of February is usually 50ish), but I'm just afraid of being delayed. Even then, I don't have to be on ship until 8:30 that evening.

Please don't underestimate Mother Nature in Atlanta, thinking there won't be bad weather just because it's a certain time of year. I'm not sure how long you've lived in ATL, but 3 years ago around that time, there was an ice storm that shut the airport down for 2 days. This year in early March, there was the hail storm the shut down the airport for hours and canceled many flights. Working in the airline industry in Atlanta, I can tell you that this really is the world's busiest airport and a little bit of weather can cause a whole lot of headache. If you're able to fly down the day before, I'd recommend doing so. You can find reasonable hotels in San Juan if you do a little research. I stayed at Da House before my cruise for $80 a night. Enjoy an extra day in San Juan without having the stress of same day travel. :)

I advise not doing this.

So many things can go wrong some related to weather but others related to so many other factors including planes being grounded.

And it does not matter if others have done this without a problem if you are on the flight where there is a problem. Things can go wrong.

Keith

Several years ago when we cruised out of PR, we were flying from Houston on a non stop flight in May. Thought it would be OK because of NS flight and before hurricane season, but Mother Nature had different plans for the area. We did land OK and went right to the ship before noon and not sailing until 8:00 PM. However, we were the last plane to land that day. A volcano on one the islands (Montserrat) had a big eruption and all flights into that area were cancelled for the day. We were told that we would sailing at Midnight hoping more people would be able to board, but they were not. All flights in the air were turned around to Miami and no others took off. Over 400 people joined the ship in Aruba. Last time we ever flew in on the day of the cruise!

I would only do this if I had insurance and had a flight that originated in Atlanta, and came in the night before. Just because the weather in Atlanta is okay, if you're joining a flight that's coming from a northern state there is good potential for that flight to be delayed or cancelled.

We flew to San Juan the day of the cruise on our very first cruise in 2002. It was also the first time my DH and I had been out of country and it was for our Honeymoon. :) Had a connection in Memphis and the plane broke down. It was a nerve racking four hour delay. Was to arrive at the port about noon, but arrived around 5:00 that night. The ship did not leave port until 10:00 that night, thank goodness.

Of course Murphy is a close friend to our family (he thinks he is anyway) and we always have some type of hiccup along the way. Because of this we always try to arrive one day early, even when we drive.

I'm considering doing this, since the hotels in San Juan are pretty pricey. The cruise is Feb 2-9. I live in Atlanta, so it SHOULDN'T be bad weather (average temp around the beginning of February is usually 50ish), but I'm just afraid of being delayed. Even then, I don't have to be on ship until 8:30 that evening.

The ONLY time we have ever flown in the day of a cruise was to San Juan (because we bought the airfare from Carnival as well) with Northwest.

This was in over 10 years ago and we said right then and there, we would never do it again.

We were scheduled to fly out of New Orleans, connect in Memphis and fly to San Juan.

An Airbus FULL of cruisers went out for maintenance in Memphis.....

Luckily we had gotten to the New Orleans airport at 5AM and were the second people in line. The first couple were also on our ill fated flight.

Jean (with Northwest) managed to get us on American from New Orleans to Dallas to San Juan (FIRST CLASS).... but we were the lucky ones.

Lots of folks missed this cruise.

Now that was over 10 years ago....

today there are far LESS seats to cover for weather, maintenance issues, security alerts....or the other dozens of things that could disrupt a flight.

All I can say is have GOOD travel insurance and be prepared mentality to catch up with the ship at a later port...just in case...

Yep...we've done it from Ohio with a plane change in Atlanta..albeit this was in October ( tail end of Hurricane season) I would do this again in a heartbeat given the late boarding time on the ship Actually this was one of the less stressful "same day fly/sail" that we have ever done..Had a couple of hairy ones in the 48 contiguous states :D Have fun and enjoy your cruise..