melaniew2000

We have a Dollar rental car reserved through MIA. They have a free shuttle that will pick us up at POM. We will then tour the Everglades for the day until our late afternoon flight. Then will drop our car at FLL & head home. Our res is about $55 for a larger car. Less expensive than a shuttle for 4 & we get a few hours of scenery (& maybe traffic!)

Thank you. I think a car for the two of us was about £30 / $45 - which as you said is cheaper than a transfer. I'm thinking it might be best to stick with the hire car when we dock at Miami, then we can go where we want for the day. We just need to leave enough time for the drive up the I95 to Fort Lauderdale. According to google maps its about 45mins drive at that time of the day, so thinking need to leave Miami area for 3pm at latest to get a 5.45pm domestic flight :-)

One quick point about the car rental option if you are from UK. Insurance is dealt with differently in the US, so book through a UK web site so that you are covered properly. For instance Dollar have got a very good .co.uk web site that we have used before. I am sure there are others on Google as well.

thanks for letting me know, just checked and I have booked the car through Dollar.co.uk website :-)

This is great information. I hadn't thought to rent a car after our cruise. For MIA do they recommend to be there 2 hours in advance? We have a 5pm flight

I would probably suggest 2 hours to give enough time to drop off the hire car and check in at the terminal :-)

There will be excursions available ON BOARD and you'll need to book a few days before your disembarkation day. I would highly recommend the Everglades and Gator Park excursion. You will board a bus with luggage and then be taken on the tour and your luggage stays on the bus and you'll be dropped off at the appropriate airport. They'll have a bus for FLL and one for MIA.

 

The excursion was so much fun, and I didn't have to worry about car rentals and/or transfers from the port to the airport.

That sort of trip sounds great, I would prefer a trip/coach transfer to hiring a car (we can both drive but hiring a car is our plan B) but for some reason on NCL website they say at the bottom 'not offered for Norwegian Sky Sailings'. I rang them to check and they just said I cant book it.

I don't really want to leave sorting out the transfer till we get on board as we wont have any internet access (we have UK mobiles) in USA unless we can find free wifi in a port to book a car last minute if we find out on board they cant do the transfer. It might be better to book a hire car anyway that we can cancel as would be quicker/cheaper to call on our phone to cancel the hire car if we find we can book the transfer when we get on board - thank I'll look into this :-)

We had a slightly longer wait for a flight back home last year and decided to rent a car for the day. The rental companies run free shuttles from POM to the airport rental centre and you can collect the car from there and keep your luggage with you before heading to FLL. Most companies don't charge extra if you drop the car off at another airport. The other option would be to drive up to Orlando. It only takes around 4-5 hours for that trip.

 

We did a bit of shopping near the airport and then headed out to the Everglades to take an airboat trip. I guess you could even fit that in if you wanted.

Thanks for your help - hiring a car is our 'Plan B' if we cant get a transfer - I suppose with that is the flexibility of being able to go and see what we want in Miami :-) We already have our flights booked from FLL-MCO but can drop the car off at FLL airport before our flight.

We took the transfer bus from the ship to the airport, checked our luggage and took the bus at the airport to Miami Beach for several hours. The bus driver told us where to catch the bus back to airport from Miami Beach and we made it safe and sound.

Google the Miami city tours and email them how to catch their "Hop-on hop-off" buses from the airport.

Have fun!

Good suggestion about leaving the luggage at the airport, but unfortunately we fly from FLL airport (as opposed to MIA) so we would still have to get from one airport to another. But will have a look for Miami City Tours to see what they offer :-)

I'm due to go on NCL Sky 18-22nd Jan 2016. When we dock back in Miami we would like to take the opportunity do do the hop-on hop-off bus tour to see a bit of the city before our flight from FLL to MCO at 5.45pm.

On NCL's website they offer this as an 'excursion' but when I called them to book it as couldn't see it online the lady told me i couldn't do it, no reason given.

We are pretty independent travellers & would still like to do something like this when we disembark the ship, however I cant seem to find online about where the luggage can be stored in the city of Miami & who operates the bus transfer up to FLL airport etc. All I can find is an expensive private car transfer to FLL Airport.

Has anyone done something similar after disembarking at Port of Miami?

Thanks in advance for your help.

Please don't be shy about asking crew or fellow guests to take your picture with you and your family, personally I've always been more than delighted to do this when asked.

I agree, just look for people with a decent sized camera around their neck & kindly ask them to take a photo for you. They usually (not always tho) know a bit about photography & will be able to take a decent photo for you with your camera and will probably take a couple too incase anyone blinks etc.

I work part time as a photographer & would have no problem if someone asked me to get a pic on their camera for them. Sometimes when I've been on holiday I've seen a family member taking a photo of the rest of their family and have offered to take a few photos with them all on so they have a photo of the whole family :-)