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New to Oceania - Flight Time Question


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If our cruise, on the Riviera, ends in Barcelona and the flight we are thinking of taking, departs BCN at 11:10am does that leave us enough time to get to the airport and go through security? We would be taking a taxi from the cruise ship dock. Is that enough time or do you think we should take a later flight?

Thanks.

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If you are a little nervous then I would take a later flight. We had an 11:20 flight from Barcelona a month ago and had plenty of time. We were nervous the whole time and wondered about taking a later flight but we gambled. Getting off the ship was fairly easy as well as the picking up our luggage. We got to the airport before 9 am (we did get off the ship 10 minutes before the actual time that we were supposed to). We even had time to get a quick bite to eat. It has a lot to do how well disembarkation goes I think. You did not say what month you were leaving Barcelona. There will be more tourists leaving BCN from when we were there.

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Is the flight you're getting on at BCN going over the Atlantic Ocean or is it going somewhere else in Europe first, such as CDG, AMS, LHR (maybe no longer in June 2019?), FRA?

 

If it is a flight getting you to a connecting flight in EU, then it's a domestic flight and you have more time to check in before the gate closes.

 

The cab ride from the Barcelona cruise port to BCN is about a half hour in good traffic.

 

If you're connecting in Europe, you are at the edge of the comfort zone - assuming you're mobile - but you are going to need to take a private transfer and will have an early morning and a quick breakfast.

 

If it's going over the Atlantic, I'd take another flight.

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Thanks. We would be leaving in early June (of next year). Just started planning everything. I am a little nervous about taking the earlier flight.

 

I think that maybe a later flight would be best. I was talking to the wife and I forgot that we spoke with a couple who were randomly pulled going through the check point and was there for 15 minutes waiting for an officer to look through their carry-on. Murphy's Law comes to mind. Whatever can go wrong will go wrong. Plus you are leaving in June when school is out. Could you make it? Probably but what if you can't?

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We are just off Regatta, arriving 7 hours late in San Francisco, and O was very busy making flight changes. Glad we had taken O air this time. The concierge was also very busy taking care of Independent travelers, who may have had to change their reservations twice. As to timing getting off the ship, I noticed that anyone taking an O transfer and booking it on the ship had to have a flight later than 1PM, or it couldn't be booked. Hope that helps, even though it's not Barcelona. You Just never know.

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When we disembarked in BCN two years ago (Oct/Nov) we opted the 8am off the ship, stood in a cab line for an hour and fifteen minutes. Had we booked the earlier flight we would have missed it

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Tell the cruise line you have an early flight. They will accomodate you and get you off as soon as ship is cleared. Arrange for a private driver, you can find them here or on Tripadvisor. Its worth paying the extra, only about $40 more than a taxi abd you'll have a driver waiting with a car holding up a sign with your name. The airport is not that far, about 18Km or so- you should have plenty of time. I've boarded and dismbarked many times in BCN, it's a great port right in the heart of the city but also by a main street leading to highway, leading to airport. You'll be at the airport in less than 40 min..

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We are taking the O'Life Air and Oceania has us taking an 11:35am flight out of Amsterdam. After seeing that we decided to pay for transfers. This is our first time with their air, and we have always used a taxi in the past. After seeing the air flights, I will let them be responsible for getting us to airport and home.

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We are taking the O'Life Air and Oceania has us taking an 11:35am flight out of Amsterdam. After seeing that we decided to pay for transfers. This is our first time with their air, and we have always used a taxi in the past. After seeing the air flights, I will let them be responsible for getting us to airport and home.

 

Problem with cruise line transfer is that you may sit for a while in the bus at the pier waiting for airport bus to fill, thus reducing your chances of making the flight. Perhaps technically you may have a better chance of blaming Oceania if you miss the flight, but if timing is tight it is very frustrating to wait for a bus to get going as compared to a taxi or privately arranged car service.

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  • 2 weeks later...
I think that maybe a later flight would be best. I was talking to the wife and I forgot that we spoke with a couple who were randomly pulled going through the check point and was there for 15 minutes waiting for an officer to look through their carry-on. Murphy's Law comes to mind. Whatever can go wrong will go wrong. Plus you are leaving in June when school is out. Could you make it? Probably but what if you can't?

 

Just a correction in the interests of accuracy <g>: Murphy's law says that if there are two ways of doing something, you will pick the wrong way. Sod's law is the one you want!:halo:clear.png?emoji-halo-1683 (or not...)

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If you haven't booked your flights yet, we are doing an Oceania cruise that ends in Barcelona and plan to stay a couple of extra days to see Barcelona. I found this company : https://barcelonadaytours.com through TripAdvisor that will take us from the cruise port, do a full day sightseeing tour of Barcelona & Montserrat & then drop us off at the hotel. They will also do transfers between the port & airport, etc. We haven't been to Barcelona before so we decided to stay a couple of days to see the sights. Hope this helps! Sue

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Thank you. Hadn't thought about getting a private driver. We might stay an extra day in Barcelona to do a little more sightseeing. Lots of decisions to make!

 

I always advocate staying at least an extra day or two, even more so when the debarkation port is Barcelona. There is so much to do there, especially if this is your first visit. (I don't know that it is!)

 

We also tend to play it safe with departure times. We had an early flight home from Venice two weeks ago, so we left the ship at 7:15am. Had a private driver who got us to the airport in plenty of time for a 10:55am flight. Fortunately there wasn't much traffic at that hour.

 

Regarding Travelglobetrotter's comment about last minute air reservation changes, that happened to some of our fellow passengers when we left Rio in November 2013. The concierge was working hard rebooking AA passengers headed for connections at Dallas Fort Worth. (We were on AA but heading for NYC which wasn't affected by the flight changes). They helped out independent travelers as well as the people using O's air.

 

Mura

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