Why arriving the day before cruise is not a good idea

[ComputerTravelGuy]

Too stressful! Once we arrived 50-minutes after embarkation (lightning delays in Orlando while headed to London Heathrow) but luckily we arranged an airport to cruise shuttle with NCL and they checked our paperwork on the bus. We flashed passports and rolled our bags across the gangway (and it was promptly removed and the ship pulled away 4-minutes later). Fastest check-in in cruise history but never again! At least two-days in advance for overseas cruises.

[more cruises]

JFK is closed so must be all other NY airports. Does trip insurance cover this?

 

You'd have to read the fine print on the policy. Many don't cover weather delays.

[Macadian]

We also drive down to Syracuse the day before the cruise for our flight to FL. That has stood us in good stead in the past. We can but hope. If all else fails our all inclusive cancellation insurance covering us from the moment we set out for the Syracuse airport from Ontario. We may miss out in the event of really bad weather prior to departure preventing us getting out in time to pick up the cruise at Fort Lauderdale next day but at least we will be reimbursed and can plan another cruise instead. It is what it is. We pays our money and takes our chances.:cool: Think positive!:D

Edited January 4, 2014 by Macadian

[romrai]

we were scheduled to fly out of boston for ny on october 29 a couple years back. drove to boston, parked the car. went to salem for halloween celebrations....laughed at sign that said winter storm warning....in october, come on??? must be joke. well, nor'easter hit..... our flight the next day (day before cruise) was cancelled, airline rebooked for 2 days after cruise left, rebooked for next day, flight cancelled. trains cancelled, highways closed etc etc. ended up having to stay extra day in boston, lost booking for ny, had to fly to bermuda to catch ship, 3 days booked hotel in bermuda. when all said and done, $1500. extra later we finally caught our ship, only to get one case of food poisioning, and one case of seasickness. could of spent a couple days in ny for less. another trip out of ny. we arrived 4 days early, snow storm hit, we managed to get our flight to greece, but others missed the first 2 days of our holiday (3 days in athens + cruise) so....the long and short of the story is don't wait until last day, but give yourself a couple extra for unknown events. start your holidays a couple days early and not have concerns....

[Cloudyrain]

It's personal choice really - i would much rather pay for decent insurance and plan travel early on the day (or day before if we were long haul) and if flights get cancelled/delayed just get my money back: no stress, nor worry, and using less days holiday from work and less money for pre-cruise accommodation. We do always pay a premium for good insurance, check the small print, and get them to confirm they would pay out in all circumstances. However, my health isn't great at times and it's better for us to be sure we could cancel with little/no loss of money: better to prepare than stress out!

 

I completely understand that people might want to travel a few days before, but that's only ok if people have the time and money to be able to.

 

I feel very sorry for people affected by the snow in America at the moment, but hopefully everyone affected has good insurance.

[dlynn0366]

Friends of ours were scheduled to fly out of Syracuse to Fort Lauderdale friday for our cruise this Saturday out of Miami on the epic. Major snowstorm happening so their flight was cancelled this morning. We are already in Florida as we drove here. You can imagine their panicked call to us this morning trying to figure out how they were going to get here. We live in Ontario Canada.

They ended up getting a flight out of buffalo for tomorrow night into Fort Lauderdale. We are keeping our fingers crossed that everything goes smoothly and i have promised them a big drink when they get here!

I always read on here to never fly in on the same day as the cruise, well I personally believe, especially in the winter to arrive a couple of days in advance.

 

I just went searching out of curiosity and Mr and Mrs C posted on her roll call that her friends made it to Miami in time for their cruise :)

[dinkydee718]

Glad their friends made it!

 

Last December (2012), my sister-in-law got married in Illinois. We were flying in from NJ Thurs. and the wedding was Saturday. They canceled the flight because of a snow storm there and the first flight they could get me on was on Sunday! We ended up having to drive to Illinois (in snow) to get to the wedding! I am already stressed for my February cruise out of Fla. We are flying in on Thursday (and spending two nights at the Portofino Bay at Universal). I swear I'd move our flight to Tuesday if it weren't for the fact that I don't want my kids missing too much school!

 

I love getting out of the cold in the winter, but it is so much less stressful to travel in the spring!

[bigfoot88]

Booking a hotel for the night prior to the cruise is adequate a majority of the time even in the winter. To always book more days in advance may start your vacation sooner, but some folks don't have time for that.

 

I always have something come up when I take flights, like airline union strikes and the like. Hurricanes or other natural things. It seems nothing can ever be worry free.

 

I do like cruising out of Boston and even NY/NJ. Boston one hour away and NYC six hours away. Realatively a short ride that could be made early AM if required.

 

We have always gone in the night before; Europe & out of Miami; on the ones out of NYC we always drive to the Meadowlands area the night before.

 

Regarding insurance, I think that it is only covered if you book the airfare via NCL.

[garycarla]

..Regarding insurance, I think that it is only covered if you book the airfare via NCL.

 

 

Yes

and

No

and

Maybe.

 

If you get the insurance via NCL and the air somewhere else, you are out of luck. If you get the insurance from a 3rd party and you include the air in the policy, then you are covered. Same with hotel, etc. etc.

 

And then, as mentioned, if your policy covers weather. And, if you have to get another flight, if your policy covers that.

 

There are so many policy options, carriers and situations. So, do not go by what "Uncle Buck" told you.

 

And, bottom line - the best insurance in the world is not going to get that first day on the ship back. None.

[che5904]

I just went searching out of curiosity and Mr and Mrs C posted on her roll call that her friends made it to Miami in time for their cruise :)

 

Woohoo, very happy they made it. I bet that was a stressful time, they'll certainly need the DOD once onboard :)

[don't-use-real-name]

If your cruise is tomorrow it may be too late to read all the FINE PRINT stuff.

So for you folks with cruises tomorrow just beg for the best deal you can get

and be prepared to pay some bucks to find alternate ways to make port call.

For the unfortunate folks in the NE travel is still prime after the holidays.

So thinking of Amtrak as an alternative may work but realize that the train

does not move at the speed of the airplane to get you to a point that affords

recovery of your vacation plans. Beware of flying into another area that is

having weather problems i.e

Cruise begins in MIAMI Air from NYC to MIA weather cancelled alternate

routing air NYC Chicago then to MIA (cavet Chicago also having weather)

so a no go that direction - consider something like Dallas but don't waste

your time going to the west coast and back - time is of essence

 

There is a lesson to be learned here - PLAN - PLAN SOME MORE - AND THEN

GO BACK AND PLAN EVEN MORE. Make sure yours plans include weather

and all of its ancillary effects. Yes it is hard to predict how bad it will be and

to what extent that you need to work around it. Better to lose two-three days

of precruise hotel shore excursions than the cruise itself "But damn get me to

the church on time!" Winter time cruises where the cruiser begins travel in a

weather affected area are a real problem. It maybe hard to keep a vacation

within budget but spending an extra day or two to get to the point of port call

maybe just the ticket needed to succeed. A simple two to three day cruise

to nowhere maybe not be of such salvageable interest but when you are taking

a 6 or more day cruise now some tangible interest is here is of high priority.

One certainly does not want the trip of a lifetime (decade or whatever) to be

messed up for lack of few dollars and advanced planning.

 

Yeah someone told you so but be aware of what you are getting into and what

you can escape from it would not be nice to see your ship sail away without

you and not have a ghost of a chance of receiving credit for the voyage missed!

[skyfire53]

my dd and I sailed on the Epic Dec 7. Leaving warm Dallas going to MIA....not a problem right? Well, I dont know if you heard about the 6" of ice we got starting the night of the 5th, but it made travel impossible..:eek:..we had booked to fly out in the morning of the 6th leaving lots of time to get there...well, needless to say, they canceled our flight and we had to brave the ice and drive to Austin and fly out the next morning with a couple of the last seats aval. I was so stressed out it was awful. We could only find a flight into FFL that didnt get in until almost 2 oclock...the ship leaves at 4 and we had no reservation for a shuttle....as we raced through the airport to pick up our checked bag, yes, we had a checked bag as well.... we saw that there was someone still in the NCL booth and there was one more shuttle to the port....as soon as we got signed up, I sat down in the chair to wait and collapsed knowing that if we were on an NCL shuttle, they wouldnt leave without us....lol...we got on board just in time for the muster drill....I never want to cut it that close again!!!!

Edited January 5, 2014 by skyfire53

[Mr and Mrs C]

Yes they did make it late Friday night. We were more then happy to pick them up at the airport!

When we got off in st. Martin, there was a line up of people with their suitcases waiting to get on. We felt so sorry for those people.

[BlueJai]

We were on this Epic trip and were told that there were 200 people that missed the ship. 17 of those were able to board in St. Maarten!

 

We would have been two of those but lucked out. Original flights had us traveling from Toronto to JFK to Miami on Friday morning (a day early). The airline called my cell a couple of days prior to leaving and offered us direct flights for and additional 75.00pp. At this point we hadn't heard about the storm. Of course we grabbed the direct flights with a huge sigh of relief!

 

Got a text on our travel day letting us know that the original flight to NY was cancelled. I really don't know what we would have done and am so happy we didn't have to find out. On the way home we weren't so lucky, our flight from Miami to NY was ok but our flight out of NY Saturday afternoon was cancelled.

[SteveH2508]

A 2 day window saved our Spirit cruise out of Malaga this Christmas. We were due to fly out early Christmas Eve from Gatwick to Malaga to pick up the ship on Boxing Day. UK was suffering from high winds and heavy rain.

 

We caught the Gatwick Express at 03.30am to get a flight at 07.40am. About 04.00 outside Croydon - 'thumpety-thumpety-crunch-crunch' (not a good sound from a train!:eek:) - dead stop - no lights for a minute. We had hit a landslide and trees!

 

It took 5 hours to get a rescue train out and get us to Gatwick. Meanwhile, unbeknown to us, Gatwick North Terminal (where BA flies from) had had a power cut due to flooding!

 

Apparently there were 20,000 people milling around not having a clue what to do, where to go, what flights (if any) were going. All in all, a complete clusterf***.

 

All credit to BA, they got us on a flight on Boxing Day morning, having put us up for two nights at the Premier Inn Gatwick for Christmas (not Malaga but hey ho - any port in a storm!:D)

 

Moral - leave plenty of time pre-cruise and fly with a decent airline - I feel for the RyanAir /EasyJet pax - who knows what happened to them?

[mrs.cool]

I shouldn't have read this!! Now I'm nervous! We sail the Dawn January 26, and fly into Tampa from Milwaukee via Atlanta on Saturday the 25th. Our weather right NOW is actually nice, but we had ice last Friday and travel was impossible.

[kenlyn]

Mrs. Cool we are on same cruise! Don't sweat the weather! Forecast right now shows good weather for Saturday travel! No storms are brewing! We will also be flying that day out of Detroit and can't wait to get on our way!

[mrs.cool]

I hope you're right! We know how hard it is for the weather people to get it right even 3 days out. Looking forward to meeting you and everyone at the meet and greet!

 

Sent from my XT901 using Tapatalk

[kenlyn]

This will be our second time on the Dawn and she is worth all the worry and nervous anticipation! Can't wait to meet everyone ,it sounds like a great group!

[CactusFlower527]

We do as well, but only because we want to start vacation sooner :D

 

same here... + we figure the 2 days pre-cruise will give us time to get adjusted to the modest time different, unwind (?) a little and get organized before we board the ship. We also want time to shop in Honolulu ... cases of bottled water and incidentals (among other things) to take on the ship. Do a little sight seeing on Oahu .. because I think we'll be TOO TIRED after the cruise to do anything but sit on the plane and sleep on our 6.5 hour flight home.

Edited January 14, 2014 by CactusFlower527

[Tiggertastic]

We now fly put 2 days before the cruise during winter but still fly same day in the summer

 

It's a risk we take

 

We reduce the risk by booking same day with the cruise lie so it's their problem to get me to the ship

[Judee]

For one holiday cruise we left home (Ontario Canada) on a Thursday for a drive to New York City to meet a 7 day cruise leaving on a Sunday. In New Jersey, not far from the state line, we were rear-ended by a pickup truck (his fault - he was staring out his side window and didn't see that traffic was stopped ahead). Our car was a write-off, was towed to a yard and we cabbed it to the NYC. Went and had dinner (with wine of course) and toast each other that we both were alive and not hurt and that we will have a great time on the cruise and NOT think about a stinkin' car. And we did just that! Upon our return we took the train home from Penn. It was the first time I felt we also lucked out with extra time to de-stress and meet the ship on time.