Checkin at port at 9:30 - will we be able to board right away?

[wahooker]

I'm on Sky for their Jan 21'st sailing. I was able to set our checkin for 9:30-10 AM, but my edocs boarding pass says - Boarding begins at 12:00 PM.

From what I understand, the ship will not have any departing passengers, because it is undergoing some maintenance immediately prior to this cruise.

Does anyone have experience with a situation like this? I'd like to get on board early, but If arriving early means just sitting in the terminal for 2 hours, I might change my checkin time.

[Meredithe]

We have been on an empty cruise like this and we boarded at 10.30am.

[graphicguy]

Check in times and boarding times are two different things!

 

Boarding times have a lot of variables.  I never recommend counting on boarding before 11:30 a.m.  Maybe board earlier.  But boarding 9:30-10:30 is probably unrealistic.  

 

You can get to the port later than your check-in time.   No issues!

 

[ChiefMateJRK]

17 minutes ago, wahooker said:

I'm on Sky for their Jan 21'st sailing. I was able to set our checkin for 9:30-10 AM, but my edocs boarding pass says - Boarding begins at 12:00 PM.

From what I understand, the ship will not have any departing passengers, because it is undergoing some maintenance immediately prior to this cruise.

Does anyone have experience with a situation like this? I'd like to get on board early, but If arriving early means just sitting in the terminal for 2 hours, I might change my checkin time.

Last April, I booked the first AK sailing of the Bliss.  The ship came in empty from Vancouver the night before.  I was sitting in the Local with my first beer at about 10:15.  FANTASTIC way to start a great B2B, with highlights like meeting my now good friends @graphicguyand Siglo!

 

Am I going to do this again?  Oh H$ll yessssss.

Edited January 2 by ChiefMateJRK

[graphicguy]

Just now, ChiefMateJRK said:

Last April, I booked the first AK sailing of the Bliss.  The ship came in empty from Vancouver the night before.  I was sitting in the Local with my first beer at about 10:15.  FANTASITIC way to start a great B2B, with highlights like meeting my now good friends @graphicguyand Siglo!

 

Am I going to do this again?  Oh H$ll yessssss.

Don’t tempt me.  

[ChiefMateJRK]

3 minutes ago, graphicguy said:

Don’t tempt me.  

 

 April 2, 2025.  Mark your calendar.  Meet me at the bar after lunch.  That's a 17 day B2B for the zellots.

[IAcruising]

2 hours ago, wahooker said:

 my edocs boarding pass says - Boarding begins at 12:00 PM.

 

I would assume this means what it says. Others obviously have a different experience. Go figure. It's NCL.

 

[njhorseman]

11 minutes ago, IAcruising said:

 

I would assume this means what it says. Others obviously have a different experience. Go figure. It's NCL.

 

 

This is just stock language spit out by the computer onto the cruise documents. There's no attempt to account for atypical circumstances. It's just an approximate time .

 

If a ship has not been carrying passengers to the port on embarkation day, then as others have noted boarding may begin significantly earlier. In fact even under typical circumstances boarding often starts before 12 noon.

[IAcruising]

2 minutes ago, njhorseman said:

In fact even under typical circumstances boarding often starts before 12 noon.

 

This is true. But I prefer to have lower expectations and be pleasantly surprised. It starts the cruise on a good note.

 

[MCMC100]

No one here would have anything more than a guess to offer up. If NCL says boarding begins at 12;00pm, assume they mean it.  
 

Each ship on every itinerary is different. There are too many random, ever changing, unique factors to consider on each cruise to ever answer a question like this accurately.  

 

Perhaps the ship is empty and they board you at 9am; perhaps the Captain decides to give the crew 3 hours of fire/lifeboat training; perhaps the ship has material and equipment from the referenced maintenance that must be off loaded; perhaps they give the crew a short break; perhaps the maintenance performed requires an inspection and you are delayed 5 hours before boarding……Any response here is, at best, a guess. Flip a coin….good luck. 

[Panhandle Couple]

1 hour ago, MCMC100 said:

No one here would have anything more than a guess to offer up. If NCL says boarding begins at 12;00pm, assume they mean it.  
 

Each ship on every itinerary is different. There are too many random, ever changing, unique factors to consider on each cruise to ever answer a question like this accurately.  

 

Perhaps the ship is empty and they board you at 9am; perhaps the Captain decides to give the crew 3 hours of fire/lifeboat training; perhaps the ship has material and equipment from the referenced maintenance that must be off loaded; perhaps they give the crew a short break; perhaps the maintenance performed requires an inspection and you are delayed 5 hours before boarding……Any response here is, at best, a guess. Flip a coin….good luck. 

Perhaps they are doing a large crew switch over coming out of maintenance.  I would expect a skeleton crew for maintenance location to first sailing home port.  Getting the new crew in place (including waiters, bar tenders and room stewards) is probably important before letting customers on board.

 

[IAcruising]

48 minutes ago, Panhandle Couple said:

Perhaps they are doing a large crew switch

 

We're on the Encore repo in April. LA is a big stop. 16-hours if I recall. I wonder how many Caribbean crew will be switched out for Alaskan crew? Entertainment groups? Who knows. It will be interesting to watch.

 

[Panhandle Couple]

10 minutes ago, IAcruising said:

 

We're on the Encore repo in April. LA is a big stop. 16-hours if I recall. I wonder how many Caribbean crew will be switched out for Alaskan crew? Entertainment groups? Who knows. It will be interesting to watch.

 

They go by contract length vs cruise locations, but may have staged the contracts so LA is a larger change over than normal, which is 80 people per week for BA/BA+.  LA makes sense for many of the crew to fly to-from home countries, which are largely in Asia. 

 

16 hours could allow for swap out of things like mattresses, etc that they can't do on a 6 hour turn around. 

[mugtech]

When we got on Sky on September 1, 2023 for our cruise to Quebec out of Baltimore, the boarding was as soon as you checked in.  The Sky had sailed deadhead from Miami to set up this cruise.  In addition the cabins were available immediately, got to drop off our carryons and got our seapasses at 11 AM.  Our check in time was listed as noon, but with only 1,600 on the cruise it was the easiest embarkation I ever experienced  Good idea to check your ship's previous cruise.

[mugtech]

7 hours ago, wahooker said:

Does anyone have experience with a situation like this? I'd like to get on board early, but If arriving early means just sitting in the terminal for 2 hours, I might change my checkin time.

Get there early, bring a good book.

[wahooker]

11 hours ago, Panhandle Couple said:

Perhaps they are doing a large crew switch over coming out of maintenance.  I would expect a skeleton crew for maintenance location to first sailing home port.  Getting the new crew in place (including waiters, bar tenders and room stewards) is probably important before letting customers on board.

 

If I can work a self checkout at walmart, pretty sure I can pour my own drinks for an afternoon if the bartenders need some time off. Just give me keys to the liquor cabinet, and we are all good. 🙂

[schmoopie17]

44 minutes ago, wahooker said:

If I can work a self checkout at walmart, pretty sure I can pour my own drinks for an afternoon if the bartenders need some time off. Just give me keys to the liquor cabinet, and we are all good. 🙂

I have a Kegerator. I obviously know how to pour a beer. Let me at it...

[Topdog52]

21 hours ago, schmoopie17 said:

I have a Kegerator. I obviously know how to pour a beer. Let me at it...

Just take a flask of Crown Royal Apple with you, until the Bartenders arrive.

[graphicguy]

I think the general rule of thumb is expect boarding to start at whatever time is stated on your boarding pass.  Might be earlier, as has happened, but I wouldn't plan on it.

 

If you don't want to wait around in the terminal, I think it's safe to say to get there around 12:30-ish.  The mad rush to get on board will be over and you'll likely board quickly.

 

If you want to wait with the mass of humanity, get there at 9:30 a.m. get pushed, shoved, wait for your number to be called, and then board.

 

Boarding happens in this order....

-Mobility impaired guests (wheelchair and walkers)

-Haven Guests

-Ambassador and Diamond Latitudes

-Sapphire and Platinum Latitudes

-Bronze and up Latitudes

-General boarding by assigned group number

 

None of the checkin time assignments matter when boarding.

Edited January 3 by graphicguy