Carnival Radiance 14nt Hawaii Apr '26

[tauep24]

Good evening.  I am looking for information on this cruise.  Has anyone done this?  I am doing this cruise as a surprise for my wife.  It will be our 25yr wedding anniversary.  Do people fly into LAX or Long Beach.  I would be coming from the East Coast?

[CreamsicleCatMom]

Are you leave from the Port of Long Beach? If yes then Long Beach or John Wayne are good to fly into. I like to avoid LAX myself as it’s crazy. I like John Wayne as it’s smaller as easier to use. 
 

The Radiance is current in Long Beach port but just make sure it’s not leaving out of LA. 

[staceyglow]

7 minutes ago, CreamsicleCatMom said:

Are you leave from the Port of Long Beach? If yes then Long Beach or John Wayne are good to fly into. I like to avoid LAX myself as it’s crazy. I like John Wayne as it’s smaller as easier to use. 
 

The Radiance is current in Long Beach port but just make sure it’s not leaving out of LA. 

Carnival does not have a terminal in LA.

[n6uqqq]

Long Beach is close, and it is a nice small airport compared to LAX. Southwest pretty much owns the place so if you fly with them there are reasonable prices to be had. 

[CreamsicleCatMom]

1 hour ago, staceyglow said:

Carnival does not have a terminal in LA.

Don’t they still leave from San Pedro? 

[staceyglow]

1 minute ago, CreamsicleCatMom said:

Don’t they still leave from San Pedro? 

No.  Princess does, but not Carnival.

[kwokpot]

2 hours ago, n6uqqq said:

Long Beach is close, and it is a nice small airport compared to LAX. Southwest pretty much owns the place so if you fly with them there are reasonable prices to be had. 

While Long Beach will obviously be closer than LAX, there's several factors to consider. You can't fly nonstop from East Coast to Long Beach and flights are limited to Long Beach, so there's alot more to consider than just automatically saying Long Beach is where you fly to.

[n6uqqq]

Just now, kwokpot said:

While Long Beach will obviously be closer than LAX, there's several factors to consider. You can't fly nonstop from East Coast to Long Beach and flights are limited to Long Beach, so there's alot more to consider than just automatically saying Long Beach is where you fly to.

You are correct. I can't seem to fly anywhere direct with Southwest! I didn't claim it would be best for everyone. It is a niche airport that is often overlooked though and can work good for those who use Southwest or maybe Delta also. 

[kwokpot]

11 minutes ago, n6uqqq said:

You are correct. I can't seem to fly anywhere direct with Southwest! I didn't claim it would be best for everyone. It is a niche airport that is often overlooked though and can work good for those who use Southwest or maybe Delta also. 

We're doing the Panorama in April and we decided to fly from NYC to LAX nonstop on American. I was able to get a great fare using points on Alaska Air so it's costing only 12,500 pts/pp/ow. Unfortunately the weekend of our cruise is a big event in Long Beach, the Grand Prix, so hotels have been blocked off. I literally have been booking and cancelling 2 nights precruise hotels multiple times as hotel rates and availability changes. I was finally able to book the Residence Inn right near the Carnival terminal the other day. Previously it had been blocked off for the Grand Prix weekend. And I was able to use points too( the cash price is ridiculous at over $460/nt!!!!) The closest hotel to the Carnival pier, besides the Queen Mary, is the Doubletree and for our dates it is still showing sold out. 

Edited February 17 by kwokpot

[MEUB1112]

If possible,  fly into Long Beach,  short ride to the port. Easy in and out. 

[stobe1]

Yes people have done this cruise.

 

Yes people fly into both LAX and Long Beach.

[EllieinNJ]

We are on a side to side cruise doing the Radiance/Panorama in April and there were no direct flights to Long Beach from the NY/NJ area.  So flying into LAX and staying in El Segundo two nights, touring LA then taking an Uber/Lyft to port.  Staying at Queen Mary between ships.

[thenexus2k]

As someone else mentioned, flying into SNA is a pretty good alternative and is a short ride to long beach. 

[tauep24]

I've noticed by my research that if i wanted to make it home the same day, I would have to fly into LAX and espically on Jetblue.

[HangryGrl]

We did the 15 night Hawaii on the Miracle this past October.  Flew into Long Beach from Denver (Southwest) and stayed at the Renaissance in downtown Long Beach.  Long Beach airport is super small (8 gates I think?) and it was really crowded the day we flew home.  Possibly from a bunch of other cruisers also trying to get home.  No where to sit at the gate so we ended up sitting in the open-air breezeway between the 2 "concourses".  Our flight didn't leave until 4pm so we hung out at the Long Beach Exchange for quite a while.

 

Long Beach Exchange (thelongbeachexchange.com)

[Saint Greg]

I fly direct to LAX and take a Uber/Lyft from LAX-IT.  For me the flight options and prices are better and I actually have had good experiences at LAX.

 

https://www.saintgregtravel.com/lax-it/

 

 

 

Edited February 20 by Saint Greg

[Saint Greg]

On 2/17/2024 at 11:53 AM, staceyglow said:

Carnival does not have a terminal in LA.

They don’t but they call it Los Angeles 

 

 

[staceyglow]

2 hours ago, Saint Greg said:

They don’t but they call it Los Angeles 

 

 

Got it, but I was replying to the specific comment to make sure that the Radiance was sailing out of Long Beach and not LA.  The poster was the one making the distinction between the two.

[fuzzmane]

When we did a 15 night RT to Hawaii, we flew from SC to LAX.  Took Super Shuttle to the Hotel Maya in Long Beach. (Now a Hilton property).  No problem with the Shuttle service or hotel.