Another issue to consider when booking air through NCL is that you have no control over how long layovers are. I booked through NCL because of the “free at sea” package, and I thought it would be nice to have seamless air/transfers. I am one who doesn’t like tight connections, but the flights they booked us are ridiculous. As an example, our one-hour direct Alaska Air flight from Seattle to Portland leaves at 8:45 pm. The ship docks that day at 6:00 am. I imagine we will have to disembark no later than about 10:00 so that they can ready the ship for the next passengers. If you figure another two hours after that (1.5 hours getting people together for the transport, plus a 30 minutes’ drive to Seatac on a Sunday) that still leaves us with over eight hours at the airport waiting for our one-hour flight. Looking at Alaska Air’s current schedule, there is availability on six flights to Portland in the afternoon before the 8:45 departure, including one at 3:10 which would only cost $20 more than the flight they booked for us. It’s understandable that their primary consideration was price, but if we had booked it ourselves, we would have thought the $20 was well worth avoiding the extra hours at the airport.
