Due to travel on Sunday from Gatwick London to Rome. Flight is arranged by RCL and my original flight from Heathrow was cancelled when the airline went out of business in October, RCL have left it to the last minute to book new flights. Apparently they have reserved seats for us and we turn up to the check in desk with our passport and get our boarding cards. Although passengers that have booked direct with the airline will be able to reserve seats, food etc, we do not have this optoin. The only thing is, UK airports are experiencing massive delays due to a lack of staff. Personally I would rather have flown the day before to be on the safe side but when I asked if I could do that, they wanted £600 each per person! My itinerary says the flight leaves at 9.30am, however it has the same flight code as one leaving at 10am. When I have queried this, I am being told not to worry. I can only imagine that there has been a schedule change which is not reflected on the system yet.
What concerns me is the timings. Looking at departures today for example, not one flight over a span of 6 hours actually took off on time. The minimum delay was 30 mins and the maximum was abuot 2hrs 45mins. If my flight leaves at 9.30am, it will be 1pm before I arrive in Rome. By the time the baggage is off the plane and the passengers are on the transfer, I reckon it will be about 2pm before we are on the way. The transfer is 75 mins provided there is no traffic. The ship departs at 5pm. By my reckoning, this leaves a window of less than an hour. There are also delays getting through passport control and security. I flew at the beginning of May and nearly missed my flight even though I had fast track security passes and just hand luggage! Normally I would have boarding pass in hand and go straight to security without putting any luggage in the hold.
My question is, what will happen if the flight is delayed? We are sailing on the Odyssey of the Seas departing 5th June. The first port is Santorini and is a tender. Will RCL fly us to Santorini? I was thinking of booking my own flight out but the TA has told me this is a bad idea and the return flights will automatically cancel if we don't fly on the outgoing flight. The other issue is the covid test. I've booked it for Friday lunchtime which is two days before embarkation. Will they have facitiities to do another test at Santorini? That will be four days after my original covid test.