Do we have enough time?

[photogineer]

So, I just booked my first cruise, Carnival Ecstasy in March, the basic 5 day/4 night Bahamas jaunt, with my friends. We also booked our plane tickets, but thinking about it, I'm starting to wonder if we'll have enough time to get on the boat.

 

So, my understanding is that the boat leaves at 4pm, so when I looked for flights, I looked for flights that would get us to the port with time to spare, for 4pm. Now I'm reading that the absolutely latest you can get to the boat is 90 minutes prior to departure, which would be 2:30pm.

 

Our flight lands at MCO at 12:40pm, how long can we expect it to take to get checked bags and get to our towncar? I understand it's about an hour drive, so we would need to get out of the airport pretty quickly. Are we going to be able to do this or are we in trouble?

 

Thanks,

Matt

[Starry Eyes]

Most people here will advise you to fly in a day early. missing a ship due to a flight delay would be heartbreaking. And since you have left so little time, travel insurance may not cover such a short missed connection:(.

 

Can you cancel that flight and fly in a day early? Or at least get an earlier flight? Isn't there a new rule that you can get out of an airline ticket within 24 hours...are you within that?

[photogineer]

Most people here will advise you to fly in a day early. missing a ship due to a flight delay would be heartbreaking. And since you have left so little time, travel insurance may not cover such a short missed connection:(.

 

Can you cancel that flight and fly in a day early? Or at least get an earlier flight? Isn't there a new rule that you can get out of an airline ticket within 24 hours...are you within that?

 

We are not within the 24 hour window, but Southwest is usually pretty good about changing things with minimal expense if it was really necessary.

 

Is this definitely problematic?

 

Matt

[trish1c]

You are in trouble. Change that flight. Flying in the day before is the safest but if you can't do that take the very first flight that day & make sure it's a direct flight.

The ship will not wait for you. You must be on board by 2:00 pm or Homeland Security / Coast Guard can deny you boarding & Carnival can't stop them.

If your plane is late. . . . If there's a traffic accident on your one hour drive . . . If you get lost . . . you are toast. Too many things can go wrong with your plans as set.

If you miss the ship, you have to pay to fly to the next port.

Even if you do make it, you will be a stressed out wreck by the time you get there.

[fishywood]

A lot depends on what you mean by "getting to our towncar". If you have a private transfer where the driver will be waiting for you at the baggage claim you should make it--painfully, stressfully close, but doable. But if you are renting a car at the airport to drop at the port the time you will have to spend waiting in line to get your keys and trekking out to find the vehicle will be fatal.

[room010]

Plenty of cruisers miss their ship because they don't allow for possible flight delays/cancellations/diversions or other unscheduled snafus on departure day. You can read about their distress and disappointment all over the forum. Ideally you should arrive the day before and enjoy a relaxing nights stay before making your way to the ship but if that's not possible then please consider taking an earlier flight that arrives with a few hours to spare to give you some wriggle room if necessary. Enjoy your first cruise!

[paul929207]

I am with the others. I would not book that late of a flight. While you might make it, there is too good of a chance to miss the cruise. Find an earlier flight, preferably the prior day

[OCruisers]

Agree with others .... A day earlier would be best or at least as early a flight the "day of".

 

LuLu

~~~~

[chipq]

Even if your Southwest flight may be a direcet flight to MCO, it usually originates in another city as Southwest hopscotches across the country so it is not unusual by mid morning to have some delays as the arriving flights get caught up in weather, air traffic or maintenance delays. That late of an arrival is really pushing things close. You may make it, you may not. For $50 per ticket to change to the day before or first thing in the AM is much less than missing the ship. Good luck.

 

http://luv2cruise.blogspot.com

[photogineer]

Even if your Southwest flight may be a direcet flight to MCO, it usually originates in another city as Southwest hopscotches across the country so it is not unusual by mid morning to have some delays as the arriving flights get caught up in weather, air traffic or maintenance delays. That late of an arrival is really pushing things close. You may make it, you may not. For $50 per ticket to change to the day before or first thing in the AM is much less than missing the ship. Good luck.

 

http://luv2cruise.blogspot.com

 

Going the day before just simply isn't an option because of work schedules, and I just looked, it'll be ~$200 pp to catch the only other available earlier flight that day. I will keep monitoring and hope for a price break, we really can't swing such a large fare difference so abruptly.

 

Matt

[SadieN]

Take the last fllight out the night before (red eye) or the earliest one day of.

 

If you miss sailaway you might be able to board at the next port. This will cost $$$$ and you will need passports.

 

If you keep your original flight see if there is a Carnival shuttle available to port.

 

Pack in carryons to save the 30-60 minutes it can take to get your luggage.

[ducklite]

Here's how it works at MCO.

 

Plane lands at scheduled time--hopefully.

 

Drives around the entire airport to the correct terminal, which depending on weather and traffic can take 10 minutes.

 

The plane starts to empty. Depending on where your seats are, it can be another 10+ minutes for you to get off the plane.

 

Once you get off the plane you need to walk to the monorail and then take that to the main terminal and then get downstairs to baggage claim. Plan on 10-5 minutes.

 

Then you wait for luggage. Half an hour is typical, and hour is not unusual, I've waited 90 minutes more than once.

 

With no checked bag, sitting in the front of the plane, and knowing exactly where you are going in the airport it's still a full 20 minutes from the time the cabin door opens until you walk outside.

 

Bottom line, if you need to be on your ship by 2:00, you want to arrive by 11:00 am at the latest.

[fleckle]

Going the day before just simply isn't an option because of work schedules, and I just looked, it'll be ~$200 pp to catch the only other available earlier flight that day. I will keep monitoring and hope for a price break, we really can't swing such a large fare difference so abruptly.

...... and how much will it cost you for airfare and overnight hotel and additional meals and ground transportation if you should need to fly to the next port to catch up with your ship?

 

 

If you really enjoy gambling and decide to stick with your original flight, make sure that all your friends take carry-ons only so that nobody holds you up by needing to hang around baggage claim waiting for checked luggage.

[photogineer]

...... and how much will it cost you for airfare and overnight hotel and additional meals and ground transportation if you should need to fly to the next port to catch up with your ship?

 

 

If you really enjoy gambling and decide to stick with your original flight, make sure that all your friends take carry-ons only so that nobody holds you up by needing to hang around baggage claim waiting for checked luggage.

 

If it comes down to it, we can get the morning flight, but the increased cost will seriously impact our travel budget, so I'd prefer to keep waiting and see if the lower fares become available. Southwest only charges for difference in fare, so if a lower fare becomes available (currently sold out) this option becomes much friendlier. I'm just waiting it out now, we're not going to gamble on the late flight.

 

Does anyone have any advice for dealing with Southwest? that's going to be the next tree I bark up :)

 

Matt

[fleckle]

Keep watching the available seats on the earlier flight.

 

If it is not oversold, you may want to consider going out to the airport early to try standing by for the earlier flight.

If they have any no-shows, they may let you on as a standby if they have any vacant seats.

They are more likely to take you as a standby if you have not checked any luggage on the later flight.

 

This often works for one or two people on an early morning flight as the first flights of the day are the ones most likely to have no-shows.

Be very polite to the gate agents because if you crowd them, pester them or piss them off, you will have no chance of getting on.

 

You did not say how many friends are going, but the bigger the group, the less chance that you would all be able to get on as standbys.

 

Be prepared in advance to split up if necessary because you won't have time to talk it over if they can only take one or two of you. They will require a yes or no answer right there on the spot, and even then you may not know whether or not you are actually getting on until the last minute, after they have boarded all the confirmed passengers and done final call.

[photogineer]

Keep watching the available seats on the earlier flight.

 

If it is not oversold, you may want to consider going out to the airport early to try standing by for the earlier flight.

If they have any no-shows, they may let you on as a standby if they have any vacant seats.

They are more likely to take you as a standby if you have not checked any luggage on the later flight.

 

This often works for one or two people on an early morning flight as the first flights of the day are the ones most likely to have no-shows.

Be very polite to the gate agents because if you crowd them, pester them or piss them off, you will have no chance of getting on.

 

You did not say how many friends are going, but the bigger the group, the less chance that you would all be able to get on as standbys.

 

Be prepared in advance to split up if necessary because you won't have time to talk it over if they can only take one or two of you. They will require a yes or no answer right there on the spot, and even then you may not know whether or not you are actually getting on until the last minute, after they have boarded all the confirmed passengers and done final call.

 

We're going to keep an eye on those seats and see if we get a good shot at them. We have some time since the cruise isn't until March, and like I said, in a pinch I can book the change and we'll eat the cost, just trying to avoid that.

 

Sitting standby sounds a little too risky to me, and in fact the two flights (early arrival and ours) depart within minutes of each other, it is just that the one we have now is a connecting flight with a stop in BWI, so it arrives later. We have a group of 3.

 

Thanks for the advice everyone, we'll work it out one way or another.

 

Matt

[SMerritt]

Tossing in a stop at BWI is even more of a gamble

 

We have flown many times non-stop Calif to MIA and FLL, (red-eye) arriving at 6 am, and I still freak. The three flights we tried "stopovers" were all chaos, including 2 stopovers that became total airplane changes.

 

Orlando traffic and freeways are crazy!! and "commute hour" starts about 3:00 PM

 

Check the flights daily, actually some change hourly. I like CheapoAir

[skrufy]

Its doable,but you have very little room. If you have to fly in the same day,reschedule to Android earlier flight.

[fleckle]

O

Tossing in a stop at BWI is even more of a gamble

Smerritt is so right. The layover at BWI is a big uh-oh that the OP never mentioned originally.

 

Always try to get a non-stop flight if you can.

Each additional landing and takeoff increases the chances for having something go wrong.

 

With both flights to MCO scheduled to depart so close together, keep an eye on the monitors when you arrive at the airport because sometimes one flight will be delayed and you can try switching to the other.

(Of course in such situations, many other passengers will have the same idea.)

 

Also, if the departure gates for both flights are close together, you can check back and forth between them to see which looks better.

[Cruisin' Chick]

When we started taking cruises, if we're not leaving from our home port (an hour drive), we'll always plan to get in at least a day ahead. And that means booking our own travel (for my first cruise out of Miami, we used Carnival air which was going to stick us with a red eyed flight getting in the morning of the cruise, and we told them to change it to getting in the night before -- since then, I've booked our own flights or train travel).

 

There are so many things that can go wrong with a flight -- mechanical, weather-related, labor-related, financial-related -- why stress yourself out? We don't travel every year so that we would have those few extra days before and after a cruise. It's so nice to spend the night in the embarkation day, have a nice dinner, have time to do a little shopping for whatever we had left behind. On the other hand, if you gamble and Murphy's Law kicks in, there goes a day or two of your cruise (and the cruise line will not prorate your fare) and as someone stated, you'll spend $ flying to the second port and may have to spend the night there.

[Keith1010]

I would fly in the day before.

 

Too many things can go wrong.

 

This includes all sorts of items such as the ones mentioned by Cruisin Chick.

 

Even others from airport and airplane security breaches to FAA glitches on top of so many other things.

 

Keith

[5326jan]

Voice of experience here....:rolleyes: We missed the first two days of a cruise. It was the only time we let the cruise line book air for us because it was over Christmas and they could get better rates than we could. For a family of 4, it was a big savings. They had us coming in four hours before sailing time. We actually got in about 6 hours after the ship sailed. Since the cruise line booked the flights they were responsible for our hotel and flying us to the ship, but we did miss two days!:mad:

 

Now we book our own flights and always arrive a day early for domestic travel and three days early for international travel. I hope it works out for you! :)

[ducklite]

If it comes down to it, we can get the morning flight, but the increased cost will seriously impact our travel budget, so I'd prefer to keep waiting and see if the lower fares become available. Southwest only charges for difference in fare, so if a lower fare becomes available (currently sold out) this option becomes much friendlier. I'm just waiting it out now, we're not going to gamble on the late flight.

 

Does anyone have any advice for dealing with Southwest? that's going to be the next tree I bark up :)

 

Matt

 

The fares are not going to come down, that's a pipe dream.

 

SW will let you change with no change fee, just the difference in fare. It will be a lot less expensive to fork over the $200 now than to buy on the spot tickets and pay for hotels and meals when you miss the ship--which given your current time table, will happen.

 

Call it a relatively inexpensive travel lesson learned and change to the earlier flight.

[ducklite]

We're going to keep an eye on those seats and see if we get a good shot at them. We have some time since the cruise isn't until March, and like I said, in a pinch I can book the change and we'll eat the cost, just trying to avoid that.

 

Sitting standby sounds a little too risky to me, and in fact the two flights (early arrival and ours) depart within minutes of each other, it is just that the one we have now is a connecting flight with a stop in BWI, so it arrives later. We have a group of 3.

 

Thanks for the advice everyone, we'll work it out one way or another.

 

Matt

 

FYI--SW will charge you the going fare for those seats. They don't do "free" standby unless the lowest available fare is what you paid for your existing ticket.

[ducklite]

Tossing in a stop at BWI is even more of a gamble

 

We have flown many times non-stop Calif to MIA and FLL, (red-eye) arriving at 6 am, and I still freak. The three flights we tried "stopovers" were all chaos, including 2 stopovers that became total airplane changes.

 

Orlando traffic and freeways are crazy!! and "commute hour" starts about 3:00 PM

 

Check the flights daily, actually some change hourly. I like CheapoAir

 

From MCO to the Port is an easy drive that is seldom congested, regardless of the time of day. 95% of the traffic exits within four miles after the exit for Semoran (the airport) onto Goldenrod or the 417, and from there on it's pretty light to the Port. Mid day it's light regardless of the day of the week.

 

The ONLY road around here where traffic never stops regardless of the time of day or day of week is I-4.