Ruby/Alaska Cruise

[kunta67]

I'm looking at booking the inside passage August 16th cruise departing Seattle on the Ruby Princess. We've mainly only sailed RCI and I know RCI will let you carry off immediately after the ship gets back into port. Does Princess allow you to do the same thing? The ship gets back into Seattle at 7 AM and there's a 10:45 AM United flight back to Denver that we'd love to catch instead of a 3 PM flight. Thank you for your help.

[seattleslew]

We've done 8 cruises back into Pier 91 without a hiccup and if you are first "walk offs", you SHOULD be able to make it to Seatac by 9:30, maybe 9:15. However, that's if everything goes all right on the ship, at the port and on the freeway. I know what you mean ... those long airport days are annoyingly tedious. It's a crap shoot, but at that time on a Sunday morning there SHOULD be very little traffic and it SHOULD take you no more than 40, maybe 30 min to get to Seatac. That's a lot of shoulds! Assuming you're taking a cab, which by the way, are often Priuses now, so not a lot of room ....

[MilliesMom]

One thing we found with Sea-Tac airport is that the security lines can be very long on days with the ships are back in town.

 

I wouldn't want the stress of making it to the airport in time for that early flight, but I'm sure many have done it.

 

We are going on the Ruby the next week (we get on as you get off), so take good care of the ship for us. We just can't wait.

[caribill]

I'm looking at booking the inside passage August 16th cruise departing Seattle on the Ruby Princess. We've mainly only sailed RCI and I know RCI will let you carry off immediately after the ship gets back into port. Does Princess allow you to do the same thing?

 

Yes and no.

 

Princess organizes the disembarkation into groups, so you can only get off first if you are in that first group.

 

During the cruise you will be given a form asking when you want to disembark. You will need to indicate that you want to be in the first walk off group. You may or may not end up in that first group, depending on the number of requests for it.

[Colo Cruiser]

I'm looking at booking the inside passage August 16th cruise departing Seattle on the Ruby Princess. We've mainly only sailed RCI and I know RCI will let you carry off immediately after the ship gets back into port. Does Princess allow you to do the same thing? The ship gets back into Seattle at 7 AM and there's a 10:45 AM United flight back to Denver that we'd love to catch instead of a 3 PM flight. Thank you for your help.

 

If all goes well and you are off in the first walk off group carrying your luggage you should be OK.

[LaurieHoffman]

As others have said you should be ok but personally that is cutting it way to close in my opinion. I would not be able to relax my last night on board stressing about making the flight. When we sailed back to Seattle it took a while to get a cab to take us to the airport. There were many passengers waiting too... but we were not the first group off either.

 

I would take the later flight.... just to be safe..