Transfer to airport in Vancouver - Princess or taxi?

[puppymama1]

Planning out our flights for next June's cruise and wondering how early  the Princess airport transfers leave the ship.. The travel agent told us not to book a flight earlier than noon, but our choices are 1:05 pm with only 57 minutes between changing planes in Seattle, or an 11:23 am flight that would give us extra time between planes in Seattle.  My husband wants to leave more time between planes, so would we be able to make the 11:23 am flight if we used Princess' airport transfer, or should we cancel that and just get our own taxi?  It will be 4 of us traveling (2 couples) so we will need a larger minivan taxi, if that matters... Do we need to arrange it in advance or will there be taxis at the port waiting?  Thanks!

[milo696]

Not this most experienced at this, but we just disembarked on the 13th in vancouver and no way would I book anything before noon.

If your dates fall on a saturday, the vancouver airport is frankly a complete mess, at least what we witnessed. It was not uncommon for people to have been in the lines 3 hours before getting to their respective gates. 

Granted, we were not the 1st  people off the ship, but the 1st ones off were between 8 and 8:30. 

I will say, the princess transfers worked seamlessly, and our luggage was at the airport as advertised and didn't have to worry about it after friday night. 

Incidentally,  our flights had a 50 minute layover in MSP and that wasn't a issue, I don't think a hour would be a problem..jmo

Again, just my opinion, and I'll let more experienced people guide you, but personally no way would I do anything before noon

Edited July 18, 2019 by milo696

[karatemom2]

On our recent cruise with Princess ending in Vancouver we had a 1 pm flight but still wanted to get to the airport as early as possible to get breakfast and just relax - it’s such a lovely airport. We opted to do walk off and take a taxi which cost about $30. We were off the ship just before 8 am, waited in line only about 10 minutes for our taxi and were at the airport by 9 am. Had there been an earlier flight option for us we would have taken it. If you get right off the ship and head straight to the airport the earlier flight time should be no problem 

Edited July 18, 2019 by karatemom2

[cruiseryyc]

To catch an 11:23 departure you would have to be at the airport by 9:23.  You go through US Immigration at the Vancouver airport so need to allow a good two hours for that plus security.  You would have to do self-disembarkation, which means carrying all your luggage off the ship yourself and be ready to get off as soon as the ship clears.  There will be taxis waiting but you'd have to ask for a mini-van to be brought around or just take two taxis.  Don't forget you also go through Canadian Immigration after getting off the ship.

 

The big issue is how many ships are arriving on the same day.  If just one or two there won't be a huge back up for Customs officials or taxis; if there are more then two ships in port - all bets are off.

 

Also since you've already gone through US Immigration in Vancouver, you won't need to upon arrival in Seattle; 57 minutes might be plenty of time.

[karatemom2]

12 minutes ago, milo696 said:

Not this most experienced at this, but we just disembarked on the 13th in vancouver and no way would I book anything before noon.

If your dates fall on a saturday, the vancouver airport is frankly a complete mess, at least what we witnessed. It was not uncommon for people to have been in the lines 3 hours before getting to their respective gates. 

Granted, we were not the 1st  people off the ship, but the 1st ones off were between 8 and 8:30. 

I will say, the princess transfers worked seamlessly, and our luggage was at the airport as advertised and didn't have to worry about it after friday night. 

Incidentally,  our flights had a 50 minute layover in MSP and that wasn't a issue, I don't think a hour would be a problem..jmo

Again, just my opinion, and I'll let more experienced people guide you, but personally no way would I do anything before noon

 

We had a very different experience. We disembarked on a Saturday and there were two other ships there as well. We chose walk off and our time assigned to leave the ship was 7:45 am and we walked off exactly at that time. As we were in the first group leaving the ship the taxi line was short and we were at the airport in no time at all. Upon arrival it was not the least bit crowded at 9 am. We literally were through security and immigration within 20 minutes. We had hours to kill waiting for our 1 pm flight. I will note that by 10:30 it had gotten much more crowded and by Noon it was packed. We also heard from fellow cruisers on our trip that the taxi lines were horrendous as the morning got later. I believe the key is doing walk off and getting off among the first group to beat the crowds. 

Edited July 18, 2019 by karatemom2

[puppymama1]

Thanks for the information... If we leave the ship around 7:45-8:00 am on a Wednesday morning, there will be a taxi line there so we won't need to reserve one in advance?  I think that is what we will do... even if we end up in 2 taxis, it will still be cheaper than the $29 per person Princess is charging us for the transfers... Thanks!

[karatemom2]

7 minutes ago, puppymama1 said:

Thanks for the information... If we leave the ship around 7:45-8:00 am on a Wednesday morning, there will be a taxi line there so we won't need to reserve one in advance?  I think that is what we will do... even if we end up in 2 taxis, it will still be cheaper than the $29 per person Princess is charging us for the transfers... Thanks!

Yes, there is a taxi line as you leave. They have it roped off and very well organized and there are taxis lined up around the block just going through one by one to pick up passengers. We saw numerous van taxis coming through that could take larger groups - we ended up in a Prius as it was just the two of us. The person coordinating at the head of the line will ask how many in your party and get you in the appropriate size taxi.

Edited July 18, 2019 by karatemom2

[puppymama1]

Thanks karatemom2!

[martincath]

You've been given all the right info already - Milo's busy airport was mostly because of waiting to take the Princess transfers, as even the earliest of those means you will arrive in a large group while every single self-disembarking person has already beaten you to YVR! Karatemom beat those crowds, so her experience is the norm for most self-disembarkers. The thousands of pax who all start rolling in around 9:30am on bus after bus really clog up the place - while cruisers only make up maybe 10-15% of the daily passenger load in summer, they tend to mostly arrive in two big chunks: ~9:30-10:30am on the 'direct to airport' buses and ~1-2pm on the 'city tour then the airport' buses. This simply overloads the airport at these times.

 

Definitely sign up for the *first* group of self-disembarking pax,  even if that means skipping brekky onboard. Being among the very first group off guarantees you minimal wait for a cab. While next year's official port schedule isn't published yet, there's still a good chance you will be competing with at least one other ship for taxis - if it's a 3 or even 4 ship day, potentially hundreds of people could beat you into the terminal even if you walk off first from your ship, there's no way to know who will be cleared for disembarkation first...

 

Assuming your flight remains at 11:23am you can afford to wait almost an hour for a cab - as long as you are in it before 9am you 'll beat the cruise transfer buses will leave before 9am, and it's mostly about beating them to YVR that determines how busy the check-in, bag drop etc. queues are.

 

If you cannot handle self-disembarking, then I'd suggest you are better to book the later flight. As mentioned above, thanks to preclearing at YVR you are treated as a Domestic connection, and all gates at SEA are accessible to each other without having to leave the secure area. If you have a lot of Status/are cruising in a suite so you can guarantee getting into the earliest 'bags taken off for you' slot the 11:23am flight might work, but Princess do prioritize folks on their own flights so you're adding probably a half hour or more delay and risk getting into 'long cab queue' territory that means the first cruise buses could beat you to YVR...

 

But if you can manage to self-disembark, then you can also handle rolling your bags to SkyTrain which guarantees a fast and efficient trip - it's always 26mins travel time, with the only variable factor being whether you get right onto a train or just miss one. Weekday mornings the train frequency is <7 minutes, so you'll always be at YVR within ~40mins after disembarking - a cab queue of <10mins will be roughly equal to SkyTrain time end to end. The fact that SkyTrain will only cost $4.25pp, so it's probably almost exactly half the price of a cab for four of you by the time you add a tip, is a bonus. You can put the savings toward one last brekky at Timmies in the terminal while you wait two hours for your flight to board because you got to YVR before all the crowds!!!

[CruiserBruce]

Is Vancouver in Alaska? How about the West Coast Departures board?

[SoBaycruiser]

You might consider the train that goes directly to the airport from the cruise terminal as a backup if you prefer a taxi.  You might want read the responses to someone who asked a similar question on a Tripadvisor forum HERE.

 

We found the train very easy.

Edited July 19, 2019 by SoBaycruiser

[puppymama1]

We will definitely disembark ourselves no later than 8:00 am and take a taxi!

thanks for the recommendation!