Diamond disembarkation... to keep luggage last night or not?

[Sandy R]

We return to Seattle on a Saturday and have a flight out at 12:30 pm on United. I've been reading about some passengers that elected to keep their luggage and take it off themselves on disembarkation day. I will ask the purser's office for the color luggage tags that get us off the ship 1st. Plus we're Elite and get priority disembarkation... but will getting off 1st give us enough time to get to the airport, check-in, go through security, etc. I'd like to know what the experiences have been from those that have had noon flights. Thanks for the input...

 

Sandy

[damerch]

We just got back from the Island and did the airport/customs routine at Vancouver. We did a land tour first and then the cruise. By the time we got to Vancouver, we were tired and really didn't want to deal with luggage. We had a 1:55 flight so it really wasn't an issue.

 

We got off the boat around 8:30 (the time that the Princess folks told us) and went thru a Canadian passport check. That's all it was. We went right to the bus because we had a transfer booked to the airport.

 

The fun began when we reached the airport. We had to wait for Princess to unload our disembarkation color code onto the carousel for us to pick up. It was about a 1 and 1/2 hour wait. We then went to the airline checkin with our baggage in tow. (Get a cart). After check-in you were sent to another line (one for passports and a different one if you had birth certificates). After the passport check for the US we had to line up to give our check-in luggage to the baggage folks. We then were sent to the security line where you do the usual screenings. The people were so polite and friendly....

 

We arrived at the airport about 9:10 and were thru and able to go to our gate around 1200 noon.