When do HAL's Fly/Cruise Flights Leave U.S. for Europe?

[HalFan]

We are considering a European cruise next summer on HAL and there are currently great deals on cruise + air packages offered by them. Has anyone done this in the past and when did they schedule you to depart the U.S.? I'm especially wondering about those of you who have departed from the West Coast. Did you arrive the same day as the cruise embarked or a day earlier? When did you leave? What airline did they send you on and were there any dramas with connections, baggage, etc.?

Any experiences you could share would be helpful. Thanks!

[HalFan]

Bumped up. Can anybody help us with this? Thanks!

[MISSYLOU]

Sorry, I don't know anything about HAL's flight schedules but I do know when you fly from the US to Europe you arrive the next day.

 

I would suppose HAL would fly you at least one day prior to the cruise to arrive on the day of the cruise.

[CowPrincess]

As far as I know, HAL uses consolidator tix, which are more or less the bottom of the barrel. You get crappy flights generally, and arriving a day early doesn't seem to be in HAL's air "game plan" necessarily. However, if you each pay an additional fee, you can arrange a "deviation" from their plans for you :) so you CAN arrive a day early, and can be guaranteed of being on the same flight as other members of your party.

 

We did HAL air once because it was a screamingly good price -- much better than we could find independently. We paid in other ways, though including lack of sleep, HUGE fight to start our vacation, and getting home at a nightmarish hour at the end of our cruise. We'd use HAL air again for the right price.... but next cruise we are doing independent air.

[kalliekae]

Sorry, I don't know anything about HAL's flight schedules but I do know when you fly from the US to Europe you arrive the next day.

 

I would suppose HAL would fly you at least one day prior to the cruise to arrive on the day of the cruise.

 

This is what we experienced with two European cruises with HAL. We arrived in plenty of time to make the transfer from the airport to the dock. HAL will work with you if you have a specific airline you prefer. One thing we experienced both times was a non-stop flight going, but a two stop flight coming home even though the same airline offered non-stop both ways. Next time, we will be more diligent so that does not occur.

[jtl513]

I don't know about flights from the West Coast, but we did HAL air to Europe twice from FL.

 

The first time we went from Orlando to Dulles on United, then overnight SAS to Copenhagen, arriving about 7:00a on embarkation day. Coming home was the reverse, but same-day because of the time difference.

 

The second time we flew Air Canada from Orlando to Toronto to Rome, again arriving early in the morning. Coming home they sent us on Lufthansa to Munich to Dulles, then United to Orlando. We missed the Dulles connection, but we lucky enough to get another flight an hour later.

 

We have learned our lesson, and won't book air through HAL again.

[MightyQuinn]

I don't know about flights from the West Coast, but we did HAL air to Europe twice from FL.

John, just popping in to say congrats for reaching a milestone count. You're running with the big kids now! :D:D

[jtl513]

John, just popping in to say congrats for reaching a milestone count. You're running with the big kids now! :D:D

Thanks! I remember when 1,000 was a long way off! :D I just hope I have helped as many as I have angered or annoyed. :)

[MightyQuinn]

Thanks! I just hope I have helped as many as I have angered or annoyed. :)

LOL. Pretty sure the numbers are lopsided in favor of helping. And now I have another post towards 1000. See you're helping again! :D:D

[yiddishkopf]

When we have taken cruises that left from foreign ports, and HAL did our flights,we were able to choose the number of days we went in advance of the cruise. We did it for the South American itinerary with a pre cruise trip to Machu Pichu, Australia, NZ and Japan. As long as you are willing to pay the hotel charges, you can fly when you want to.

 

Last year our cruise left from Osaka/Kobe and we spent 3 days in Osaka before boarding the ship. When we fly that distance, I need a day to adjust my sleeping schedule and a day or two for sightseeing.

[Steve Q]

We recently returned from a 16 day cruise of the Baltic aboard the Prinsendam. It was the first time that we ever had a cruise line arrange our air travel. We did so simply because the package they offered in March included airfare from Phoenix and there was no way we could match their prices on our own.

 

The ship sailed from Amsterdam on August 7th. We departed Phoenix on August 6th via Delta on a 7:00 AM flight to Atlanta. We departed from Atlanta via Delta after a 4 hour layover. The plane landed Friday morning and HAL had agents at the Amsterdam airport waiting for us.

 

Our return flight left London at approximately 2:30PM the afternoon we disembarked. The flight was on British Airways and was nonstop to Phoenix.

 

We were really shocked at how convenient the arrangements were. Honnestly, we could not have booked better flights on our own.

[ger_77]

If I were you, I'd pay for the air deviation and select the flights / airlines you'd like. We used HAL's air for our first one - arrived with about an hour to spare before sailing, but we made it. Second time we used HAL's air we were the last ones to board the ship - they literally pulled up the gangway behind us. Needless to say, we made it to the ship, but our luggage didn't. Now that we're going on our 3rd trip to the Mediterranean, we've made our own arrangements, getting to the port the day ahead and not having to worry about whether or not we'll make it to the ship on time. It isn't worth the anxiety.

 

Smooth Sailing! :):):)

[CruiserBruce]

We are booked on HAL next summer in the Med. We are planning on flying in two nights prior to our cruise, arranging our own flights.

 

HAL flights or not, there is no way you can fly in from the West Coast the same day. If HAL was being the most efficient, you could depart from SFO or LAX at about between 9 am and 2pm, and arrive at a European city at about 10 am (depending on the European city)the next day. Then you would go direct to the port. This isn't the best idea, as baggage loss, customs delay, missed connections and general delays seriously threaten making the cruise. You really need to be there at least one night prior to your sailing.

 

In other words, the flight from the US will be overnight, arriving the next day. As far as I know, there is no way way around this.

[mudscraper]

Anyone who is considering booking their airline travel through the cruiseline should read the Sticky titled Cruise Air and Air Deviation Explanations.

It can be found under Cruise Discussion Topics-click on Cruise/Air.

 

 

Rich

[Randyk47]

We're still going back and forth about our air travel for next year's Med cruise. Obviously we've got some time but we're "intense" planners so we have a tendency to focus on an issue until we get it solved. :) Right now, at least for us, it's so far out that the airlines can't deal in specifics but we're working on it. What we know, or think we know, is that you can work with HAL on their air and get there earlier than the morning of the cruise. If you don't ask then they will book you to arrive the day of the cruise. For instance, the HAL air schedule would have us arriving in Rome around 7 AM after an all-night flight. If, and that's a big "if", it arrives on time then no big issue getting from Rome to the port in Citivichia. Another alternative is that we could book one of HAL pre-cruise packages and arrive a few days ahead but those packages seem expensive and go places and do things we're not particularly interested in doing. Most probably what we'll do is arrange our own flignts, leveraging frequent flier miles we've been saving for just this kind of trip to fly business class to Rome a couple of days before the cruise. We're researching hotels and transportation, with good recommendations from some CC'ers by the way, and will probably make it a "do it ourselves" adventure. Pretty much the same considerations on the return from Athens.

[SandyMc]

I think anyone even considering HAL air should go ahead and reserve it when they book the cruise. You can always cancel it later if you decide to do something else.

We decided after booking our Alaska cruise that we wanted air thru the cruise line - too late! They had no more seats out of DFW and we were forced to buy our own at more money. That's one lesson we learned the hard way!

[Randyk47]

I think anyone even considering HAL air should go ahead and reserve it when they book the cruise. You can always cancel it later if you decide to do something else.

 

We decided after booking our Alaska cruise that we wanted air thru the cruise line - too late! They had no more seats out of DFW and we were forced to buy our own at more money. That's one lesson we learned the hard way!

 

You raise an excellent point. Our experience has been a little different in that we're typically able to arrange flights far below what HAL charges but we did find that HAL had flights/seats into Ft Lauderdale at the peak of spring break and we couldn't book anything at any cost ourselves. Thank goodness for HAL air that time. :)

[HalFan]

Thanks everyone for your input. We don't want to cut it too close and arrive the day we would be sailing, plus we want to get over outr jet lag and do some land travel before or after. The uncertainty of not knowing your air routing (especially from the West Coast) is not worth it. We can fly to many European cities non-stop from SFO, which takes long enough, let alone going via New York, Chicago, Atlanta, Dallas, etc., which adds so many more hours to the trip and leaves you open to delays or luggage not being transferred. We'll make our own arrangements.

[Randyk47]

We're stuck with going through Dallas one way or the other as there aren't many direct flights to other major hubs out of San Antonio and since we're focusing on using our American Airlines miles that really limits our options. Unless American makes some really different connection changes we're also stuck with going from Dallas direct to Rome or Dallas to Chicago or New York then direct to Rome. We've pretty much eliminated the HAL air option at this time. Interestingly the worst "lost" luggage situation I ever had was a non-stop from San Francisco to Frankfurt on Lufthansa and it took 6 weeks for my bag to show up. :eek: