Need genius ideas. Baton Rouge to New Orleans

[pzerba]

Months ago I found airfare from Minneapolis to Baton Rouge for $225 a person, with the cheapest I had seen to New Orleans at $400 I jumped at the chance.

 

Just looking for any idea to get to and from. The obvious answer is to rent a car, one way dropping it at the airport and taking a cab from the airport. That appears to be about $90 each way. Looking for a cheaper option.

 

One way cab rentals into the city are currently more expensive, and not as convenient. The Hertz at the Convention center would be great, if they were charging $125 for the privilege.

 

Any other ideas?

 

I'm flying in the day before, and have a 2:30pm outbound flight, so I'm not terribly worried about time.

[rvsullivan]

You do realize that you are going to be 80-90 miles from the cruise terminal? And it can be a hard drive. Last month on a Saturday it took me over 2 hours to make the drive. There is no easy solution to this going either way. You are saving $175 on airfare, but I think you may end up spending more than that to try to make this work. One way car rentals and cab fares are going to eat that up pretty fast. Let us know what you work out.

Good luck.

[pzerba]

One way car rentals are at $55 each way currently, so I'm still way ahead of the game - not to mention, hotels in Baton Rouge are significantly cheaper.

 

Drury Inn - Baton Rouge = $80, Drury Inn - New Orleans = $170.

 

Looks like my original play is probably the best, as I'm not willing to take public transportation with luggage.

[bcwaves]

As a MN native relocated to Baton Rouge, I've gotta say that it's interesting to find airfare from MSP into BTR that is cheaper than MSY. We've driven down and flown out of NOLA to MN just because of the cheaper flights. Out of curiosity, are you flying non-stop?

 

Anyway, I was going to mention the LA Swift. It's cheap, but I agree about taking the luggage on there.

 

 

Your 2:30pm outbound flight will probably work - as long as you get off early and don't run into any trouble on the I-10 bridge back. We once were stuck on there for an hour or so due to marsh fires on Pontchartrain. There's no way to turn off once you're on there.

 

Your best bet now would probably be to rent a car at the airport in Baton Rouge, stay at your hotel in Baton Rouge and drive to NOLA the next day and return the car at the airport and take a cab or shuttle to the cruise terminal. There are a few different shuttles from the MSY airport. You can google for information on that.

 

 

Hope that you have a great time on your cruise!

[pzerba]

Our flights are on Delta, with a stop in Atlanta (of course) but for the money, I couldn't turn it down. I checked today, and it's 278 to BTR and 325 to MSY.

 

My current plan is very similar to what you suggest.

 

After much checking, I'm getting a car at BTR for about $38 (Budget), staying overnight at the Drury. (going to do the "haunted" plantation tour) and take off in the morning.

 

In the morning we will drive to MSY, drop the car and get a cab/shuttle to the port.

 

On the way back, Autoslash has found Hertz at the convention center has a car for about $65, so I'll do self-disembark, walk over and grab the car and save time from having to do a swap at MSY. Just pray it's not raining that morning.

 

I've set-up autoslash.com to keep checking for me, so I hope to lower those numbers a few bucks.

[pcur]

Try Tiger Airport shuttle. They are recommended on other travel sites.