Same Day Flight - Times?

[Langley Cruisers]

I am going to search for hotels in the FLL or MIA areas. If any of you have stayed at some that are not expensive, please feel free to share.

 

The Florida board where you also posted this has, literally, hundreds of threads on hotels in both cities. :)

[wrp96]

Sailed Majesty at the beginning of the month. Scheduled to fly in the night before arriving at 12:30am. Notice the word scheduled. Due to there not being a gate available at our connection city, we missed our flight to Miami. Thankfully there were multiple flights the next day - except they were all fully booked. We got lucky and they were willing to oversell one of those flights to get us there, but we were quite exhausted by the time we got to the ship.

 

For fun, our flight home from our connection city got cancelled as well. Thank goodness for travel insurance.

[gram2kids]

If the airline changed the time you can call & get it changed to a different flight for no charge...even a day early if you want...just tell them that their change will not work for your cruise...

 

Thanks, KC, I hadn't thought of that BUT the problem is there is another person joining me on this cruise that is coming from a different airport and airline and hers has not changed arrival time so to change hers would be expensive at this time. Her arrival time is at 11:05am into MCO. We just have to keep a positive attitude that it will all work out fine on that day. I will remember if that ever happens to me again I'll take your advice and inquire about changing flights without being charged extra.

[rudeney]

We always go in a day early. Even if it costs $300 for a night in a hotel, that's better than missing the sailing and dealing with catching up to the ship. We even debated this for our next cruise out of Galveston. We have a direct flight from BHM to HOU that arrive at 9:30am. That is plenty of time to make it to the port. But, if the flight is delayed or cancelled, there are no other flights that day to get us there in time (via SWA). So our choice would be to miss the sailing and catch up (three days late) at another port, or change airlines and pay a lot for a last-minute fare.

 

We decided to come in a day early, so we arrive Saturday at 9:30am for a Sunday sailing. We will have an entire day to kill in Galveston, which means a hotel room and now, a rental car + parking. All that will cost about $500 over maybe $200 in shuttles, but now we can relax and not worry about any delays/cancellations (which is what vacation is all about, right?)

[nbsjcruiser]

Thank you all for the replies. I don't fly much but I guess I've been lucky and never had a sizable delay. I may just take an extra day of vacation and enjoy the day before. I am going to search for hotels in the FLL or MIA areas. If any of you have stayed at some that are not expensive, please feel free to share.

 

When sailing out of Miami we always stay at the Holiday Inn, Port of Miami. Its a tad more expensive then I think it should be ($150-$180 depending on the time of year and day of the week) but you're within walking distance of Bayside Marketplace which is hopping with action. Bands will be playing outside, lots of places to eat at and its a great place to kill the night before a cruise. Taxi to the port will be no more than $10. We always really enjoy Bayside the night before a cruise. Here's a couple pics I took a couple years ago there. Lots to do around Bayside.

 

 

 

[negc]

Bill, the OP is flying into Fort Lauderdale but sailing out of Miami on Majesty which is a slightly longer drive than 10 minutes.:D I thought the driving time was about 30-45 minutes from FLL to the Port of Miami.

 

Thanks Patti. Didn't read the original post carefully enough. Your estimate of the driving time required to go from FLL to the Port of Miami agrees with mine and makes arrival on time more problematic. I agree with most of those who recommended flying in the day before.

[Jay Sam]

Please do not do this.

 

This plan leaves no room for anything to go even slightly wrong. Stay in the Dania beach area of Ft. Lauderdale, and in the morning catch a breakfast and head down to Miami's port on SAS shuttle service. Just confirm that SAS picks up from your hotel. There are several hotels in that area that SAS serves, such as Hilton Garden Inn, Best Western, Cambria Suites etc etc etc.

[SMN73]

Sailed Majesty at the beginning of the month. Scheduled to fly in the night before arriving at 12:30am. Notice the word scheduled. Due to there not being a gate available at our connection city, we missed our flight to Miami. Thankfully there were multiple flights the next day - except they were all fully booked. We got lucky and they were willing to oversell one of those flights to get us there, but we were quite exhausted by the time we got to the ship.

 

For fun, our flight home from our connection city got cancelled as well. Thank goodness for travel insurance.

 

Oh my word. I would have been a wreck coming and going.