Boarding time in Hamburg

[siforest65]

We’ve been allocated our boarding time and I was wondering how much wiggle room they allow in Hamburg? I know from experience that Southampton are reasonably flexible but are we wasting our time arriving earlier in Hamburg?

[TV Dad]

We're also boarding in Hamburg. I'm guessing (and this is only a guess based on past cruises with other cruise lines) you'll have 30-60 minutes, depending on cabin class.

[Bigmike911]

Last year in Hamburg we arrived about 11:30 am. We checked in, waited briefly (less than 20 minutes) and were escorted aboard and were in the cabin by 12:30. 

[BobBranst]

It may depend on which of the Hamburg cruise centers the ship uses.   There are three.  

 

When we boarded the QM2 in Hamburg, we arrived at the HafenCity Cruise Center a little before noon and there was already a passenger line stretching well outside the building.  We were in our cabin about 90 minutes later.   If I were doing it again, I would consider waiting until closer to the suggested time before arriving at the port.  

 

Some have said that boarding at the newer Altona and Steinwerder Cruise Centers are better organized, but I have no personal experiece with them.   

[Lynnewob]

We had priority boarding and took this photo in the Steinwarder terminal on the upper level walking to board the ship after check in.  The queues were horrendous and we were thankful for priority.

[siforest65]

Thanks for the replies. We are boarding at Steinwarder and that photo doesn’t bode well. We are only on a short cruise back to Southampton so wouldn’t have minded getting on earlier to familiarise ourselves with the ship. Wouldn’t want to get to the front of that though only to be turned away.

[Bigmike911]

15 hours ago, BobBranst said:

It may depend on which of the Hamburg cruise centers the ship uses.   There are three.  

 

When we boarded the QM2 in Hamburg, we arrived at the HafenCity Cruise Center a little before noon and there was already a passenger line stretching well outside the building.  We were in our cabin about 90 minutes later.   If I were doing it again, I would consider waiting until closer to the suggested time before arriving at the port.  

 

Some have said that boarding at the newer Altona and Steinwerder Cruise Centers are better organized, but I have no personal experiece with them.   

Bob, Cunard now uses the Steinwerder Cruise Terminal in Hamburg. The Hafencity terminal has been discontinued, and the area is being re-developed. 

[BobBranst]

Thanks for the correction.  the HafenCity facility was far from excellent even though it was relatively close to the city center.    Do you happen to know if there is a subway station near Steinweder like there is/was at HafenCity?  

[Bigmike911]

1 hour ago, BobBranst said:

Thanks for the correction.  the HafenCity facility was far from excellent even though it was relatively close to the city center.    Do you happen to know if there is a subway station near Steinweder like there is/was at HafenCity?  

Unfortunately no subway. It is a taxi ride out in the middle of nowhere, well maybe not nowhere, but a heavily cleared re-development area. The terminal is a purpose built structure and nicely done. 

Edited June 8, 2019 by Bigmike911

[Yoshikitty]

In my opinion, the long waiting lines partly are a result of many people not showing up at their assigned boarding time - so everybody arrives at around noon time.

 

Cunard usually offers a (pay) bus shuttle from the main station to Steinwerder Terminal.

 

[Se1lad]

21 hours ago, Bigmike911 said:

Unfortunately no subway. It is a taxi ride out in the middle of nowhere, well maybe not nowhere, but a heavily cleared re-development area. The terminal is a purpose built structure and nicely done. 

 

There's a ferry shuttle service you can take which gets you to a subway station, however it's a 15 minute walk and the ferry only runs every 20-30 minutes.  The walk is pretty exposed too so I wouldn't want to do it in bad weather.  There were plenty of taxis waiting outside the terminal the 2 times I have been there.

[Fairgarth]

20 hours ago, Yoshikitty said:

In my opinion, the long waiting lines partly are a result of many people not showing up at their assigned boarding time - so everybody arrives at around noon time.

 

We boarded in Hamburg in October.  We had a boarding time of 3:30pm and like good little children we showed up at 3:15 expecting a smooth and quick process.  Ha!!  Good luck with that one!  Did Cunard tell a whole boatload of people to show up at 3:30?  It sure looked like it - there was a long Disneyland snake of people lining up.  Got to the cabin at 4:30.  It was our first times on Cunard so we were distinctly unimpressed.  No other cruise line had ever given us a boarding time so we - naively - expected that by spreading boarding out there would be no waiting times.  Even without a boarding time, no other cruise line had ever made us take that long to get on board.  Once on board, things improved considerably and the crossing was great.  Having studied queuing theory many, many moons ago, I suspect the Cunard problem is that the customer contact time is far too long.  Do they have anybody in management who knows how to look into this stuff?  Do they care?

[smoothcruiser]

We embarked QM2 at the Steinwarder cruise terminal a few days ago.

 

We had arrived early. Boarding commenced at 12 noon. They started to board the Priority line first.

We are Platinum members and joined the regular queue. At the front of the queue we were told that Platinum members are considered to be priority, and we were shuffled over to an immediate checkin. Then through security, and were on board by 12.15. The cabins were ready. 

They paid no attention to the boarding times that were printed on the cruise ticket.

[Underwatr]

We arrived a little after 1 PM last Friday. We have Platinum priority, but the regular queue filled the cattle chutes and snaked around the hall before heading almost to the door. With priority we we're onboard within 20 minutes of pulling up, including unlikely adding the car and wheeling bags to the luggage drop point.