How early can we disembark Edge?

[eel]

In February, we will be on Celebrity Edge out of Fort Lauderdale.  The day we get back, we board the Harmony of the Seas in Port Canaveral.  The cruise leaves at 4:30 PM and we need to be on board by 2 PM. We have a rental car lined up to drive to Port Canaveral.  The drive is about 3 hours.  I believe if we hit the road by 9 AM we will have sufficient buffer to get to the ship with time to spare.

 

What is typically the earliest we can disembark if we walk off with our luggage?  We are hoping we can get off Edge no later than 7:30 or 8 AM. 

[jelayne]

If there are no delays you should be off 7:30.  We did walk off in January and there was a delay by the port authorities so walk-off didn’t start until 8:15.  We were in a Uber on our way to the airport  by 8 45

[Fouremco]

A few years ago, there was a thread started by a CC member who had faced a similar situation heading in the other direction. The OP and his family had spent a few days at Disney World and were driving down to Fort Lauderdale to start a cruise. They too had started off at about 9:00am, but barely made the boarding cut off time. There were numerous construction delays, then a huge delay as the result of a major, multi-vehicle accident.

 

In their case, they might have been wise to drive to Fort Lauderdale the night before, an option not available to you. While you probably won't experience any similar delays, or at least not delays of the same magnitude, I would encourage you to make every effort to get off the ship as early as possible and to get driving as soon as possible. 

[hcat]

Where are you picking up the rental car..airport, other site? 

Getting there and the car transaction will also take a bit of time unless they are bringing it to you??? Also drop off and transp to  the next ship

 

Day of the week also affects traffic at port and highway

 

Hope it works out

Edited October 5, 2019 by hcat

[eel]

3 minutes ago, hcat said:

Where are you picking up the rental car..airport, other site? 

Getting there and the car transaction will also take a bit of time unless they are bringing it to you???

 

 

We have a car reserved at the Hertz location near the cruise port. We will probably Uber to the car rental office to be safe. They open at 7:30 AM on Sundays.  I am going to be there in a few weeks after a different cruise and will try to talk to the manager and see if he can somehow flag the reservation so it is expedited.  I am Hertz #1 Gold. Not sure if that will help!

[Markator]

Just got off Equinox last month in Port Everglades. Used Port Everglades Terminal 25.  Scheduled arrival 7:00am. Got in line to get off at about 6am. Walked off with our bags. We were curbside at 7:45 and in a Lyft at 7:51. 

The line to get off got really long by 7 so I would advise get in line as soon as possible and not be eating breakfast at 6. 

I believe it was just about 7:30 the first people were allowed off. 

The drive to Canaveral is just under 3 hours and on weekends shouldn’t be any traffic unless something out of the ordinary. I have made the drive several times when you would be going. 

I don’t think you should have any problem as long as nothing like a bad accident along the way. 

For kicks I looked on Lyft and it was $226 Ship to ship when I looked on Saturday morning. Just another option. More money but less time than dealing with rental hassle. 

Best of luck to you. 

[volk904]

The Edge is the fastest ship we have ever walked off.  Got off at 715 and were in a cab by 745.  

[CYNSport]

One more suggestion, when you speak to the folks at Hertz, ask them about their early morning car inventory. We have experienced rental car delays because the satellite locations don’t have enough cars before noon (they wait for the drop offs from cruisers who are departing that day) and they are flooded with departing cruisers.  Sometimes you can’t get the type of car you reserved or, in worst case, have to wait for any type of car. 

[varoo]

On 10/5/2019 at 11:48 AM, eel said:

In February, we will be on Celebrity Edge out of Fort Lauderdale.  The day we get back, we board the Harmony of the Seas in Port Canaveral.  The cruise leaves at 4:30 PM and we need to be on board by 2 PM. We have a rental car lined up to drive to Port Canaveral.  The drive is about 3 hours.  I believe if we hit the road by 9 AM we will have sufficient buffer to get to the ship with time to spare.

 

What is typically the earliest we can disembark if we walk off with our luggage?  We are hoping we can get off Edge no later than 7:30 or 8 AM. 

 

It looks like you will have plenty of time to make your connection, but I just want to offer a piece of "security blanket" advice that should relieve you of any time restraint pressure.

 

Talk to the concierge on your first cruise, explain your situation, and ask him/her to coordinate with the concierge on the second ship so they will know to expect you and will put you on the manifest for the second cruise.

 

We were once in a similar situation, transferring from a Celebrity ship to a Royal Caribbean ship and needing to travel from one port to another to catch our second cruise in a different city.

As it turned out, we were delayed in transit so we did not arrive  until nearly an hour after the boarding time cutoff, just as they were starting the muster drill. 

But because they were expecting us, they had us on the manifest and one of the ship's officers even met us at the gangway to take our passports, check us in and hand us our seapass cards right there.

 

We were so grateful to the concierge who handled the arrangements for us, because if we had simply shown up so late on our own, we would have been denied boarding.

 

 

 

[pa-annie]

17 hours ago, volk904 said:

The Edge is the fastest ship we have ever walked off.  Got off at 715 and were in a cab by 745.  

 

Did you do walk-off?  If so, what time did you get online and how long did it take to disembark?

 

Thx - BZ

[eel]

On 10/24/2019 at 5:51 PM, varoo said:

 

It looks like you will have plenty of time to make your connection, but I just want to offer a piece of "security blanket" advice that should relieve you of any time restraint pressure.

 

Talk to the concierge on your first cruise, explain your situation, and ask him/her to coordinate with the concierge on the second ship so they will know to expect you and will put you on the manifest for the second cruise.

 

We were once in a similar situation, transferring from a Celebrity ship to a Royal Caribbean ship and needing to travel from one port to another to catch our second cruise in a different city.

As it turned out, we were delayed in transit so we did not arrive  until nearly an hour after the boarding time cutoff, just as they were starting the muster drill. 

But because they were expecting us, they had us on the manifest and one of the ship's officers even met us at the gangway to take our passports, check us in and hand us our seapass cards right there.

 

We were so grateful to the concierge who handled the arrangements for us, because if we had simply shown up so late on our own, we would have been denied boarding.

 

 

 

What a great suggestion.  Thanks a bunch.  We have been cruising so have not been following Cruise Critic much and just checked in today.

 

Also thinking about booking a rental car at the airport. The local edition Hertz opens at 9 AM but the airport location is 24 hours and has a better inventory of vehicles.