How was I supposed to know what terminal in Miami was our ship before arriving?

[Jezo]

We figured it out by going into the Royal garage at terminal A, asking some people, then driving back to terminal G.

 

Where was I supposed to get this info before arriving?  I saw our ship at the opposite end of all of the terminals but as I have never been here before I didn't know where I was supposed to go or park.  All that maps said terminal A for RC so I assumed there was a shuttle or something that would take you between the check in and the ship.  Nope.  Drove the length of the whole port twice.  I am here two hours early so nothing lost, jus trying to know more for next time.

 

Like how on an airplane ticket it tells you what gate you are supposed to be at where did it say I was going to be at this terminal today?  

 

I want to know so next time I don't drive around clueless on what I am doing.  

[Native Floridian 26]

There are signs as you arrive in the port that tell you which terminal your ship is at.

[Biker19]

11 minutes ago, Jezo said:

I want to know so next time I don't drive around clueless on what I am doing.  

O class are at terminal A, all others are a toss up between A and G. A glimpse at any ship position app (like cruisemapper) will show you the location of the ship.

[LilBlackDress]

We just look at the signs when entering the port 

[Jezo]

1 minute ago, LilBlackDress said:

We just look at the signs when entering the port 

There were no signs other than Terminal A, B, C... And so on.  Didn't say what terminal was used for what ship.

 

2 minutes ago, Biker19 said:

O class are at terminal A, all others are a toss up between A and G. A glimpse at any ship position app (like cruisemapper) will show you the location of the ship.

 

So no where in the RC app or paperwork tell you where to go?  I know I could have used my own eyes and looked but as I have never been here before nothing told me not to go to the Royal Caribbean hub and garage.  RC website for parking even says use the RC garage.

[Biker19]

1 minute ago, Jezo said:

So no where in the RC app or paperwork tell you where to go?

Not for ports like Miami where there are multiple terminals.

[livingonthebeach]

21 minutes ago, Jezo said:

We figured it out by going into the Royal garage at terminal A, asking some people, then driving back to terminal G.

 

Where was I supposed to get this info before arriving?  I saw our ship at the opposite end of all of the terminals but as I have never been here before I didn't know where I was supposed to go or park.  All that maps said terminal A for RC so I assumed there was a shuttle or something that would take you between the check in and the ship.  Nope.  Drove the length of the whole port twice.  I am here two hours early so nothing lost, jus trying to know more for next time.

 

Like how on an airplane ticket it tells you what gate you are supposed to be at where did it say I was going to be at this terminal today?  

 

I want to know so next time I don't drive around clueless on what I am doing.  

 

I was on the Jewel a few weeks ago and this happened to a lot of people. There is no shuttle either.  One person told me their Uber dropped them off at terminal A, they got out and found that the Jewel was at G.  They had to call another Uber to get from G to A at a cost of $10.  There are no signs that say which ships are where only signs for the different letter terminals.  

 

In my case I knew it was terminal G because I was doing a "Live" report for that cruise and happened to have pulled up cruisemapper which had a circle around where the Jewel was. I posted this on my Roll Call and those that saw it were able to go to the right terminal. As @Biker19 mentioned, a look at cruisemapper before going to PortMiami helps to find the location of the ship's terminal before heading out. 

 

I agree that RCI should have in the edocs the terminal location as PortMiami is a very large cruise terminal with several ships on any given day. There should also be a shuttle that takes you around the terminal. 

 

[S.A.M.J.R.]

I've never been to Port Miami, so I could be way off base.  Do these electronic signs not say what ship is where (I grabbed the pic off google street view)?

[Jezo]

Well at least I am not the only one.  As we were driving down the bridge from the beach side we saw all the other ships and then the jewel at the very end, coming into the terminal the jewel was the first one we passed but since all the maps says RC was terminal A I just kept driving.

 

Now I know for next time drive to where your ship is and find the closest parking lot.  At least as an advantage I think parking at G is $3 cheaper a day than A?

 

I'll find out when we leave I guess.

[Jezo]

2 minutes ago, S.A.M.J.R. said:

I've never been to Port Miami, so I could be way off base.  Do these electronic signs not say what ship is where (I grabbed the pic off google street view)?

Oh yah those are the signs but they don't actually tell you what ship is at which terminal.  Just says what you see there.  I mean now that I know I could have just looked over and saw what ship was where but as you are driving you see the big Norwegian, Carnival, MSC, Virgin terminals with the big Royal Caribbean one way over at Terminal A.  So thinking it was like an Airport where everyone on JetBlue goes to the JetBlue counter and everyone on Delta goes to Delta we drove to the RC area only to be told nope go back to G.  

[shof515]

Another way to check is by looking at the Port Miami cruise schedule:

https://wwwx.miamidade.gov/Apps/Seaport/dailydock/Default.aspx

 

it will tell you the location like A,G ,F ,etc

[Jasukkie]

Aren't there smaller electronic signs at each exit? I could have that confused with another port. 

[WeMissSeaView]

8 minutes ago, Jasukkie said:

Aren't there smaller electronic signs at each exit? I could have that confused with another port. 

Port Everglades has those.

[njkruzer]

How about looking at port webcam before heading to the port?  Dh says we did that.

[jean87510]

yet another way is google maps or waze.  I found it in 10 seconds

[twangster]

Check MarineTraffic.com before leaving for the port and there are usually signs once out of the tunnel.  

[S.A.M.J.R.]

2 hours ago, shof515 said:

Another way to check is by looking at the Port Miami cruise schedule:

https://wwwx.miamidade.gov/Apps/Seaport/dailydock/Default.aspx

 

it will tell you the location like A,G ,F ,etc

 

1 hour ago, njkruzer said:

How about looking at port webcam before heading to the port?  Dh says we did that.

 

32 minutes ago, jean87510 said:

yet another way is google maps or waze.  I found it in 10 seconds

 

10 minutes ago, twangster said:

Check MarineTraffic.com before leaving for the port and there are usually signs once out of the tunnel.  

While I'm sure those are all good suggestions, that seems a strange thing to ask of cruisers in 2022.  If they have electronic signs, why can't they just program them daily?  

[livingonthebeach]

30 minutes ago, jean87510 said:

yet another way is google maps or waze.  I found it in 10 seconds

 

Yes but that doesn't tell you which ship is at which terminal. When I cruised on the Jewel it was docked in Terminal G and Oasis was in A.  I knew just by looking at the ship docked at A with all the slides and without looking at the name, that it could not have been the Jewel. Someone else might not have known and got dropped off at A as were many on my sailing. With luggage and the heat it's a schlep to walk from A to G so some took taxis or Uber to the right terminal. It's best to check a cruise ship position type of site like cruisemapper to know in advance which terminal to go to in PortMiami. Port Everglades has a better system - there's signage there indicating the corresponding terminals for each ship. 

[livingonthebeach]

5 minutes ago, S.A.M.J.R. said:

While I'm sure those are all good suggestions, that seems a strange thing to ask of cruisers in 2022.  If they have electronic signs, why can't they just program them daily?  

 

Exactly. I don't know why they don't.  At the very least we should get some indication via email or text of which terminal to go to a few days prior to sailing. 

[njkruzer]

We had car service take us to the port and we seemed to know where the Jewel, niether A nor G.  I also think there was a sign.  I also think think there was an email from Royal. 

[livingonthebeach]

18 minutes ago, njkruzer said:

We had car service take us to the port and we seemed to know where the Jewel, niether A nor G.  I also think there was a sign.  I also think think there was an email from Royal. 

 

I don't know when you went but the Jewel was definitely at terminal G on my cruise a few weeks ago. There were no signs at PortMiami that day indicating which terminal the ships were docked at. You had to guess. Several people got dropped off at the wrong terminal as I stated previously. On the edocs they just mentioned Royal Caribbean Way and no terminal letter. I remember this was discussed in our Roll Call. For most cruisers, it is easy to visually look at the ships and tell right away where their ship is but the Jewel was hidden (it's a smaller ship) behind other ships. YMMV

[njkruzer]

11 minutes ago, livingonthebeach said:

 

I don't know when you went but the Jewel was definitely at terminal G on my cruise a few weeks ago. There were no signs at PortMiami that day indicating which terminal the ships were docked at. You had to guess. Several people got dropped off at the wrong terminal as I stated previously. On the edocs they just mentioned Royal Caribbean Way and no terminal letter. I remember this was discussed in our Roll Call. For most cruisers, it is easy to visually look at the ships and tell right away where their ship is but the Jewel was hidden (it's a smaller ship) behind other ships. YMMV

We sailed December 30th and sailed from D per dh. Terminal to the left was under construction,  maybe for Viking.  Not sure.

[twangster]

43 minutes ago, S.A.M.J.R. said:

While I'm sure those are all good suggestions, that seems a strange thing to ask of cruisers in 2022.  If they have electronic signs, why can't they just program them daily?  

 

If Ubering the onus is on the passenger to specify the correct destination.  There is scam going around where you tell an Uber to go to destination X in the app but then ask them to go to destination Y in the car.  You get out and cancel the ride based on the diver not taking you to the correct destination.  Consequently Uber drivers will only go to the exact location you specify in the app.  If you need terminal G you need to put that in the app.   You won't know that from your hotel unless you look.  

 

When driving you come out of a dark tunnel and in the bright sunlight upon exiting the tunnel when in traffic it's easy to miss the sign boards.  They are there but easily missed.  

 

So the wise thing to do is know where you are going before getting there.

[Jezo]

1 hour ago, jean87510 said:

yet another way is google maps or waze

 

1 hour ago, jean87510 said:

yet another way is google maps or waze.  I found it in 10 seconds

 

And in ten seconds you found the wrong terminal!  That's what we did, looked up royal Caribbean, went to the terminal for royal Caribbean, only to find out our royal Caribbean ship was not at the royal Caribbean port.  We know for next time to go to where the ship is, not the royal Caribbean terminal.

[Jezo]

41 minutes ago, livingonthebeach said:

 

 For most cruisers, it is easy to visually look at the ships and tell right away where their ship is but the Jewel was hidden (it's a smaller ship) behind other ships. YMMV

 

We saw it but didn't think we should go to it.  Seems kind of dumb now but I did airport logic.  I don't care if my plane is at gate a23 or a189, I go to the terminal and go to my airline's check in.. did the same thing here, we are traveling RC so we went to the RC terminal.  Lesson learned for Miami!