Disembarkation after princess cruise

[colesc15]

Hi all. First time sailing Princess in January on Sun princess and looking at flights from FLL. On Royal, we always carry off our luggage and have made 10am flights with no issues from Ft Lauderdale.. Is there a similar process on princess where we can carry our stuff off and be off the ship by 7-7:30 or is that not possible on Princess? 

 

Thanks! 

[memoak]

8 minutes ago, colesc15 said:

Hi all. First time sailing Princess in January on Sun princess and looking at flights from FLL. On Royal, we always carry off our luggage and have made 10am flights with no issues from Ft Lauderdale.. Is there a similar process on princess where we can carry our stuff off and be off the ship by 7-7:30 or is that not possible on Princess? 

 

Thanks! 

It all depend on customs but every cruise I have been on disembarkation was usually between 7-8 unless there was a customs or Coast Guard hold

[Paula_MacFan]

18 minutes ago, colesc15 said:

Is there a similar process on princess where we can carry our stuff off and be off the ship by 7-7:30 or is that not possible on Princess? 

 

Yes Princess offers self-disembarkation where you walk off with your luggage. You'll recieve a questionnaire during the cruise and you mark your preference. After our first cruise 20+ years ago we've always done self-disembarkation and are usually off by 7:30am depending on port.

 

We've caught a flight from FLL at 11am with no problems but book at your own risk 😊 If for any reason the ship is late getting into port you're probably out of luck.

Edited April 9 by Paula_MacFan

[Arizona Wildcat]

Think already said.  There could be several issues including a Coast Guard hold, weather delays, a smash on the way to the airport, delays at security.  One cruise there was a 2 hour delay because a couple longshoremen unloading the luggage got into a fight and a weapon was involved.   Everything was frozen in place till about 9am.

On another cruise the normal facial recognition by immigration was not used with each person needing to show their passport - looking for something.  We spent from 7:30 until 11am standing in line!

You never know.

Same thing I say about once a week.  If you need to think that your flight might be too early; it probably is.

[skynight]

Early Walk off began around 7:30 and ran until around 8pm on the Ruby a few weeks ago. Walk off groups were controlled so that the gangway did not get over crowded. Escalator use requires a free hand for the handrail. They will not allow you on without the free hand. Without a free hand you will have to use the elevator which has some short delays. You wheel off all your own luggage, go through immigration/customs. I did not receive a questionnaire to select a disembarkation time. Suggest you visit Passenger Services during the cruise and request early walk off. 

[Pickels]

Regarding Customs:  recently off Enchanted Princess in Ft. Lauderdale we noticed a significant change to Customs; much faster with what I think they call "face recognition".  Made going thru Customs a breeze. 

[memoak]

43 minutes ago, Pickels said:

Regarding Customs:  recently off Enchanted Princess in Ft. Lauderdale we noticed a significant change to Customs; much faster with what I think they call "face recognition".  Made going thru Customs a breeze. 

The same thing in SF 2months ago. Just walked right through 

[skynight]

2 hours ago, Pickels said:

Regarding Customs:  recently off Enchanted Princess in Ft. Lauderdale we noticed a significant change to Customs; much faster with what I think they call "face recognition".  Made going thru Customs a breeze. 

We also had face recognition which was operated by terminal employees, not immigration. agents. I did notice one individual that was referred to one of the agents. 

[kywildcatfanone]

On 4/9/2024 at 11:32 AM, colesc15 said:

Hi all. First time sailing Princess in January on Sun princess and looking at flights from FLL. On Royal, we always carry off our luggage and have made 10am flights with no issues from Ft Lauderdale.. Is there a similar process on princess where we can carry our stuff off and be off the ship by 7-7:30 or is that not possible on Princess? 

 

Thanks! 

Yes, it's the same.  

[jeromep]

Others have covered that Princess does have a luggage-in-hand walk-off option, which is going to be your earliest disembarkation after the ship has cleared customs.

 

If we have to fly to and from the port we always budget, both money and vacation time, to accommodate arriving to the port city at least a day early, and giving us an extra day after the cruise to fly home.  I'd rather get off a cruise in a leisurely manner and fly out the next day, than either have the stress related to rushing to the airport to make a flight or try figure out what to do with my luggage and burn time in an unfamiliar city waiting for a late flight out.

[Arizona Wildcat]

4 hours ago, skynight said:

We also had face recognition which was operated by terminal employees, not immigration. agents. I did notice one individual that was referred to one of the agents. 

The ship uses facial recognition to zero out the passenger count.

What you did not see was the camera used by Immigration that matches faces with their data base.

[Itchy&Scratchy]

18 hours ago, jeromep said:

I'd rather get off a cruise in a leisurely manner and fly out the next day, than either have the stress related to rushing to the airport to make a flight or try figure out what to do with my luggage and burn time in an unfamiliar city waiting for a late flight out.

some of us do not have that luxury.

[memoak]

27 minutes ago, Itchy&Scratchy said:

some of us do not have that luxury.

You don’t have one extra day ?  I always go in one day early and if I have to fly I leave one day after so thee is no rush to get off. Too many times there have been delays at customs

[Itchy&Scratchy]

6 minutes ago, memoak said:

You don’t have one extra day ?  I always go in one day early and if I have to fly I leave one day after so thee is no rush to get off. Too many times there have been delays at customs

we have a school aged kid who doesn't get PTO or vacation days from school... It's bad enough that we pull him out of school the day before the cruise...

 

And for the upcoming cruise, we have a choice of a 10 am return flight or 7 pm return flight. Ugh. 7 pm wouldn't be so bad if Spirit didn't insist on letting us drop luggage off no earlier than 4 hours before the flight.

[JordanF]

The OP is one cool customer!  I think you can make the early flight unless something goes wrong.  For myself, I would just spend too much of my valuable cruise time worrying about this--so for MY peace of mind, I would not do it.  I acknowledge that this is more about what's in my head, but hey, it's my vacation.  So, for example, last year we had a cruise arriving to Fort Lauderdale in the morning with a choice of a 10:30 am flight or a 6:30 pm flight (all the same day).  I chose 6:30, we did the excursion to see the alligators, and still had a long afternoon at the airport.  I would do it that way again.  But, since the OP has got the early flights in the past and is cool with that--I say go for it!

[JGmf]

@colesc15 Yes, you can make your flight.  Shoot, I walked-off disembarked in Miami off an NCL ship (on a Sunday) and got to FLL by 8:15am.  Port Everglades is way closer.  Maybe take a cab instead of waiting for Uber or Lyft just to shave-off 10 minutes..

 

[jeromep]

2 hours ago, Itchy&Scratchy said:

some of us do not have that luxury.

 

1 hour ago, Itchy&Scratchy said:

we have a school aged kid who doesn't get PTO or vacation days from school... It's bad enough that we pull him out of school the day before the cruise...

 

And for the upcoming cruise, we have a choice of a 10 am return flight or 7 pm return flight. Ugh. 7 pm wouldn't be so bad if Spirit didn't insist on letting us drop luggage off no earlier than 4 hours before the flight.

 

I have an 8 y.o.  So I do understand the difficulty you are facing.  The choices we have made are that we cruise less and we only vacation when she is out of school.  If a cruise, trip across the U.S. to see the other side of the family in Georgia or another vacation option doesn't line up, well, we don't do it.  We either find something else to do, or we don't do anything.  Such is the cost of having school aged children.

 

Seeing family is difficult because we loose a whole day to air travel, even when we can get direct flights from SEA to ATL, we have one commuter flight from home to SEA, a layover there of at least 1.5 hours, but sometimes as long as 3, then 5+ hours in the air from SEA to ATL, along with the time it takes to retrieve luggage, get the rental car, and then drive north to where the in-laws are.  And we loose a whole day coming home with flights and layovers that are similar.

 

I don't consider visiting family much of a vacation.  They aren't as curious or historically excited as I am.  When we visit Atlanta and Georgia I want to visit historical landmarks, Civil War sites and such.  I still haven't gotten to the MLK Jr. Memorial, and it is near the MARTA line to Buckhead (right?).  They just aren't into that.  We end up visiting a lot of malls and chain restaurants.  I can do that at home.

 

I am glad that you are not willing to pull your kids out of school to vacation.  My mom taught 3rd grade for many years in a low performing and low income school district, and the kids that need to be in school the most were the most likely to be pulled out of school for a week or more just to visit family.  The kids that wouldn't be impacted by being out of school for a couple of days were always in school.  The irony of it all.

 

We all make our own decisions and have our own tolerances for "risk" when traveling.