What time embark if leaving Vancouver at 11PM?

[Kingsmom]

I have searched these boards high and low and cannot find any mention of when a ship would begin embarkation if leaving Canada Place at 11:00 PM.

We are set to sail on Princess Sapphire from Vancouver to San Francisco and the itinerary states we leave Vancouver at 11:00 PM.  What time will we begin boarding?  I would like to explore Vancouver as long as we can.

 

Thank you!

[martincath]

It depends - if Princess are willing to pay OT for everyone at the pier (always including security, but if your cruise goes straight to a US port also CBP...) then in theory they might let you embark up to 2 hours before.

 

In practise though, a ~5pm cutoff like most ships is much more likely. Only Princess can confirm what the deal is!

 

Regardless though, you can drop bags early and then go wandering unencumbered - and the good news is that unless other ships on the same day are also leaving late, as soon as you get to between 2 and 3pm the queues plummet (as many ships depart 4 or 5, with a hard cap of 2 hours beforehand for showing up to check in). So even if they say you have to be onboard by, say, 6pm - you can roll in at 4 and have virtually nobody else queuing up with you, so you'll swan through all the queues superfast.

 

All the short coastals I've done add an extra Canadian port - which means no CBP Preclearance, and a bit more flexibility in how late you can embark - but does mean you also need to pad your schedule at the first US port to allow for being cleared far less efficiently! Don't book any expensive early morning excursions, in case you get stuck waiting three hours for the far-too-few CBP agents to clear your vessel at e.g. Astoria!

[d9704011]

18 minutes ago, martincath said:

All the short coastals I've done add an extra Canadian port - which means no CBP Preclearance, and a bit more flexibility in how late you can embark - but does mean you also need to pad your schedule at the first US port to allow for being cleared far less efficiently! Don't book any expensive early morning excursions, in case you get stuck waiting three hours for the far-too-few CBP agents to clear your vessel at e.g. Astoria!

I believe the cruise is Vancouver to Victoria (spend day in Vic) to SF.  So, CBP will be upon arrival in SF.

[martincath]

6 minutes ago, d9704011 said:

I believe the cruise is Vancouver to Victoria (spend day in Vic) to SF.  So, CBP will be upon arrival in SF.

That's certainly what we've experienced in the past - and SF was absolutely brutal, Golden Princess took over 3 hours to clear! Fortunately we were among the first off (it was the end of the cruise for us) and we self-disembarked so we were on the street within a half hour of arrival and off to our hotel for the weekend - we purposely booked Alcatraz for the day after arrival to be safe, and heard later there were a lot of POd pax who missed their morning slots on the very limited tours and could not book another any time over the weekend!

[Kingsmom]

Thank you all for the responses!  We live just north of SF so we don't have any plans once we arrive there other than going home.  The plan is to fly into Vancouver the evening before boarding and then spend as much time exploring before we depart. We've never been to Vancouver before so we want to make the most of the time we do have.  If you only have 1/2 a day, what would you focus your efforts on?  The only stop the cruise makes for us is in Victoria.  We plan to rent E-bikes and tour around at our leisure.  Thanks again!

[d9704011]

40 minutes ago, Kingsmom said:

Thank you all for the responses!  We live just north of SF so we don't have any plans once we arrive there other than going home.  The plan is to fly into Vancouver the evening before boarding and then spend as much time exploring before we depart. We've never been to Vancouver before so we want to make the most of the time we do have.  If you only have 1/2 a day, what would you focus your efforts on?  The only stop the cruise makes for us is in Victoria.  We plan to rent E-bikes and tour around at our leisure.  Thanks again!

Where are you staying in Vancouver?  Your plans/activities may change depending on whether you can leave your luggage with the hotel for the day or if you need to make your way to the cruise terminal to drop things off.

[Kingsmom]

14 minutes ago, d9704011 said:

Where are you staying in Vancouver?  Your plans/activities may change depending on whether you can leave your luggage with the hotel for the day or if you need to make your way to the cruise terminal to drop things off.

I have reservations at both the Blue Horizon and YMCA.  The Y is coming in about $50 cheaper.  I'm keeping an eye on both of them.  The Blue Horizon website states they can hold our luggage.  The YMCA doesn't say anything on their site or in the confirmation email.  So maybe they won't.  That might be the deciding factor...

[d9704011]

2 hours ago, Kingsmom said:

I have reservations at both the Blue Horizon and YMCA.  The Y is coming in about $50 cheaper.  I'm keeping an eye on both of them.  The Blue Horizon website states they can hold our luggage.  The YMCA doesn't say anything on their site or in the confirmation email.  So maybe they won't.  That might be the deciding factor...

Maybe you should consider the Hop On Hop Off.  Stop 3 is at the Blue Horizon Hotel.  IMO, a pretty good use of the time you have and fairly convenient for leavin/retrieving luggage and making your way to the cruise terminal.  Plans may change depending on latest boarding time Princess permits.

https://westcoastsightseeing.com/hop-on-and-hop-off/

[martincath]

Honestly @Kingsmom, with only half a day it's super-critical that you ignore any individual opinions and try to figure out the handful of places that are best for you! In theory you could get to any local attraction, with enough time to do it justice - but the big hits like Stanley Park, Grouse Mountain, MOA, even VAG if you like a current traveling art exhibit could easily eat your entire available time meaning that's all you could do... so you better make sure that the thing you do is your idea of the best possible time spend, not Joe Q Public's 'Must Do In Vancouver!!!'

 

If an overview of as many things as possible is the way you roll when time is tight, I agree that the HOHO is likely your best bet - every single coach tour wastes time by stopping places that you get no choice over, so unless you genuinely want to wander the Public Market at Granville Island (which tends to be the only stop long enough to do anything other than take some photos) they're more expensive and worse than the HOHO. Just riding the loop is about 2 hours in summer, allowing for some traffic, so if you board the first bus of the day in theory you can get off for up to 3 hours wherever you like, then still get to the pier for ~2pm.

 

If you are in BH, that stop right outside is tempting - but given that the first bus usually fills completely at the pier because most disembarking cruisers get off their ships in time to get on it! Unless some folks get off at stop 2 or 3 - highly unlikely, as they are the Pinnacle Hotel and your own, no sightseeing attractions per se - you'll very likely watch the first bus or even two sail past, too full to let anyone on... So personally I'd walk down to the pier by 8:30am - 15mins early for the first HOHO bus, hopefully early enough to get on it!

 

The other approach is trawling through Tripadvisor, starting with the top attractions as voted by Joe Q Public, and seeing which jump out as the kinds of attractions you enjoy. Hopefully you've got enough of an idea how your personal tastes differ from JQP, so you can focus on the categories likeliest to be great for you!