Leaving a Ship one Day Early

[tgetz]

Has anyone ever left a HAL ship early? WE will arrive in Buenos Aires on Saturday morning and we can overnight on the ship and disembark on sundyay am but the flights are not until 8 or 9 at night. We are considering disembarking on the day we arrive, saturday, and touring around and then just flying on home. we will have been gone 22 days by then. We have permission from HAL to do so, but we must notify the ship when we embark. We will then be told what time we must be off the ship in order to clear customs. Has anyone done this? Is ther a lot of paperwork? did you just wheel your own luggage off? can you come back on, if you go off once to get more luggage?

[jtl513]

can you come back on, if you go off once to get more luggage?

My guess is that the Security man at the gangway wouldn't know if you're just leaving for a day's excursion (with a lot of bags) or permanently. Or, if you're going back on and he objects you could say you "forgot something" ... which would be true: the rest of your baggage.

[m steve]

so there will be no hassel with security when disembarking. This needs to be done before the cruise.

[sail7seas]

If HAL has said okay, what could be the problem? Get it in writing to avoid any problem when aboard and attempting to leave. (Have whoever gave you the okay send a fax or e-mail stating you may leave the ship on the date in question.) I imagine they should know in advance as you will have to clear Customs and Immigration at the port before they permit you to proceed to the airport.

 

Sounds like a good plan to me.

 

Have a great cruise.

[Krazy Kruizers]

I am certain that once you turn in your letter at the front desk and have notified them that you are leaving the ship a day early, you can ask the front desk for a porter to help you off with your luggage.

[sail7seas]

Absolutely. They will send someone to assist with your luggage upon your request for same.

 

 

Have a great time.

[ANSalberg]

We ended up flying home a day before the cruise was over from Canada because our Grandson was graduating from high school and we CERTAINLY didn't want to miss that. Since we knew in plenty of time HAL was wonderful about helping us etc - absolutely no problem.

Relatives who cruise Princess decided to fly home early at relatively "The last minute" and did NOT notify Princess of their intentions -and Princess was VERY unhappy about it.

I think it is more or less a security issue rather than any great inconvenience for anyone.

[tgetz]

thanks everyone... I did get a letter from my TA saying HAL had ok'd but i needed to notifly the ship once on board. (I did print out that ok.) They will then notify us of what time we we must be off by- there must be someone from customs to inspect us and they are not there all day. Sounds like, s usaul, HAl handles it perfectly... :-)

[hammybee]

When a cruise ship does an overnight at its final destination port, it's not uncommon for some passengers to depart for home early. This is especially true in ports than have U.S./Canada bound flights in the late evening. My guess is that you will have plenty of company.

 

It's impossible to speculate when you will have to be off the ship because international customs are always changing.

[sail7seas]

Unless the letter from your TA has HAL attachment showing their letterhead/signature of HAL representative, I would request something directly from HAL. Just because your TA tells you what they said does not mean on the ship they will be accepting that HAL agreed to this.

 

The chances are 99.9% it would never be an issue but why leave something so simple to correct left undone?

 

A letter from your TA carries little to no weight to ship's crew. IMO

 

[arzz]

I suspect that since you are already in the "final port" of the cruise the biggest concern that HAL would have would be as others have already stated, one of security and the other being the settlement of your final bill -- knowing that you are leaving the ship so that the final bill can be settled before you go may not be a big concern of yours but it would certainly be a big concern of HAL's.

 

That being said, however, if I may, we were two days in Buenos Aires a year and a half ago and to this day we wish that we had more time there. Lots of great places to walk, shop and eat -- at very reasonable cost. Take in a tango show. We wish that we had had more time there. There were complimentary buses from the port to the shopping districts and taxis in town were very reasonable. Why not take the first day in Buenos Aires on your own and then book a city tour/airport transfer for the second day? They do offer these types of tours. You have already paid for your night on the ship.

[FLACRUISER99]

Will this mean he will only get 21 Days credit in the Mariner program instead of 22?

[sail7seas]

:D :D Good question. I think they'll give him the full cruise. ;)

 

[SDHALFAN]

I suspect that since you are already in the "final port" of the cruise the biggest concern that HAL would have would be as others have already stated, one of security and the other being the settlement of your final bill -- knowing that you are leaving the ship so that the final bill can be settled before you go may not be a big concern of yours but it would certainly be a big concern of HAL's.

 

That being said, however, if I may, we were two days in Buenos Aires a year and a half ago and to this day we wish that we had more time there. Lots of great places to walk, shop and eat -- at very reasonable cost. Take in a tango show. We wish that we had had more time there. There were complimentary buses from the port to the shopping districts and taxis in town were very reasonable. Why not take the first day in Buenos Aires on your own and then book a city tour/airport transfer for the second day? They do offer these types of tours. You have already paid for your night on the ship.

 

 

I have to agree with arzz: Buenos Aires is a beautiful city with very nice, kind and friendly residents. It would be a crying shame to venture all that way and not take advantage of being in "The Paris of the South".

 

Valerie:)

[tgetz]

We are traveling with our two grandhildren that live with us aged 7 and 9 and one other granddaughter that will be 14, and our secretary and her husband. While we might enjoy Rio for 2 days, not sure the young ones would, and they will start school again a day after we return, so thougtht we would get home a lttle sooner so they can adjust their systems to the time change. We always leave a credit card number so i am sure there is no problem with the the final bill. We have sailed many days with HAL and i really don't care if we get 19 or 20 days credit. we are going down a few days early to see some wineires so we will be gone 22 or 23 days... I do know you can leave some crusies early as long as you are in foreing ports. there is some crazy thing about american ports. can't remember exactly, but we were going to take a 64 day cruise-that was before the children lived with us- and we inquired about leaving the ship in Hawaii so we could be home for Thanksgving and somehow that would have been a problem, but the foreign ports are different. It is more a matter of getting the luggage off easily, and if we can find a porter, that is fatastic, and then the only big question is how late can we disembark, and i assume that varies from port to port and day to day. That is the way i understood it. we needed to just notify the ship and they will tell us the details on board. WE will have a private transfer so we will jsut email them from the ship. From those of you who seemed to have done this, seems like it will be no big deal, but i do understand why you might wonder why we wouldn't jsut stay on. We also still do work some :-)

[tgetz]

Just realized i had said the wrong port. we end up in Rio de Janiero, not BA. Actaully the one granddaughter has relative in BA and she will see them while we are there....

[SDHALFAN]

Just realized i had said the wrong port. we end up in Rio de Janiero, not BA. Actaully the one granddaughter has relative in BA and she will see them while we are there....

 

Well, as far as I am concerned (and I'm sure that I am in the minority here) cutting short a Rio visit will be just fine:D . I absolutely looooove Buenos Aires and would go back there in a second (maybe when I'm through with my current "Asia fixation") but I really did not like Rio at all. It really is beautiful but it was waaaay too hot and humid; noisy and crowded.

 

Just one thought: you mentioned that the flights to the U.S. don't leave until 8:00 p.m. - 9:00 p.m. Are you sure about the time because when we were there (back in 2001, and I realise that was a while ago) the flights to the U.S. did not leave Rio until midnight or 1:00 a.m. The reasoning behind this was that the flights would connect with the business flights in the U.S. the following morning.

 

I hope that you all have an absolutely sensational cruise and that you have no trouble whatsoever leaving the ship a day early - once again, if it were Rio and it were me, then I would be leaving a day early also.

 

Valerie:D