Can you request early disembarkation time?

[gargoyle999]

We'll be on our first Princess cruise in two weeks. We have an early flight out of Long Beach when we get back.

 

If we do not do self-disembarkation, can we get signed up for any early group to leave since we have an early flight or does it just go by deck?

[Pam in CA]

We'll be on our first Princess cruise in two weeks. We have an early flight out of Long Beach when we get back.

 

If we do not do self-disembarkation, can we get signed up for any early group to leave since we have an early flight or does it just go by deck?

Yes, you have two choices: you can request self-disembarkation but that means you'll have to carry ALL of your luggage, carry-on's, purses, and "stuff" off the ship and down the escalator; the other choice is to let the Pursar's Desk know you have an early flight and you'll be given luggage tags for one of the first groups to disembark.

 

No matter what, I would never, ever consider booking a flight earlier than 11AM, even in Long Beach (and after Noon at LAX). There are no guarantees that the ship will arrive on time and no one is allowed to disembark until the ship is cleared. Traffic can be a nightmare and some airlines won't check your luggage if you arrive closer than an hour before your flight. We disembarked the Sapphire last May and were being picked up by our limo; he was coming from Orange County, south of Long Beach, and was stuck in traffic for over an hour on the highway right at the exit to the pier. You just never know when it comes to traffic in the LA region.

[gargoyle999]

Yes, you have two choices: you can request self-disembarkation but that means you'll have to carry ALL of your luggage, carry-on's, purses, and "stuff" off the ship and down the escalator; the other choice is to let the Pursar's Desk know you have an early flight and you'll be given luggage tags for one of the first groups to disembark.

 

No matter what, I would never, ever consider booking a flight earlier than 11AM, even in Long Beach (and after Noon at LAX).

 

We'll our flight is at 11:15am. Not ideal but Delta kept moving the time around a dozen times or more, it was later than that when I booked back in March. Then Princess changed our arrival time from 6am to 7am a couple months ago! Could be stressful end to our trip, but I'll worry about that when I have to worry about that! :)

 

I did self debarkation a couple years ago on Carnival. It went ok but wasn't the easiest thing in the world, but now I'm two year older and even more out of shape. :) Plus I don't think we'll have a hand free to get past the escalator police so we'd have to use the elevators which I've read can be slow.

 

I'm thinking it might be almost as fast and certainly easier to just try and get as early a time as we can without doing it all ourselves. Glad to know there an option.

[gargoyle999]

Sort of a secondary question. Are cabs hard to get in San Pedro during disembarkation?

[hillslife]

Are you sure you are flying out of Long Beach, because Delta DOES NOT fly out of LB, only LAX or Orange County (John Wayne)....we are locals and fly Delta all the time....:confused:

[spongerob]

You can ask to be put into one of the "Red" (early) groups. Take a copy of your flight schedule to the guest services desk and they will take care of it.

[Sunny AZ Girl]

I have heard there is no self disembarkment in San Juan. Do you know if this is true? If it is I hope we can get an early color with a request, too. Our flight was also bumped back by the airlines to noon. I think that may be early for that port.:eek:

[bhopal21]

Sort of a secondary question. Are cabs hard to get in San Pedro during disembarkation?

 

Absolutley not. Just walk to the curb and one will be hailed and in front of you within two minutes.

 

San Pedro doesn't allow them to park directly in the loading area; but it takes only a few seconds for them to appear from a staging area.

 

The same goes for SuperShuttle.

 

Mike:)

[Willbcruisin]

We'll be on our first Princess cruise in two weeks. We have an early flight out of Long Beach when we get back.

 

If we do not do self-disembarkation, can we get signed up for any early group to leave since we have an early flight or does it just go by deck?

 

Just off Ruby and we had problems getting early tags. I filled out the paperwork that we needed to be off early for a 9am pick-up but we were given later tags. I went to the pursers desk and she actually argued with me and told me NO, I could not get off earlier. She was very rude to say the least. Then she handed me a paper with a number and said you HAVE to carry your bags yourself in order to get off any earlier than 9am. I asked for a hotel manager to contact me as I had done earlier in the week but never heard from anyone throughout the entire cruise! Needless to say this was my first and last cruise with Princess.

 

Not trying to sound negative as we did enjoy ourselves by making our own fun and we were on a ship!!!! We just did not find the level of service or friendliness we are used to receiving while cruising.

 

I only posted this as I would not like to see you encounter any issues trying to get off the ship as we did!

 

Hope you enjoy your cruise!!

[Pam in CA]

Are you sure you are flying out of Long Beach, because Delta DOES NOT fly out of LB, only LAX or Orange County (John Wayne)....we are locals and fly Delta all the time....:confused:

I agree. Are you sure you're flying out of Long Beach or Orange County (SNA)? If you're flying out of SNA, you'll need to allow more time as it's at least 30 minutes away from Long Beach.

[Pam in CA]

Just off Ruby and we had problems getting early tags. I filled out the paperwork that we needed to be off early for a 9am pick-up but we were given later tags. I went to the pursers desk and she actually argued with me and told me NO, I could not get off earlier. She was very rude to say the least. Then she handed me a paper with a number and said you HAVE to carry your bags yourself in order to get off any earlier than 9am. I asked for a hotel manager to contact me as I had done earlier in the week but never heard from anyone throughout the entire cruise! Needless to say this was my first and last cruise with Princess.

Were you being met or were you flying out the same day? The ship's priority is to get those with flights off the ship first and they have to time it so that there aren't too many people going through Immigration and Customs at the same time nor too many people picking up their luggage at the same time. They're not going to allow people who aren't flying to take up disembarkation room from those who need that time in order to make their flights. If you had an early flight, all you had to do was to show a copy of your flight arrangements and I'm sure they would have given you luggage tags to get off earlier. If you didn't have a flight and decided you wanted to get off earlier, you would have been given a time after those with flights. Not just Princess does it this way but HAL and RCCL as well.

[sunshine426]

On our last cruise we were worried that our disembarkation time was going to be cutting it close for our flight. (We like a nice cushion of time, as you never know how long immigration will take, security at the airport, unexpected traffic.....)We went down to the Purser's desk, explained the situation and asked to get off at 9am unstead of 10am. The gentleman checked the computer(I had registered our flight time with Princess) and asked us if 8:40 would be ok. We said yes and went away with new tags. On a side note, another passenger was in a spiritied argument with desk personelle and did not seem to be getting anywhere. He was most upset, so I am not sure what the difference with us was. As it was, we were off the ship, thur customs and immigration, and at FLL airport in less than one hour, so we would have been OK with our original time.

[gargoyle999]

Are you sure you are flying out of Long Beach, because Delta DOES NOT fly out of LB, only LAX or Orange County (John Wayne)....we are locals and fly Delta all the time....:confused:

 

I'm sure it's LGB. It's actually Skywest Airlines. But I booked it via the Delta website so I've just been saying Delta. I guess technically it is not. I'm not a frequent flyer so I'm not sure how all that works. As long as I get to where I'm going right? :)

 

Though they changed my reservation about 20 times since I booked in March and I've read Delta is well known for doing that! :D

[gargoyle999]

Not trying to sound negative as we did enjoy ourselves by making our own fun and we were on a ship!!!! We just did not find the level of service or friendliness we are used to receiving while cruising.

 

I only posted this as I would not like to see you encounter any issues trying to get off the ship as we did!

 

Hope you enjoy your cruise!!

 

Thank you for the heads up. Worst case we could manage to do self disembarkation. If we can get an early time I think we'll do that. If not then we'll lug it off. I'll be sure to update my flights in my Personalizer page and bring a copy of our flight itinerary to show as I plead my case. :)

[Tak8]

I think part of the problem is people who just want to get off the ship earlier are trying to get earlier times. That makes it more difficult for the people who really need to make a flight. To keep things running smoothly, Princess can only let so many off at a time.

[Lookingforfacts]

I think part of the problem is people who just want to get off the ship earlier are trying to get earlier times. That makes it more difficult for the people who really need to make a flight. To keep things running smoothly, Princess can only let so many off at a time.

 

Should people who chose to make their plane reservation earlier then suggested by the cruise line, perhaps to book a lower fare, have priority over passengers that want to disembark early to sightsee? I'm not talking about those pax that have an early flight time due to a schedule change and who aren't able to book a later flight. I think those pax who chose to book an early flight should be willing and able to self-disembark.

[Sunny AZ Girl]

Should people who chose to make their plane reservation earlier then suggested by the cruise line, perhaps to book a lower fare, have priority over passengers that want to disembark early to sightsee? I'm not talking about those pax that have an early flight time due to a schedule change and who aren't able to book a later flight. I think those pax who chose to book an early flight should be willing and able to self-disembark.

Personally, I always try to book a flight after 1 PM. I don't like to hurry off the ship. However, in our case, the only choice we had was a flight that was at 12:45 or in the late afternoon. Traveling from San Juan to Phoenix in the late afternoon would have brought us home too late for those who needed to be at work the next day - no my DH could NOT take an extra vacation day! We figured 12:45 would be closer than we like, but ok. Since then our flight has been bumped up twice & is now at noon. From what I hear disembarkment from the CB in San Juan has been a nightmare and people have been not getting off the ship until after 11:00 in some cases! So yes, I will be asking for early luggage tags. If self disembarkment is available in San Juan (it has not been) by the time we cruise we will be doing that.

 

If I had my druthers I would be staying overnight in San Juan and taking a mornng flight back. However, as I said, an extra vacation day for DH is not allowed.:(

[Pam in CA]

Thank you for the heads up. Worst case we could manage to do self disembarkation. If we can get an early time I think we'll do that. If not then we'll lug it off. I'll be sure to update my flights in my Personalizer page and bring a copy of our flight itinerary to show as I plead my case. :)

This is pretty much all arranged while you're on your cruise. As long as you have your flight information, you won't have to "plead" -- it'll all be arranged and you'll have an early disembarkation luggage tag. But, keep in mind that nothing is a given when it comes to LA (the metro area, including Long Beach) traffic. :(

[gargoyle999]

This is pretty much all arranged while you're on your cruise. As long as you have your flight information, you won't have to "plead" -- it'll all be arranged and you'll have an early disembarkation luggage tag. But, keep in mind that nothing is a given when it comes to LA (the metro area, including Long Beach) traffic. :(

 

Yeah I"m not looking forward to the traffic there. DW doesn't want me to drive our rental car cause I'm not a jerk (I mean aggressive enough). :rolleyes:

 

Guess if we miss our flight and have to spend an extra day in California it wouldn't be the end of the world. :)

[Sunviking]

We arrived in FLL on the Emerald T/A on Oct 21 and the ship was not cleared until sometime around 10AM. Frankly IMHO anyone who arranges a pickup or flight earlier does so at their own risk. Clearing the ship is out of Princess' control.

[gargoyle999]

We arrived in FLL on the Emerald T/A on Oct 21 and the ship was not cleared until sometime around 10AM. Frankly IMHO anyone who arranges a pickup or flight earlier does so at their own risk. Clearing the ship is out of Princess' control.

 

Yeah...sometimes you just gotta roll the dice! Originally our flight was 12:30pm and the ship was scheduled to get in at 6am. Now the flight is 11:15 and the ship is scheduled to get in at 7am.

 

Whatever happens, happens. But I'm not going to worry about it until I have to worry about it. :)