Getting to Caribbean cruise

[Jaq2]

We're planning a cruise in the Caribbean next February, meeting up with family from the US. We will fly, hopefully from Manchester, but flights look long (not direct!) and do not arrive until ship has departed that day. Is it easy to find somewhere to stay overnight and get to ports if we say fly to Miami? Or if we fly to and ship departs from Orlando is there anything we can do with our luggage all day? Same will apply on way back. Was supposed to be a half term holiday but looking like school absence fines may be necessary!

Have you already booked the cruise on its own? Most cruise lines or agents willboom to get you there the day before and add a hotel in for you. There are plenty of hotels near the ports so no issue with accommodation. Where are you flying into?

Not booked yet, looking at all the possibilities! My sister-in-law in America will book the cruise itself, we need to do flights and transfers (and maybe hotels).

We've done this lots of times. We normally arrive the day before and stay in a hotel and then the next day arrange for a private transfer to the port. We've done it from the port to the airport as well as the car rental drop off to the cruise terminal. We used a company called A1A Limo in Florida and they were great. My husband doesn't like sitting in the back of cars and the driver was happy to have him upfront, they had a good old chat. It was about $100 including the tip. This was a few years ago so may cost more now but was worth it and really easy to do.

We've stayed in both Miami and Fort Lauderdale before cruises from Port of Miami. It was very easy to get a cab from our hotel in Miami to the port on the morning of the cruise (no need to prebook)

From Fort Lauderddle we did book a shared transfer with SAS, I think it was $13 per person, and very easy.

If you fly into Orlando, it's a fairly long way from the port (over an hours drive, I think). You could hire a car, to drive it yourself, and it would give you somewhere to keep your luggage. But I'd not fly in the same day, too risky if there was a flight delay. If you book a hotel, they'd most likely look after your luggage until you were ready to head to the port.

Many thanks for your replies, very helpful. Looks like we will be going from Port Lauderdale and meet up with the various branches of the family in a Miami hotel the night before. No doubt I'll be back with more cruise questions soon!!

Who are you sailing with? I can live vicariously through you as I'm not doing Caribbean again until 2019

We always book a night pre cruise and 2 or 3 post cruise. You get a much better deal by doing it yourself rather than go with the cruiselines choice as they usually use bland chain places.