Miami vs. Port Canaveral

[Julianna07]

Good evening, We are heading out on a cruise out of Miami in Dec and I was wondering what differences I may encounter with PAT, Check-in, Boarding numbers, time getting on the ship, room access.

I've been on 3 cruises out of PC and was hit with the possiblity that things could be slightly different. I am a planner and I know they introduced the PAT because other ports are smaller and can't handle the masses at 10:30 so they try to stagger the influx.... Will I be able to enter the terminal earlier than my PAT?

Boarding numbers. I assume they hand those out as well in Miami... Any idea When Boarding would start?

Room access is 1:30 still I believe

So excited about the cruise but nervous about the new port.... any feed back would be wonderful!

thanks

 

[su_A_ve]

Good evening, We are heading out on a cruise out of Miami in Dec and I was wondering what differences I may encounter with PAT, Check-in, Boarding numbers, time getting on the ship, room access.

I've been on 3 cruises out of PC and was hit with the possiblity that things could be slightly different. I am a planner and I know they introduced the PAT because other ports are smaller and can't handle the masses at 10:30 so they try to stagger the influx.... Will I be able to enter the terminal earlier than my PAT?

Boarding numbers. I assume they hand those out as well in Miami... Any idea When Boarding would start?

Room access is 1:30 still I believe

So excited about the cruise but nervous about the new port.... any feed back would be wonderful!

thanks

I sailed once out of PC and twice out of MIA. The MIA port is decorated with some temporary banners, as it's not a permanent DCL terminal. It does have a parking garage across the street, so in that sense, it is similar, but no bridge on the 3rd floor.

Port opens 30' later than PC and hence PATs available are later. Also, you tend to board on deck 4 so it's not as grand of an entrance to walk to the ship.

Note that nobody boards until after 11:30 or so, and your boarding group is tied to the PAT, so arriving earlier just means waiting on the terminal.

Boarding groups get called one after another, and they all take an escalator up - people tend to bunch up near the bottom of the escalators, but CMs try to keep the area clear.

Mickey and/or Minnie do show up for photo op prior to boarding.

Don't worry! Just make sure you have your passports or birth certificates ready - not like us that we almost had to spend the day at the passport office (which is a good thing that MIA has one!) - we were able to get them overnight from home using United Airlines courier service - best $75 I ever spent. Ugh...

 

[disneylove69]

I have done both and they were both easy. They did have to open another waiting area in MIA because there was a delay in boarding and everyone was sitting/ standing by the entrance. Other than that no problems.

 

[mom4fun]

Once you're in the port, it's not that different of a process than pc. The worst part about Miami is the traffic around the port. The beauty of the port during sail away is much better than pc.

 

[darwinsrule]

Once you're in the port, it's not that different of a process than pc. The worst part about Miami is the traffic around the port. The beauty of the port during sail away is much better than pc.

The view during sail-away is wonderful. Did NCL Getaway out of POM this past August and just sat back on the balcony and watched the City fade from view. Think skyline, million dollar homes, multi-million dollar yachts.

On the Wonder in March. Honestly POM is easy. Stayed at Holiday Inn POM the night before the cruise. Taxi was less than 10 minutes to the port. Wasn't even time for a welcome aboard video . The only real issue we had was that the cell service was spotty at POM post cruise so we did have trouble calling SAS for our return transfer. Wasn't much of an issue however given that the SAS shuttles were parked 2 min away. Seeing where the Wonder is parked today I am hoping that the cell service is better on that end of the port.

 

[kamgen]

You enter on a different deck?? Not into the Atrium?? Can someone explain. After 15 DCL sailings out of PC, I am a bit thrown by this. And we like to get on the ship as soon as possible, typically within in the first 10 families or so. I am starting to regret booking out of Miami, but the kids wanted to do the Magic because of the new Avengers Academy and Aqua Dunk.
Do they still take the embarkation photo?
We also have my mom who is handicap, so we typically park right at port to avoid shuttles. Can you park and walk over? Thanks so much!!!

 

[wilma-bride]

We sailed on our PC cruise out of Miami in May. The main differences I noted were:

• They were asking to see the actual cruise booklet in order to gain access to the terminal building. i didn't have mine as I had given it to my husband (who was returning the rental car to the airport) but I had my cruise contract stuff printed out. The guy gave us a hard time but did eventually let us in.
• Whenever we have sailed out of Port Canaveral, my husband always returns the rental and I am able to check him in at the port. In Miami, however, I could not check him in - he had to check in himself when he arrived in order to receive his KTTW and lanyward.
• The terminal in Miami seemed much smaller and more crowded. In my opinion, there is not enough seating - and, obviously, it is not a dedicated DCL terminal so although it is Disney-fied, it's not the same as PC. Staff were telling people off for standing in the wrong place or sitting on the floor.
• When you board the ship, you do not enter in the atrium but rather on the deck above. It was a bit odd, to be honest. They still announce you and everything but it really isn't the same.
• The sail-away from Miami is much more picturesque than from PC - it is truly beautiful. For me, this was the one major advantage of sailing out of Miami.

 

[runskyhy]

While this trip summary is a bit old (2013), there are some photos of DCL's Miami terminal on pages 6-13 of this PDF:

website: http://www.mediafire.com/?cdyuvw7482wks
filename: feb2013sum1.pdf

Hope this helps! (Also accessible from the signature link below) Have a great trip!