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US CITIZEN BOARDING IN VANCOUVER- How long does it take to board?


Kathleen

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Our upcoming cruise is Oct 3 and we will be sailing from Vancouver. Are there extra steps we must go through as US citizens once we get to the port. We know we are required to have our Arrive Can App completed, as well as proof of vaccination and negative test but we wondered if there was a separate customs area we were required to go through before gaining entry into the port where we begin embarkation process. TIA

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Only takes about 10 minutes with good timing, I will warn you though.........there is a LOT of walking involved...it is an interesting process.

Walk down long hallway to ship check in, then double back on a lower level and walk long hallway to customs, then double back again and walk hallway to waiting area to board ship.

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12 minutes ago, dodgestang said:

Only takes about 10 minutes with good timing, I will warn you though.........there is a LOT of walking involved...it is an interesting process.

Walk down long hallway to ship check in, then double back on a lower level and walk long hallway to customs, then double back again and walk hallway to waiting area to board ship.

Thank you. We were fortunate enough to get a 1030 arrival time. So arrival around 10 or 1015 should be appropriate?

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20 minutes ago, dodgestang said:

Only takes about 10 minutes with good timing, I will warn you though.........there is a LOT of walking involved...it is an interesting process.

Walk down long hallway to ship check in, then double back on a lower level and walk long hallway to customs, then double back again and walk hallway to waiting area to board ship.

Interesting - what's the additional customs check for?  I'm assuming we'll have to hit customs the day prior when we arrive at the airport (and we'll have the ArrivCAN stuff all ready to go too).  We're on the same cruise - can't wait!

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1 hour ago, ColdRingo said:

Interesting - what's the additional customs check for?  I'm assuming we'll have to hit customs the day prior when we arrive at the airport (and we'll have the ArrivCAN stuff all ready to go too).  We're on the same cruise - can't wait!

Its US customs because you are going from Canada to US (Alaska).

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13 minutes ago, Vancity Cruiser said:

Its US customs because you are going from Canada to US (Alaska).

Wonder if we'll have to do that then? The October 3rd cruise out of Vancouver goes from there to Victoria, BC, then 5 or 6 nights of open water before hitting Hawaii (where I expect to have to hit customs at some point).  Anyone who's done that cruise know?  Not a big deal I suppose as long as we get on the ship.  🙂

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I found the process in Vancouver to be the same as any US port. As mentioned earlier,  the terminal is not well laid out, so there's tons of confusing walking to do. Overall,  we ere ready to board in about 20 minutes,  but the ship wasn't ready so we had to wait in a lounge area.

Not a great boarding experience,  but you won't have any real problems 

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It varies depending on how many ships are in port and their size.  

I've experienced the two level approach and the more direct one level approach.  The one level approach was probably shorter than most US cruise ports in terms of steps walked while the two level approach was longer.

US CBP preclearance is typically an additional step in Vancouver since cruises from Canada almost always go to the US.  This sets Vancouver apart from US cruise ports.  Some days that's an additional 5 minutes and some days it is an additional 25 minutes.  It depends how many CBP officials are on hand and how complicated the folks in the queue in front of you are to process.  

On my last visit the person directing traffic suggested I don't use the Global Entry queue because it was very deep compared to the general queue.  I watched it as we inched forward and it was very close by the time I reached an official.  I might have saved 2 minutes had I taken the GE lane but then I would have been blocking both queues given how backed up GE was.  It's hard to blame Vancouver because US CBP was slow that day.  That's on US CBP.

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8 hours ago, ColdRingo said:

Interesting - what's the additional customs check for?  I'm assuming we'll have to hit customs the day prior when we arrive at the airport (and we'll have the ArrivCAN stuff all ready to go too).  We're on the same cruise - can't wait!

Lol

You just reminded me of my Vancouver flight post cruise.

we arrived at 9am for a 1pm flight but you can’t enter through security until 3 hours prior to the flight.  We sat in a waiting area outside security 

When allowed, we did security and customs and waited for our flight at our gate, only to find later it was not leaving on time and we’d miss our connection in Seattle.  Our new flight wasn’t until much later so once again we had to leave the gated area, going through customs again, to wait until we were allowed back into the gated area, only to go through customs again to finally catch our plane, which almost didn’t take off when the pilot was delayed from his connection.  Ah, memories….

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11 hours ago, Pattycruise said:

Lol

You just reminded me of my Vancouver flight post cruise.

we arrived at 9am for a 1pm flight but you can’t enter through security until 3 hours prior to the flight.  We sat in a waiting area outside security 

When allowed, we did security and customs and waited for our flight at our gate, only to find later it was not leaving on time and we’d miss our connection in Seattle.  Our new flight wasn’t until much later so once again we had to leave the gated area, going through customs again, to wait until we were allowed back into the gated area, only to go through customs again to finally catch our plane, which almost didn’t take off when the pilot was delayed from his connection.  Ah, memories….

Unless you wanted to go explore elsewhere you don't need to leave the gated area because your flight was delayed. Once you are through you are through.

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20 hours ago, Kathleen said:

Thank you. We were fortunate enough to get a 1030 arrival time. So arrival around 10 or 1015 should be appropriate?

We did a 10:30 check in, starting the walk the escalator at the hotel at 10am and where on board by 10:30 (we had to sit waiting for ship to open up for a several minutes along with all the walking between stations where we did things 😉 )

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20 hours ago, ColdRingo said:

Interesting - what's the additional customs check for?  I'm assuming we'll have to hit customs the day prior when we arrive at the airport (and we'll have the ArrivCAN stuff all ready to go too).  We're on the same cruise - can't wait!

Customs is always confusing.  Even if you fly into Canada in the AM of the cruise, you fill out arrivecan for that flight, and then you fill it out again for the cruise.  It is like a prefill out that you are coming back in x number of days.

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On 8/26/2022 at 7:49 AM, dodgestang said:

Customs is always confusing.  Even if you fly into Canada in the AM of the cruise, you fill out arrivecan for that flight, and then you fill it out again for the cruise.  It is like a prefill out that you are coming back in x number of days.

I'm flying to Canada for the Vancouver departure on Sunday. Can I fill out two ArriveCan things before I leave? The email from Royal implies you have to do the second one after you pass through customs. I'd rather just have all this done ahead of time if possible.

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1 hour ago, JMoff said:

I'm flying to Canada for the Vancouver departure on Sunday. Can I fill out two ArriveCan things before I leave? The email from Royal implies you have to do the second one after you pass through customs. I'd rather just have all this done ahead of time if possible.

No.  You can only do one arrivecan at a time but we got by just doing one arrivecan in June…Just did the one for our flight in and it was attached to our passport.  The next day when we got on the ship…No Customs or Royal asked us for the second one.  

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12 hours ago, JMoff said:

I'm flying to Canada for the Vancouver departure on Sunday. Can I fill out two ArriveCan things before I leave? The email from Royal implies you have to do the second one after you pass through customs. I'd rather just have all this done ahead of time if possible.

The APP only supports one trip at a time.  Royal email will tell you to fill out another one while at airport waiting taxi (or something like that).....the first one is hard because of the info needed, the second one is easier because your travelers are 'saved' in the app

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  • 2 weeks later...

Recent experience, the Royal part of the check in process was flawless. The problem is that Vancouver merged three ships boarding experience at the same time.

We had an 11:00 -  11:30 check in time. We were there on time despite a ton of traffic, right at 11. You board an elevator to go upstairs, line for that. You get upstairs and go to the Royal check in, which took < 10 minutes. You come out of that and are herded to US customs. You're merged with the passengers from the three other ships. You enter a Disney World line of snaking lines to get to a security check. Pass through that and you get to another series of snaking lines to get to US customs. 

We were on board by 12pm, so only an hour. We heard horror stories from people who arrived at 2pm and were worried they wouldn't make it on board by 5pm (got on at about 4:30). Highly recommend arriving early. If flying in the day of the cruise, consider flying in the day before.

Second Arrive Canada thing never got used. You only pass through US customs on the way in. On departure day, Canadian customs collected our pre-filled out form and did nothing else. Basically walk right past. 

Thanks for folks who helped me. Hope this helps others.

Jeff

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9 hours ago, JMoff said:

Recent experience, the Royal part of the check in process was flawless. The problem is that Vancouver merged three ships boarding experience at the same time.

We had an 11:00 -  11:30 check in time. We were there on time despite a ton of traffic, right at 11. You board an elevator to go upstairs, line for that. You get upstairs and go to the Royal check in, which took < 10 minutes. You come out of that and are herded to US customs. You're merged with the passengers from the three other ships. You enter a Disney World line of snaking lines to get to a security check. Pass through that and you get to another series of snaking lines to get to US customs. 

We were on board by 12pm, so only an hour. We heard horror stories from people who arrived at 2pm and were worried they wouldn't make it on board by 5pm (got on at about 4:30). Highly recommend arriving early. If flying in the day of the cruise, consider flying in the day before.

Second Arrive Canada thing never got used. You only pass through US customs on the way in. On departure day, Canadian customs collected our pre-filled out form and did nothing else. Basically walk right past. 

Thanks for folks who helped me. Hope this helps others.

Jeff

Thank you so much for checking back in and giving us your update of the procedure. It helps tremendously just knowing what to expect. We are flying in 2 days in advance so hopefully that and our 10:30 check in time will help somewhat with the lines that others reported late in the day.

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  • 4 months later...

Ditto to what Steverk said above.    We went on the first RC Alaskan cruise of the 2022 season aboard the Ovation of the Seas.  The people operating the Canadian Terminal are polite and professional, but the terminal process could use improvement.  The terminal layout is a bit of a goat-rodeo.    Arrived at the port at our designated time and told to wait in the crowd for permission to go upstairs to process, then back downstairs the way we had come.  It was queue after queue even in Sky Class with no expedited lines visible for higher class tickets as in most other ports.    We had successfully completed all pre-boarding steps prior to arrival at the terminal but it still took us about 45min once we started the process to get through.  At least it wasn't stressful.    Overall, the customs portion was quicker than expected as the aggressive Covid-19 posture was beginning to recede.

 

 

   

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