At the terminal
A meter, or a queue
Almost no port publishes a transfer fare, and several publish taxi waits instead.
Cruise Port Transfers Worldwide: the right terminal, the right gate, and the only four real fares.
Almost nothing about an airport-to-ship transfer is standard. A handful of authorities publish a fare for it and the rest leave it to a meter; one port lets a taxi stop outside the terminal door while the next admits no cars at all; and the single most expensive mistake is arriving at the right port on the wrong side of it.
- Europe
- Americas
- Asia & Gulf
- Oceania & Africa
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Booked ahead
One figure, agreed
Per vehicle, settled before you fly, tied to the terminal on your ticket.
Your transfer, in three
- Terminal, off the ticketFive at Southampton, three at Yokohama, two in Sydney
- Watched to the runwayA slipped inbound drags the pickup with it; the ship will not wait
- Gate the driver can useCars and coaches are often sent to different ones
Start here
Six questions that decide an embarkation day
Six questions that decide an embarkation day, answered in full before the page goes port by port. Nothing below contradicts anything here.
- Does an official airport-to-cruise-port fare exist?
- Almost nowhere. Across every port authority, terminal operator and taxi regulator we read, only 4 publish a fare for this journey: Barcelona fixes €46 either way between the airport and the Moll Adossat terminals, Vancouver’s port authority publishes $42 to Canada Place, New Orleans’ airport publishes $36 into the district both cruise terminals sit in, and New South Wales is trialling $60 from a Sydney Airport rank into the central area. Everywhere else it is a meter, a cruise line’s coach, or a price you agree in advance.
- What goes wrong most often?
- The terminal, not the price. Southampton has five terminals behind four dock gates with no walking route between the Eastern and Western Docks. Seattle has two piers about 8 km apart used by different lines. Sydney has two on opposite sides of the harbour. Carnival sails from Long Beach while four other lines sail from San Pedro, a different port in a different city. A cruise sold as Tokyo usually leaves from Yokohama, 65 km away.
- Which transfer is genuinely hard?
- Civitavecchia for Rome. The port publishes about 60 km to Fiumicino, there is no rail link, and its own suggested route runs airport, train towards Rome, change at Roma Trastevere, train to Civitavecchia — then a shuttle inside the estate, because the only vehicle gate is Varco Vespucci. Galveston is the other one: the Port of Galveston puts Houston Intercontinental, where the long-haul lands, at about an hour and a half away.
- Do you cover every cruise port?
- No. The network publishes airport pages for 81 countries, and a cruise transfer works where one of those airports is the one you actually fly into. That covers every homeport in this page’s tables. It does not cover Iceland, Hong Kong, Thailand, Puerto Rico, Aruba or the Bahamas, and the German airport pages do not credibly reach the northern German cruise ports. They are all named further down rather than left for you to discover.
- How is our own fare worked out?
- Per vehicle, in the currency of the booking, agreed before you travel — not per person and not on a meter. The class follows the suitcase count rather than the seat count, which on an embarkation morning is usually a bigger vehicle than people expect.
- What do you need from me?
- The flight number, the ship’s terminal as your cruise documents name it, and the bag count. The flight number fixes the pickup to the real landing time; the terminal fixes the gate; the bag count fixes the vehicle.
Our vehicles
Nine vehicles, and the one that fits a fortnight of cruise luggage
From a saloon up to a 50-seater coach. On an embarkation morning the sentence to read twice is the second one: the fare is for the vehicle, and cruise luggage — not the head count — is what decides which class you need.
Normally a Volkswagen Passat or similarSaloon taxi
4 passengers, 2 large bags
Two people with a case each. Rarer than you would think on a sailing day.
View vehicle →
Normally a Mercedes E-Class or similarExecutive car
3 passengers, 2 large bags
Up to three, when the arrival is part of the business and not just the getting there.
View vehicle →
Normally an estate taxiEstate taxi
4 passengers, 3 large bags
Four people whose cruise cases will not close a saloon boot.
View vehicle →
Normally a 6-seater MPV people carrierPeople carrier
5 to 6 passengers, 4 to 5 large bags
Five or six with a pushchair and a fortnight of formal nights.
View vehicle →
Normally a 7 seater taxi7 seater taxi
7 passengers, 7 cabin bags
Seven travelling light, which on a cruise means cabin bags only.
View vehicle →
Normally an 8 seater taxi8 seater taxi
8 passengers, 6 to 8 large bags
Eight people and six large cases — the shape most cruise parties actually arrive in.
View vehicle →
Normally a 16 seater minibus16 seater minibus
16 passengers, about 14 large bags
An extended family off one flight, kept together to one gate.
View vehicle →
Normally a 30-seater coach30-seater coach
30 seats
Charter groups and incentive parties past minibus size.
View vehicle →
Normally a 50-seater coach50-seater coach
50 seats
Full-ship charters and group embarkations, booked well ahead.
View vehicle →| Extra | What to know |
|---|---|
| Child seats | Infant, child and booster seats are available on request at no extra cost. In Spain a seat is needed for children under 135 cm, with a narrow exemption for taxis on urban journeys, so give us the children’s ages when you book. |
| Golf clubs, skis, bikes, dive gear | Fine with notice. Tell us the item and its length at booking so a vehicle with the right load space is allocated. |
| Wheelchair-accessible vehicles | Request one at booking so we can confirm a suitable vehicle for your route and date. |
Every vehicle is shown on our fleet page. Models are typical for each class, so your quote confirms what is offered. Tell us your party size and bag count so the right vehicle is allocated.
Reviews
What travellers say, in their own words
The scores below are the ones our review widget publishes, checked on 14 October 2026. They come from travellers at airports across our network, and we show a selection of passenger reviews about airport transfers. Every review stays on the platform where it was written.
Write a review
Excellent4.9453 reviewsShowing all 10 reviews
- Paul Phillips22 Sep 2026Google
Excellent service...arrived at terminal and driver was waiting...helped with luggage to the car...smooth drive...perfect overall
Very reliable and easy to get a hold of. I was very confused leaving the airport - user error haha - and they were super helpful. My flight was also delayed and the guy who picked me up was on top of it.
Super affordable and professional service! The pricing was very clear from the start, with no hidden charges, which I really appreciated. Everything went smoothly, and the professionalism of the global airport taxi service stood out. Highly recommended for anyone looking for a hassle-free and budget-friendly option.
- Christina Bundrick20 Sep 2026Google
Amazing taxi service to the airport! Our driver was friendly, on time, and made the whole trip so easy. The car was clean and comfortable, and we got to the airport right on time. Would definitely use this service again!
- AnonymouslyProvenExpertProvenExpert
Excellent service , driver waited for us as flight was delayed, clean car and smooth ride
I would totally recommend Global Airport Taxi to anyone needing a taxi service for their airport commute. I decided on way to the airport that I was flying out of that I will need a cab service at LHR. They were quick to respond to and accommodated some of my last minute schedule change requests after I had landed at LHR. Totally reliable and willing to be flexible. Outstanding customer support provided by Jennifer and Root. Keep it up guys !!
- Sarah Finch22 Sep 2026Google
This was a brilliant service our driver was excellent he was friendly and helpful. Used again for the return journey and driver was professional and ensured we made it to the airport on time with heavy traffic
The service was extremely reliable. My cab arrived exactly on time for my early morning flight, which was a huge relief. Everything went smoothly, and I felt confident choosing this service. Highly recommend global airport taxi for stress-free airport transfers!
Amazing customer service, on time driver helped with cases. A pleasant experience Thank you
- BarhamK11 Apr 2026Yell
Very clean car and on time very polite driver will use them again
These scores cover the whole network rather than cruise transfers alone. Trustindex supplies the widget, and every review appears exactly as its author wrote it. Nothing on this page is a review we wrote.
The service
What you are actually booking, and what the line sells instead
A private vehicle between an airport and a named cruise terminal, priced per vehicle before travel, with the terminal taken off your cruise documents rather than guessed.
The short answer A private, pre-booked vehicle from your arrivals hall to the cruise terminal your ship is actually using. The fare is agreed per vehicle before you fly, the booking is tied to your flight number so a delay moves it rather than breaking it, and the vehicle class is set by your luggage rather than your head count.
A private transfer, not a shared coach
One vehicle for your party, door to door from the arrivals hall to the terminal your ship is at. No other passengers, no circuit of hotels, and no waiting for a coach to fill.
Tied to your flight, not the timetable
The booking follows your flight number. A late inbound moves the pickup with it, which on an embarkation morning is the part that matters most, because the ship will not wait.
Sized for cruise luggage
Cruise cases are bigger and there are more of them. The vehicle class is set from the bag count, so four people with a fortnight of luggage get an estate or a people carrier rather than a saloon that cannot close its boot.
One figure, agreed first
Per vehicle, in the currency of the booking, settled before you fly. Traffic, a diversion or a slow carousel do not change it, because there is no meter running.
What the figure has inside it
A licensed professional driver, the vehicle class you booked, flight tracking against your inbound, the driver meeting you inside the arrivals hall of the terminal you actually landed in with a name board, help with the luggage, child seats if you asked for them, and 60 minutes of waiting from the moment you touch down. On a pickup from the ship the included waiting is 90 minutes instead, because disembarkation runs to the ship’s schedule rather than yours.
Both directions, and the awkward middle
Airport to ship on embarkation morning, ship to airport on disembarkation day, and the version most people actually need: airport to a hotel the night before, then hotel to the terminal in the morning. A cruise port to airport leg at the end books the same way, and a return transfer priced with the outbound usually beats two separate bookings. That is two bookings or one with an extra stop, and it is worth pricing both ways because at several ports the terminal does not open early enough to go straight there.
Where a cruise line’s own transfer wins, and where it does not
A line transfer is simple and it is usually priced per person, so a couple often does well and a family of five rarely does. The conditions are the real difference. Carnival will only run its Long Beach transfers if your flight lands at Los Angeles by 12:00 or Long Beach by 12:30, on embarkation and debarkation days only, and publishes no price at all. Miss the window and there is no transfer, which is a worse problem than a higher fare.
The money
Four cruise transfer fares in the world are official. Here they all are
Nine published fare positions, each read at the authority that sets or records it. Four are real fixed fares, one covers half the journey people need, one is an average the port is careful not to call a tariff, and one is a flat fare that has been abolished.
The short answer Four authorities in the world publish a fixed airport to cruise terminal fare: Barcelona at €46, Vancouver at $42, New Orleans at $36 into the district its terminals sit in, and the New South Wales trial at $60 from a Sydney Airport rank. Miami used to and abolished it. Everywhere else, an official fare does not exist.
| Place | What it covers | The figure | Kind | Published by |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Barcelona | Airport to the Moll Adossat cruise terminals | €46 fixed | Fixed | Àrea Metropolitana de Barcelona |
| Vancouver | Airport to Canada Place | $42 flat | Fixed | Vancouver Fraser Port Authority |
| New Orleans | Airport to the Central Business District and French Quarter | $36 for up to two | Fixed | Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport |
| Sydney | Airport rank to the central business district trial area | $60 fixed, $80 for a maxi | Fixed | New South Wales Government |
| New York | JFK to Manhattan only | $70 flat | Partial | New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission |
| Fort Lauderdale | Airport to Port Everglades | $18 to $21, as an average | Average | Port Everglades |
| Miami | Airport or seaport, any destination | No flat fare exists | None | Miami-Dade County |
| Singapore | Trips starting at Changi | Surcharges, not a fare | None | Changi Airport Group |
| Shanghai | Wusongkou terminal to the airports | About ¥200 and ¥150 | Dated | Shanghai municipal government |
Prices move. Port authorities, airport operators and taxi regulators each reset on their own calendar, and we review ours, so treat every figure on this page as a guide and read your quote as the price.
What each of those figures actually means
- Barcelona — €46 fixed
- Tariff T-4. Either direction, every supplement included. The only genuine airport to cruise terminal fixed fare we found anywhere in Europe.
- Vancouver — $42 flat
- Downtown hotels and Pacific Central Station from $16; everything else metered. The page does not label the currency, which here reads as Canadian dollars.
- New Orleans — $36 for up to two
- $15 per passenger for three or more. Both cruise terminals sit inside the zone the fare covers, and taxis are required to take cards.
- Sydney — $60 fixed, $80 for a maxi
- A fixed-fare trial, with road tolls and airport access fees not added on top. The trial area is set by a map we could not open, so whether the Overseas Passenger Terminal falls inside it is unconfirmed. A separate $5.45 airport toll applies to every taxi taken from a rank.
- New York — $70 flat
- Plus surcharges. It reaches the Manhattan Cruise Terminal and stops there: Cape Liberty is in New Jersey, where a yellow cab is metered under out-of-city rules and the passenger pays the driver’s return tolls. LaGuardia has no flat fare at all.
- Fort Lauderdale — $18 to $21, as an average
- The port is careful to publish this as an average subject to change rather than as a tariff. It publishes no figure from Miami.
- Miami — No flat fare exists
- The county eliminated the airport to seaport flat rate along with its zone fares. Journeys are metered with a $15 minimum from the airport or the seaport and a $2 per-trip surcharge; vans and SUVs add 30 per cent.
- Singapore — Surcharges, not a fare
- S$8 between 17:00 and 23:59 and S$6 otherwise, with 25 per cent at peak and 50 per cent between midnight and 05:59. No flat-fare scheme exists and the flag-down rate varies by company.
- Shanghai — About ¥200 and ¥150
- Pudong about ¥200 and 70 minutes, Hongqiao about ¥150 and 50 minutes, the city centre about ¥100. Published in 2018, so indicative rather than current.
Why so few ports publish one
Because the fare is almost never the port’s to set. A port authority publishes directions, gates and berths; the price is set by whichever taxi regulator covers the city, and regulators publish tariffs rather than point-to-point fares. Barcelona is the exception that proves it: the metropolitan authority there sets a named fixed fare for the cruise dock, which is why Barcelona is the only European port on this page with a real number against it. Vancouver is unusual in the other direction — the port authority itself publishes the taxi fare.
What a surcharge regime does to a quoted price
Where there is no fixed fare, the add-ons decide the bill. Changi loads S$8 on a trip starting at the airport between 17:00 and 23:59, 25 per cent at peak and 50 per cent between midnight and 05:59. Sydney charges a $5.45 toll on every taxi taken from a rank. Barcelona charges €4.60 for the airport and another €4.60 for the Moll Adossat cruise dock, which is most of the reason its fixed fare sits where it does. A metered estimate that ignores these is not an estimate.
The one that costs real money
New York. The Taxi and Limousine Commission’s $70 JFK flat fare reaches Manhattan and stops at the state line. Cape Liberty is in Bayonne, New Jersey, so a yellow cab from JFK or LaGuardia runs on the meter under out-of-city rules and you pay the driver’s return tolls as well as your own. Newark is the near airport at about nine miles. Plenty of passengers book JFK for a cruise that sails from New Jersey.
Coverage, honestly
The ports we reach, and the ten we will not pretend to
The network publishes airport pages for 81 countries. A cruise transfer follows that footprint rather than a separate one, so this section says plainly which cruise regions are inside it and which are not.
The short answer Coverage follows the airport network, not a separate cruise network: the transfer works wherever the airport you land at is one of the 81 countries with a published airport page, which includes every port in the tables on this page. It does not include Iceland, Hong Kong, Thailand, Puerto Rico, Aruba or the Bahamas, and the German pages do not credibly reach the northern German cruise ports.
How the coverage actually works
We are an airport transfer operator, and a cruise terminal is an address. So the question is never whether we have a cruise network — it is whether the airport you fly into is one of the 81 countries the network publishes pages for. Where it is, the terminal is simply a destination on the booking, and that covers every port in the three tables below. Where it is not, no amount of willingness makes a car appear, and we would rather tell you that before you book a flight than after.
Why this page names the gaps
Because a worldwide page that implies worldwide coverage is the single most common piece of dishonesty in this market, and it does real damage: a passenger books a flight to Keflavík or Kai Tak on the strength of a page like this one and finds out at the airport. The list below is the ports people ask us about that the published network does not reach.
Ports we are asked about and do not serve
- Reykjavik, Iceland
- Iceland is not one of the 81 countries with an airport page, so a Keflavík to Skarfabakki transfer is not part of the published network.
- Kai Tak and Ocean Terminal, Hong Kong
- Hong Kong is not in the published network. Worth knowing anyway: the government’s own figures record taxi waits at Kai Tak averaging 15 to 30 minutes, and nearly two hours on one Queen Mary 2 call.
- Laem Chabang, for Bangkok, Thailand
- Thailand is not in the published network, and this is the hardest transfer on anybody’s list — the pier is in Chonburi, not Bangkok, and Seabourn puts its own ship-to-Bangkok coach at about two hours each way.
- San Juan, Puerto Rico
- Puerto Rico is not in the published network. The port itself puts the airport at about 7 miles, and the Old San Juan piers and the Panamerican terminals sit on opposite sides of the bay.
- Oranjestad, Aruba
- Aruba is not in the published network, though the port publishes the shortest airport hop of any homeport we looked at — a little over two miles.
- Nassau, Bahamas
- The Bahamas are not in the published network. The cruise port publishes no on-site parking at all and a taxi time of about 20 minutes from the airport.
- Hamburg, Kiel and Warnemünde, Germany
- The German airport pages cover Frankfurt, Berlin and Munich. None of them is a credible road transfer to the northern cruise ports — Rostock puts Hamburg at about two and a half hours and Berlin at about three from Warnemünde.
- Bergen, Norway
- The Norwegian page covers Oslo, which is the wrong side of the country. Bergen also runs a strict ISPS regime: a visitor needs documentation of their errand plus photo identification, and the port does not publish whether a taxi may reach the ship at all.
- Venice, Trieste and Ravenna, Italy
- The Italian airport pages cover Rome Fiumicino and Milan Malpensa. Neither is a sensible transfer to the northern Adriatic, and the terminal naming at Venice has changed recently enough that we will not publish it from memory.
- Cozumel, Mexico
- The Mexican pages cover Mexico City and Cancun. Cozumel is an island with no road connection to the mainland, so it is reached by its own airport or by ferry from Playa del Carmen — structurally unlike every other port on this page.
Europe
Europe and the Mediterranean: 12 homeports, terminal by terminal
12 homeports, from the one port in Europe with a real fixed transfer fare to the one the port authority routes you to by three trains. Every terminal name below is the name the port or its operator uses for itself.
The short answer Barcelona is the only European port with an official fixed airport to cruise terminal fare, at €46 either way. Civitavecchia is the hardest transfer, at about 60 km from Fiumicino with no rail link and one vehicle gate. Southampton is the most mistaken, with five terminals behind four dock gates and no walking route between the Eastern and Western Docks.
| Port | Authority or operator | Airports | Terminals | Published fare |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Southampton, England | Port of Southampton | London Heathrow LHR, London Gatwick LGW, Southampton SOU | 5 | None published |
| Dover, England | Port of Dover | London Gatwick LGW, London Heathrow LHR | 2 | None published |
| Barcelona, Spain | Port de Barcelona | Josep Tarradellas Barcelona-El Prat BCN | 5 | A fixed €46 either way between the Moll Adossat terminals and the airport, all supplements included — tariff T-4 in the metropolitan schedule. |
| Civitavecchia, for Rome, Italy | Port of Civitavecchia | Rome Fiumicino FCO, Rome Ciampino CIA | 3 | None published |
| Piraeus, for Athens, Greece | Piraeus Port Authority | Athens International ATH | 1 | None published |
| Lisbon, Portugal | Porto de Lisboa | Lisbon Humberto Delgado LIS | 3 | None published |
| Valletta, Malta | Valletta Cruise Port | Malta International MLA | 2 | None published |
| Palma de Mallorca, Spain | Autoritat Portúaria de Balears | Palma de Mallorca PMI | 2 | None published |
| Amsterdam, Netherlands | Passenger Terminal Amsterdam | Amsterdam Schiphol AMS | 1 | None published |
| Copenhagen, Denmark | Copenhagen Malmö Port | Copenhagen CPH | 1 | None published |
| Genoa, Italy | Stazioni Marittime S.p.A., Ports of Genoa | Milan Malpensa MXP | 2 | None published |
| Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Canary Islands | Puertos de Tenerife | Tenerife North TFN, Tenerife South TFS | 2 | None published |
None of these are final prices. The bodies that publish them change them on their own schedules, so the figure that binds is the one on your quote.
Each port in full
Southampton, England
SOUTHAMPTON
Port of Southampton
- Terminals
- Queen Elizabeth II Cruise Terminal. Eastern Docks. Entry by Dock Gate 4, then Test Road for about a mile; the terminal is on the right. Satnav SO14 3GG
- Ocean Cruise Terminal. Eastern Docks, Berth 46/47 on Cunard Road. Entry by Dock Gate 4. Satnav SO14 3QN
- Mayflower Cruise Terminal. Western Docks, Imperial Way. Drivers are directed to Dock Gate 20, with Dock Gate 10 as the alternative. Satnav SO15 0GN
- Horizon Cruise Terminal. Western Docks, 102 Berth, West Bay Road. Entry by Dock Gate 10, then up Horizon Way. Satnav SO15 1AW
- City Cruise Terminal. Western Docks, 101 Berth, Solent Road. Entry by Dock Gate 8. Satnav SO15 1HJ
- Airports
- London Heathrow (LHR); London Gatwick (LGW); Southampton (SOU)
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- Associated British Ports states in each terminal’s own passenger directions that “private taxis can drop off directly outside of the cruise terminal”. The gate, not the terminal name, is what a driver needs: five terminals sit behind four different dock gates.
- Easy to get wrong
- The Eastern and Western Docks are separate entrances and there is no walking route between them. A car sent to Dock Gate 4 for a Western Docks sailing has to leave the estate and re-enter somewhere else.
Dover, England
DOVER
Port of Dover
- Terminals
- Dover Cruise Terminal 1. Western Docks, postcode CT17 9DQ
- Dover Cruise Terminal 2. Western Docks, same approach and postcode
- Airports
- London Gatwick (LGW) — about 78 miles, roughly 125 km, about 1 hour 20 minutes, as published by the port; London Heathrow (LHR)
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- Vehicles reach the terminal car park directly, so there is no internal shuttle to allow for. The approach is the M20 to the A20, then the Limekiln roundabout and the signposted cruise terminal route.
Barcelona, Spain
BARCELONA
Port de Barcelona
- Terminals
- Terminals A, B and C. South Wharf and Moll Adossat; berthing lines 305 m, 318 m and 367 m
- Terminal D, Palacruceros. Moll Adossat, 425 m berthing line
- Terminal E, Helix. Moll Adossat, 475 m, operated by Barcelona Cruise Terminal
- Terminal H. Moll Adossat, 400 m, operated by MSC Cruises Barcelona Terminal SLU
- WTC Barcelona. Moll de Barcelona, 350 m, and the one terminal inside the city at 400 m from the centre
- Airports
- Josep Tarradellas Barcelona-El Prat (BCN)
- Published fare
- A fixed €46 either way between the Moll Adossat terminals and the airport, all supplements included — tariff T-4 in the metropolitan schedule. It is the only fare of its kind we could find anywhere in Europe.
- On the day
- The €4.60 Moll Adossat supplement and the €4.60 airport supplement are separate charges on a metered journey, which is why a run that touches both ends up where the fixed fare sits.
- Easy to get wrong
- Moll Adossat is a long breakwater. Terminals A to H are spread along it between about 2 and 3.9 km from the city, while WTC is in the city itself.
- Our pages
- Barcelona Airport taxi
Civitavecchia, for Rome, Italy
CIVITAVECCHIA
Port of Civitavecchia
- Terminals
- Amerigo Vespucci Terminal. Opened 2018
- Donato Bramante Terminal. Pier 12, opened December 2025
- Three further cruise terminals. Operated by Roma Cruise Terminal across berths 10, 11, 12, 12bis, 13, 13bis and 25. The operator does not publish names for these three, so this page does not invent any
- Airports
- Rome Fiumicino (FCO) — about 60 km, as published by the port; Rome Ciampino (CIA) — about 85 km, as published by the port
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- The only vehicle entrance is Varco Vespucci. Varco Nord is restricted to heavy and internal service traffic. Inside the estate a free cruise shuttle links berths 10 to 13bis and berth 25 with the Largo della Pace service centre, running to ship schedules.
- Easy to get wrong
- There is no rail link from Fiumicino. The port’s own route is airport, then a train towards Rome, then a change at Roma Trastevere, then a train to Civitavecchia — and you are still not at the ship.
- Our pages
- Rome Fiumicino Airport taxi
Piraeus, for Athens, Greece
PIRAEUS
Piraeus Port Authority
- Terminals
- Three passenger terminals. The authority publishes three terminals and eleven simultaneous berthing places but does not name them, so this page does not either
- Airports
- Athens International (ATH)
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- The authority publishes a free internal shuttle bus, the X96 bus to the airport, the X80 to Syntagma and the metro. It publishes no distance and no drive time.
- Easy to get wrong
- The authority calls Piraeus an important Mediterranean destination rather than a turnaround homeport, and the terminal names in wide circulation are not the ones it uses.
- Our pages
- Athens Airport taxi
Lisbon, Portugal
LISBON
Porto de Lisboa
- Terminals
- Lisbon Cruise Terminal. Concession held by LCP – Lisbon Cruise Port, Lda., at Doca Jardim do Tabaco
- Santa Apolónia Cruise Terminal. Beside the Santa Apolónia rail terminus
- Gare Marítima da Rocha Conde de Óbidos. West of the centre, on the Alcântara waterfront
- Airports
- Lisbon Humberto Delgado (LIS)
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- The port authority publishes the concession holder’s regulated maximum tariffs, but those are ship and terminal service charges, not passenger transfer fares.
- Easy to get wrong
- Three terminals strung along several kilometres of waterfront, and the authority’s terminal index does not say which one handles turnarounds.
- Our pages
- Lisbon Airport taxi
Valletta, Malta
VALLETTA
Valletta Cruise Port
- Terminals
- Magazino Terminal. Check-in and embarkation are generally handled here, reached from the Marsa side or by Crucifix Hill
- Valletta Waterfront, Pinto Wharf. Vault 1, Upper Floor, Floriana — the registered port address
- Airports
- Malta International (MLA) — approximately a 15-minute drive, as published by the port
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- The operator states plainly that there is no dedicated shuttle service: access is by public transport, taxi or on foot. Only ticketed passengers and authorised staff pass the security points, and anyone seeing a passenger off can go no further than the public areas of the Valletta Waterfront.
- Our pages
- Malta Airport taxi
Palma de Mallorca, Spain
PALMA
Autoritat Portúaria de Balears
- Terminals
- Berth P181. Alineación Norte de la Plataforma del Dique del Oeste
- Berth P120. Ampliación Muelle de Poniente Norte
- Airports
- Palma de Mallorca (PMI) — about 10 km from the port, as published by the port
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- A binding port instruction designates P181 and P120 for cruise calls, normally two ships at a time, and sets the order of preference: ships based in Palma first, then larger gross tonnage, then more passengers. Overflow goes elsewhere in the port.
- Easy to get wrong
- The authority lists six maritime stations across 11,780 m of berths but does not say which of them handle cruise ships, so the berth matters more than the station name.
- Our pages
- Palma de Mallorca Airport taxi
Amsterdam, Netherlands
AMSTERDAM
Passenger Terminal Amsterdam
- Terminals
- Passenger Terminal Amsterdam. Piet Heinkade 27, 1019 BR Amsterdam. The terminal has added river cruise under the name Cruise Port Amsterdam and has been acquired by Port of Amsterdam, so the naming is in transition
- Airports
- Amsterdam Schiphol (AMS)
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- The terminal publishes a driving route rather than a distance: leave the A4 at the De Nieuwe Meer junction onto the A10 south, then follow the A10 towards the Centrum, Zeeburg, Artis and IJburg exit.
- Our pages
- Amsterdam Airport taxi
Copenhagen, Denmark
COPENHAGEN
Copenhagen Malmö Port
- Terminals
- Oceankaj, Ydre Nordhavn. Three identical terminal buildings of 3,300 m² each along an 1,100 m quay, opened by Queen Margrethe II on 2 May 2014. The port’s own release does not give the three buildings individual names
- Airports
- Copenhagen (CPH)
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- There is no metro station at Oceankaj. The port states that one will be built not far from the terminals in future, and that the Nordhavnstunnelen opening in 2027 will improve access to Ydre Nordhavn. Until then every passenger needs a road transfer.
- Our pages
- Copenhagen Airport taxi
Genoa, Italy
GENOA
Stazioni Marittime S.p.A., Ports of Genoa
- Terminals
- Ponte dei Mille. Over 16,000 m² on three levels, two large ships, up to 10,000 passengers a day, a 340 m quay plus a 290 m berth being extended to 376 m
- Ponte Andrea Doria. About 11,000 m² on two floors, two 300 m berths, up to 8,000 passengers a day
- Airports
- Milan Malpensa (MXP)
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- Stazioni Marittime runs five passenger terminals across twelve berths and about 3,981 m of quay, so the terminal name is the useful instruction, not the port name.
- Our pages
- Milan Malpensa Airport taxi
Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Canary Islands
TENERIFE
Puertos de Tenerife
- Terminals
- Muelle Sur. The cruise operations section of the port, which publishes its own Cruise Operations Protocol
- A dedicated enclosure for MSC embarkation. The port has published that it enabled a separate enclosure for MSC embarkation and disembarkation operations
- Airports
- Tenerife North (TFN); Tenerife South (TFS)
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- The island has two airports and they are not interchangeable: most long-haul and charter traffic lands at Tenerife South, which is the longer run to Santa Cruz.
The Americas
North America and the Caribbean: 14 homeports, two of them not where you think
14 homeports, including the three with published flat fares, the one whose flat fare was abolished, and the pair that sit in two different states under one marketing name.
The short answer Vancouver and New Orleans publish flat fares of $42 and $36; Miami abolished its flat fare and is now metered with a $15 minimum; and New York’s $70 JFK flat fare does not reach Cape Liberty, which is in New Jersey. Galveston is the longest mainstream transfer in the region, at about an hour and a half from Houston Intercontinental by the port’s own figure.
| Port | Authority or operator | Airports | Terminals | Published fare |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Miami, Florida | PortMiami | Miami International MIA, Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International FLL | 7 | There is no longer a flat fare. |
| Fort Lauderdale, Florida | Port Everglades | Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International FLL, Miami International MIA | 3 | The port publishes an average rather than a tariff: a taxi from Fort Lauderdale airport to Port Everglades averages $18 to $21, subject to change. |
| Port Canaveral, Florida | Canaveral Port Authority | Orlando International MCO, Orlando Melbourne MLB, Orlando Sanford SFB | 2 | None published |
| Galveston, Texas | Port of Galveston | Houston William P. Hobby HOU, Houston George Bush Intercontinental IAH | 4 | None published |
| Tampa, Florida | Port Tampa Bay | Tampa International TPA | 3 | None published |
| New Orleans, Louisiana | Port of New Orleans | Louis Armstrong New Orleans International MSY | 2 | The airport publishes a flat fare of $36. |
| Charleston, South Carolina | South Carolina Ports Authority | Charleston International CHS | 1 | None published |
| Baltimore, Maryland | Maryland Port Administration | Baltimore/Washington International BWI, Washington Dulles IAD, Washington Reagan National DCA | 1 | None published |
| New York and New Jersey | Manhattan Cruise Terminal and Cape Liberty | Newark Liberty EWR, New York JFK JFK, New York LaGuardia LGA | 2 | New York’s regulated fares only reach Manhattan. |
| Seattle, Washington | Port of Seattle | Seattle-Tacoma International SEA | 2 | None published |
| San Pedro and Long Beach, California | Port of Los Angeles and Port of Long Beach | Los Angeles International LAX, Long Beach LGB | 2 | None published |
| Boston, Massachusetts | Flynn Cruiseport Boston | Boston Logan International BOS | 1 | None published |
| Vancouver, British Columbia | Vancouver Fraser Port Authority | Vancouver International YVR | 1 | The port authority publishes a flat $42. |
| Bridgetown, Barbados | Barbados Port Inc. | Grantley Adams International BGI | 1 | None published |
Figures drift. A tariff reset, a currency move or a new supplement can all overtake a page like this one, so the quote is the number to go by.
Each port in full
Miami, Florida
MIAMI
PortMiami
- Terminals
- Terminal AA. 2200 N. Cruise Blvd — MSC
- Terminal A. 2000 N. Cruise Blvd — Royal Caribbean
- Terminal B. 1761 N. Cruise Blvd — Norwegian
- Terminals D, E and F. 1435, 1265 and 1103 N. Cruise Blvd — Carnival
- Terminal V. 718 W. Cruise Blvd — Virgin Voyages
- Terminal J. 1120 Caribbean Way — small and luxury vessels
- Terminal G. 909 N. Cruise Blvd — Royal Caribbean, under construction and expected in 2027
- Airports
- Miami International (MIA); Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International (FLL)
- Published fare
- There is no longer a flat fare. Miami-Dade eliminated the airport-to-seaport flat rate along with its zone fares, so a taxi runs on the meter with a $15.00 minimum for trips starting at the airport or the seaport, plus a $2.00 per-trip airport and seaport surcharge. Vans and SUVs add 30 per cent.
- On the day
- The port asks drivers to drop luggage before parking. The free inter-terminal shuttle runs only when a ship departs from one terminal and returns to another.
- Easy to get wrong
- A great many transfer pages still quote a Miami flat airport fare. The county has formally abolished it, so a quoted flat rate is either out of date or not a taxi fare.
Fort Lauderdale, Florida
EVERGLADES
Port Everglades
- Terminals
- Terminals 2 and 4. Served by the Heron Garage, 1,818 spaces, 7 ft clearance
- Terminals 18 and 19. Served by Lots A to D
- Terminals 21, 25, 26 and 29. Served by the Palm Garage, 1,966 spaces, with a shuttle to Terminal 29
- Airports
- Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International (FLL) — the port describes it as just minutes away via US-1, as published by the port; Miami International (MIA) — 30 to 45 minutes south of the port via I-95, as published by the port
- Published fare
- The port publishes an average rather than a tariff: a taxi from Fort Lauderdale airport to Port Everglades averages $18 to $21, subject to change. It publishes no figure from Miami.
- On the day
- Everyone aged 18 or over must show government photo identification and cruise documents at any checkpoint. Checkpoint 1 at Eller Drive and I-595 is open around the clock; Checkpoints 2 and 3 open 06:00 to 18:00. The port advises allowing at least 45 minutes between a flight landing and terminal check-in.
- Easy to get wrong
- Eight numbered terminals and the port publishes no cruise line to terminal map, so the terminal number has to come off the ticket.
Port Canaveral, Florida
CANAVERAL
Canaveral Port Authority
- Terminals
- Terminals 5, 6, 8 and 10. The A Terminals, north side of the port, reached from SR-528 Exit 54A
- Terminals 1, 2 and 3. The B Terminals, south side, reached from SR-528 Exit 54B
- Airports
- Orlando International (MCO) — about 45 minutes west via SR-528 East, as published by the port; Orlando Melbourne (MLB) — 25 miles, about 40 km, about 40 minutes, as published by the port; Orlando Sanford (SFB) — about an hour north-west via SR-417, as published by the port
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- Drive straight to the terminal to set passengers and bags down; porters take it from there. The garages and surface lots do not open to embarking passengers before 10:00.
- Easy to get wrong
- The exit splits before the port, not inside it. A driver has to know whether the ship is at an A or a B terminal while still on SR-528.
Galveston, Texas
GALVESTON
Port of Galveston
- Terminals
- Terminal 10. 1402 Harborside Drive, Pier 10 — Royal Caribbean
- Terminal 25. 2502 Harborside Drive, formerly Terminal 1 — principally Carnival, with some Disney and Princess
- Terminal 28. 2702 Harborside Drive, formerly Terminal 2 — principally Disney
- Terminal 16. 1602 Harborside Drive. The port’s own pages are inconsistent about which lines use it, so this page does not state an assignment
- Airports
- Houston William P. Hobby (HOU) — about 45 minutes, as published by the port; Houston George Bush Intercontinental (IAH) — about 1 hour 30 minutes, as published by the port
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- The approach is I-45 south onto the island, then Harborside Drive, with port signage to the terminal entrance. There is no rail link and the port publishes no airport shuttle.
- Easy to get wrong
- Long-haul and international arrivals land at Intercontinental, the airport the port itself puts at about an hour and a half away, crossing the whole Houston metro.
Tampa, Florida
TAMPA
Port Tampa Bay
- Terminals
- Terminal 2. 651 Channelside Drive
- Terminal 3. 815 Channelside Drive, with the garage across the street
- Terminal 6. 1333 McKay Street
- Airports
- Tampa International (TPA) — a 15-minute drive from the Channelside district, as published by the port
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- The port separates its traffic by colour: the blue route is passenger drop-off and valet, the red route is secure port parking. There is no luggage storage in the terminals for an early arrival.
- Our pages
- Tampa Airport taxi
New Orleans, Louisiana
NEWORLEANS
Port of New Orleans
- Terminals
- Erato Street Cruise Terminal. 1100 Port of New Orleans Place — Carnival. Parking is the Erato Street Garage, opening at 09:00, with height limits of 8 ft 4 in on the third floor and 7 ft 6 in above
- Julia Street Cruise Terminal. 920 Port of New Orleans Place — Norwegian and Royal Caribbean. Parking is off-site at the 100 Poydras Garage with a shuttle for passengers and bags
- Airports
- Louis Armstrong New Orleans International (MSY)
- Published fare
- The airport publishes a flat fare of $36.00 from the airport to the Central Business District or the French Quarter west of Elysian Fields for up to two passengers, and $15.00 per passenger for three or more. Both cruise terminals are inside that area, and taxis are required to accept credit cards.
- On the day
- The port is specific that you should not try to reach the terminals from the entrances to Port of New Orleans Place at Julia Street or Poydras Street, and that boarding documentation is checked at the garage entrance at both terminals.
- Easy to get wrong
- Two terminals a few hundred metres apart with different parking arrangements — Erato parks on site, Julia Street does not.
- Our pages
- New Orleans Airport taxi
Charleston, South Carolina
CHARLESTON
South Carolina Ports Authority
- Terminals
- Union Pier Cruise Terminal. Vehicle entry at Gate 2, Concord and Laurens Streets, Charleston SC 29401. Taxis, limousines and coaches use Gate 1, the main gate at 32 Washington Street, and the pick-up lot is at 196 Concord Street
- Airports
- Charleston International (CHS) — about 10 miles, roughly 16 km, allow at least 20 to 30 minutes, as published by the port
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- Vehicles and luggage are typically accepted between 11:30 and 15:00 on a sailing day, with early luggage drop-off from 09:00 to 11:00 at Gate 2 for passengers with early flights. Each passenger needs cruise documents, government photo identification and proof of citizenship.
- Easy to get wrong
- Cars and taxis use different gates. The route is I-26 to exit 219-B, then the brown and white CRUISE signs.
- Our pages
- Charleston Airport taxi
Baltimore, Maryland
BALTIMORE
Maryland Port Administration
- Terminals
- Cruise Maryland Terminal. South Locust Point, with more than 1,538 parking spaces. The administration publishes the Inner Harbor at 2.7 miles and Washington at 40 miles, but does not publish the terminal’s street address
- Airports
- Baltimore/Washington International (BWI); Washington Dulles (IAD); Washington Reagan National (DCA)
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- The administration publishes no parking rate and no airport distance, so both are worth confirming when the sailing is booked rather than on the day.
- Easy to get wrong
- Washington-area arrivals are 40 miles away by the administration’s own figure, and that is to the Inner Harbor rather than to the terminal.
New York and New Jersey
NYC
Manhattan Cruise Terminal and Cape Liberty
- Terminals
- Manhattan Cruise Terminal. 711 12th Avenue at West 55th Street, New York NY 10019. Piers 88 and 90, five quays totalling 1,040 ft, operated by Ports America
- Cape Liberty Cruise Port. 4 Port Terminal Boulevard, Bayonne NJ 07002. Reached from the New Jersey Turnpike exit 14A onto Route 440 South, then Port Terminal Boulevard to a guard gate. Garage height limit 7 ft 4 in
- Airports
- Newark Liberty (EWR) — about 9 miles to Cape Liberty, roughly 14 km, as published by the cruise line; New York JFK (JFK); New York LaGuardia (LGA)
- Published fare
- New York’s regulated fares only reach Manhattan. The JFK flat fare of $70.00 applies to Manhattan alone, plus surcharges. From Newark a yellow cab is metered with a $20.00 Newark surcharge and the passenger pays the driver’s return tolls as well as the outbound ones. LaGuardia has no flat fare at all, only the meter plus $5.00.
- On the day
- Cape Liberty is in New Jersey. The JFK flat fare does not reach it, so a yellow cab from JFK or LaGuardia runs on the meter under out-of-city rules with return tolls on top.
- Easy to get wrong
- Two terminals about 20 km apart in two different states, both sold as New York cruises. The one on the ticket is the only one that matters.
Seattle, Washington
SEATTLE
Port of Seattle
- Terminals
- Bell Street Cruise Terminal at Pier 66. 2225 Alaskan Way, Seattle WA 98121 — Norwegian and Oceania. Garage parking $33 a day, or $32 prepaid online
- Smith Cove Cruise Terminal at Pier 91. 2001 West Garfield Street, Seattle WA 98119 — Carnival, Celebrity, Cunard, Holland America, Princess and Royal Caribbean. Parking from $27 a day, oversize from $47 including fees and taxes
- Airports
- Seattle-Tacoma International (SEA) — 30 to 40 minutes by direct ride to either terminal, as published by the port
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- The port states there is no direct mass-transit option to either terminal: it is taxi, rideshare, airport shuttle or motor coach.
- Easy to get wrong
- Two terminals about 8 km apart, each used by a different set of lines. Confirming which pier before dispatch is not optional here.
- Our pages
- Seattle Airport taxi
San Pedro and Long Beach, California
LOSANGELES
Port of Los Angeles and Port of Long Beach
- Terminals
- Los Angeles Cruise Terminal, San Pedro. 100 Swinford Street, San Pedro CA 90731, at Harbor Boulevard and Swinford Street. The port homeports Princess, Norwegian, Royal Caribbean and Virgin Voyages here
- Long Beach Cruise Terminal. A separate port in a separate city, used by Carnival, which homeports five ships there. The port authority publishes no terminal street address we could read
- Airports
- Los Angeles International (LAX); Long Beach (LGB)
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- Carnival publishes operating windows rather than prices for its own Long Beach transfers: the flight must land at Los Angeles by 12:00 or at Long Beach by 12:30, and the service runs on embarkation and debarkation days only.
- Easy to get wrong
- San Pedro and Long Beach are two different ports in two different cities, and Long Beach is marketed as Long Beach, Los Angeles. A ticket naming the line is the reliable guide: Carnival sails from Long Beach, the others from San Pedro.
Boston, Massachusetts
BOSTON
Flynn Cruiseport Boston
- Terminals
- Flynn Cruiseport Boston at the Black Falcon Terminal. Operated by Massport. Its own passenger pages were not readable from here, so this page publishes only the name it is officially dedicated under
- Airports
- Boston Logan International (BOS)
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- Massport publishes the terminal’s parking, drop-off and FAQ pages behind bot protection, so the street address, parking rates and drop-off rules should be confirmed with the terminal rather than taken from a third party.
- Our pages
- Boston Airport taxi
Vancouver, British Columbia
VANCOUVER
Vancouver Fraser Port Authority
- Terminals
- Canada Place cruise terminal. 999 Canada Place, Vancouver BC V6C 3E1. Vehicles enter by the ramp at the foot of Howe Street. Long-term parking height limits are 198 cm on P1 and 205 cm on P2
- Airports
- Vancouver International (YVR)
- Published fare
- The port authority publishes a flat $42.00 taxi fare from the airport to Canada Place, with downtown hotels and Pacific Central Station from $16.00 and everything else metered. The page does not label the currency, which here reads as Canadian dollars.
- On the day
- Taxis may drop off at the terminal; ride-hailing must use level P2 of the parkade and cannot pick up at the terminal at all, so those passengers walk to a street-level zone. Never drop off on Canada Place Way, Howe Street or Cordova Street.
- Our pages
- Vancouver Airport taxi
Bridgetown, Barbados
BARBADOS
Barbados Port Inc.
- Terminals
- Bridgetown Port. Barbados Port Inc. markets homeporting services directly, including airport to seaport transfers, baggage transfer between airport and seaport under customs seal, special assistance vehicles on request and pre-boarding security screening of guests and baggage
- Airports
- Grantley Adams International (BGI)
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- The port states that its partnership with designated port agency providers supports customs and immigration processing between the airport and the seaport, which makes this one of very few ports with a formalised airport-to-ship baggage chain.
- Our pages
- Barbados Airport taxi
Asia and beyond
Asia, the Gulf, Oceania and Africa: 12 homeports, and the easiest run on this page
12 homeports, including the best-documented transfer anywhere, the terminal where you can check in for your flight before leaving the ship, and the two Japanese ports 65 km apart that are both sold as Tokyo.
The short answer Brisbane publishes the clearest figures of any port on this page, at 12 km and about 15 minutes from the airport with no public transport to the terminal at all. Abu Dhabi’s Zayed Port has airline check-in desks inside the cruise terminal. A cruise sold as Tokyo usually sails from Yokohama, which is 79 km from Haneda against Tokyo’s own 14 km.
| Port | Authority or operator | Airports | Terminals | Published fare |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Singapore | Singapore Cruise Centre and Marina Bay Cruise Centre | Singapore Changi SIN | 2 | Changi Airport Group publishes surcharges rather than a flat fare: S$8 on trips starting at the airport between 17:00 and 23:59, S$6 at other times, with a 25 per cent peak-hour surcharge and a 50 per cent surcharge between midnight and 05:59. |
| Yokohama, for Tokyo, Japan | Port of Yokohama | Tokyo Haneda HND, Tokyo Narita NRT | 3 | None published |
| Tokyo, Japan | Port of Tokyo | Tokyo Haneda HND, Tokyo Narita NRT | 1 | None published |
| Shanghai, China | Shanghai Wusongkou International Cruise Terminal | Shanghai Pudong PVG, Shanghai Hongqiao SHA | 1 | The municipal service page puts a taxi from the terminal at about ¥200 to Pudong and ¥150 to Hongqiao, with the city centre at about ¥100. |
| Dubai, United Arab Emirates | Mina Rashid and Dubai Harbour | Dubai International DXB | 2 | None published |
| Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates | Zayed Port | Zayed International AUH | 1 | None published |
| Doha, Qatar | Doha Port | Hamad International DOH | 1 | None published |
| Sydney, Australia | Port Authority of New South Wales | Sydney Kingsford Smith SYD, Sydney Kingsford Smith SYD | 2 | Two official figures apply. |
| Melbourne, Australia | Ports Victoria | Melbourne Tullamarine MEL | 1 | None published |
| Brisbane, Australia | Port of Brisbane | Brisbane BNE | 1 | None published |
| Auckland, New Zealand | Queens Wharf and Princes Wharf | Auckland AKL | 2 | None published |
| Cape Town, South Africa | Cape Town Cruise Terminal | Cape Town International CPT | 1 | None published |
Treat the amounts above as indicative. Each belongs to the body that publishes it and can change without this page hearing about it; your quote is what you pay.
Each port in full
Singapore
SINGAPORE
Singapore Cruise Centre and Marina Bay Cruise Centre
- Terminals
- Marina Bay Cruise Centre Singapore. 61 Marina Coastal Drive, Singapore 018947. Open only on days a ship is at berth. Marina South Pier MRT station is about 600 m away by sheltered linkway
- Singapore Cruise Centre, HarbourFront. The replacement International Cruise and Regional Ferry Terminal. The old HarbourFront Passenger Terminal closed on 14 July 2026, and the operator had not published the new terminal’s street address when this page was written
- Airports
- Singapore Changi (SIN)
- Published fare
- Changi Airport Group publishes surcharges rather than a flat fare: S$8 on trips starting at the airport between 17:00 and 23:59, S$6 at other times, with a 25 per cent peak-hour surcharge and a 50 per cent surcharge between midnight and 05:59. There is no flat-fare scheme, and the flag-down rate varies by taxi company.
- On the day
- Check in no later than 90 minutes before sailing at Marina Bay.
- Easy to get wrong
- HarbourFront moved in July 2026. A pre-2026 address for it is now wrong.
- Our pages
- Singapore Airport taxi
Yokohama, for Tokyo, Japan
YOKOHAMA
Port of Yokohama
- Terminals
- Osanbashi Passenger Terminal. 1-1-4 Kaigandori, Naka-ku. Berths A to D at 450 m each, four mobile boarding bridges and a CIQ plaza of about 2,000 m² on level 2
- Daikoku Pier Cruise Terminal. Tsurumi-ku. Opened April 2019 for ships that cannot pass under the Yokohama Bay Bridge, rated to 220,000 GT, with no boarding bridges
- Shinko Pier Cruise Terminal. 2-14-1 Shinko, at Yokohama Hammerhead
- Airports
- Tokyo Haneda (HND) — 79 km, about 49 miles, to Osanbashi, about 53 minutes, as published by the cruise line; Tokyo Narita (NRT) — 99 km, about 61 miles, to Osanbashi, about 1 hour 40 minutes, as published by the cruise line
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- Daikoku opens only on ship-entry days, passengers may not enter the building, and there are no cafes or shops nearby. The nearest stations are about 15 minutes away by taxi. The city confirms that drivers merely dropping off or collecting passengers need no application and pay nothing.
- Easy to get wrong
- A cruise sold as Tokyo very often sails from Yokohama, and the two are about 65 km apart by airport transfer. Holland America, whose figures these are, notes that taxi availability at Osanbashi is limited.
Tokyo, Japan
TOKYO
Port of Tokyo
- Terminals
- Tokyo International Cruise Terminal. Aomi 2-chome, Koto City, on Odaiba. Opened 10 September 2020. Tokyo International Cruise Terminal station on the Yurikamome line is about eight minutes on foot, and a free shuttle runs from Tokyo Teleport station when ships are in port
- Airports
- Tokyo Haneda (HND) — 14 km, about 9 miles, about 16 minutes, as published by the cruise line; Tokyo Narita (NRT) — 99 km, about 61 miles, about 60 minutes, as published by the cruise line
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- The Haneda limousine bus reaches hotels on Odaiba in about 20 minutes, from where the terminal is a couple of minutes by rail. From Narita the limousine bus takes about 90 minutes.
- Easy to get wrong
- Tokyo is far closer to Haneda than Yokohama is — 14 km against 79 km — which is exactly why confirming which of the two your ship uses is worth doing before booking a flight.
Shanghai, China
SHANGHAI
Shanghai Wusongkou International Cruise Terminal
- Terminals
- Shanghai Wusongkou International Cruise Terminal. 1 Baoyang Road, Baoshan District, formerly the Baoshan cruise terminal. Berths up to four large ships at once along 774 m of coastline
- Airports
- Shanghai Pudong (PVG) — about 70 minutes by taxi, as published by the port; Shanghai Hongqiao (SHA) — about 50 minutes by taxi, as published by the port
- Published fare
- The municipal service page puts a taxi from the terminal at about ¥200 to Pudong and ¥150 to Hongqiao, with the city centre at about ¥100. Those figures were published in 2018 and should be treated as indicative rather than current.
- On the day
- The terminal is in Baoshan, well north of central Shanghai, and the published times are from the terminal rather than to it.
- Our pages
- Shanghai Pudong Airport taxi
Dubai, United Arab Emirates
DUBAI
Mina Rashid and Dubai Harbour
- Terminals
- Hamdan bin Mohammed Cruise Terminal. At Mina Rashid, also styled Port Rashid, with passenger terminals 2 and 3. Parking is not available at the cruise terminal
- Dubai Harbour. A second cruise location in the city. Long-term parking at the pier requires leaving a copy of the driving licence and vehicle registration with port security
- Airports
- Dubai International (DXB)
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- Dubai has two cruise locations, so the terminal has to be checked per sailing rather than assumed. Neither the authority nor the lines publish a distance or drive time from the airport to Mina Rashid.
- Easy to get wrong
- Mina Rashid and Dubai Harbour are different places, and a document written for one does not describe the other.
- Our pages
- Dubai Airport taxi
Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates
ABUDHABI
Zayed Port
- Terminals
- Abu Dhabi Cruise Terminal at Zayed Port. Developed by AD Ports. The terminal has airline check-in counters, so a departing passenger can check in for the flight inside the cruise terminal and then needs only passport control at the airport
- Airports
- Zayed International, Abu Dhabi (AUH)
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- Pier parking is limited to 24 hours unless cruise terminal management approves longer.
- Our pages
- Abu Dhabi Airport taxi
Doha, Qatar
DOHA
Doha Port
- Terminals
- The Grand Cruise Terminal. Doha Port, Corniche Road, Mina District. Shuttle buses run from the terminal to the city centre, and the nearest metro stops are Souq Waqif and National Museum
- Airports
- Hamad International (DOH) — only about 20 minutes by taxi, as published by the port
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- The port sits on the Corniche, a five to ten minute drive from Souq Waqif and the National Museum of Qatar.
Sydney, Australia
SYDNEY
Port Authority of New South Wales
- Terminals
- Overseas Passenger Terminal. Circular Quay West, at Argyle and George Streets, The Rocks NSW 2000. Drop-off is on the lower roadway via George Street, two minutes maximum, and you may not leave the vehicle. There are no parking or waiting bays on cruise days
- White Bay Cruise Terminal. Balmain, comprising berths 4 and 5 and parts of berths 3 and 6. On ship days public vehicles enter by James Craig Road; Robert Street is closed to them
- Airports
- Sydney Kingsford Smith (SYD) — 19 km, about 12 miles, to the Overseas Passenger Terminal, about 30 minutes, as published by the cruise line; Sydney Kingsford Smith (SYD) — 16 km, about 10 miles, to White Bay, about 30 minutes, as published by the cruise line
- Published fare
- Two official figures apply. The airport charges a $5.45 toll on every taxi taken from one of its ranks, plus road tolls. Separately, a New South Wales government fixed-fare trial sets $60 from a Sydney Airport rank to the CBD trial area, or $80 for a requested maxi taxi or five or more passengers, with road tolls and airport access fees not passed on on top. The trial area is defined by a map, and whether the Overseas Passenger Terminal falls inside it is not something we could confirm.
- On the day
- Bag drop generally opens around 09:00 and closes about 90 minutes before departure; the authority asks passengers to arrive at least an hour before. Disembarkation typically begins about 30 minutes after arrival. On disembarkation mornings the Overseas Passenger Terminal rank is on Level 3, reached from the upper level of Hickson Road.
- Easy to get wrong
- Two terminals on opposite sides of the harbour. Holland America warns that taxi and rideshare waits at White Bay can run to an hour.
- Our pages
- Sydney Airport taxi
Melbourne, Australia
MELBOURNE
Ports Victoria
- Terminals
- Station Pier, Port Melbourne. About 3 km south-west of the central business district, with three active cruise berths across 933 m of wharf. Tram route 109 links it to the city, and berths can be negotiated as dedicated homeporting berths during a season
- Airports
- Melbourne Tullamarine (MEL) — about 27 km, roughly a 30-minute drive, as published by the cruise line
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- Only the southern end of the pier is open to the public, currently 07:00 to 17:00 and extending to 06:00 to 20:00 from 4 October 2026 to 4 April 2027. The pier closes to visitors on some dates for ship operations or maintenance.
- Our pages
- Melbourne Airport taxi
Brisbane, Australia
BRISBANE
Port of Brisbane
- Terminals
- Brisbane International Cruise Terminal. 1 Cruise Terminal Drive, Pinkenba, also known as Luggage Point. The port warns that some satnavs do not recognise the address and asks drivers to use Marine Road, which becomes Cruise Terminal Drive
- Airports
- Brisbane (BNE) — 12 km, about 15 minutes, as published by the port; Brisbane city centre — 21 km, about 30 minutes, as published by the port
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- The port states that the terminal is not currently serviced by public transport, so every passenger needs a road transfer. The taxi rank is about 120 m from the entrance by covered walkway, and the terminal opens only on days a ship is at berth. Vehicles over 6.5 m or towing cannot enter the drop-off loop.
- Our pages
- Brisbane Airport taxi
Auckland, New Zealand
AUCKLAND
Queens Wharf and Princes Wharf
- Terminals
- Queens Wharf, Shed 10. 89 Quay Street
- Princes Wharf. 147 Quay Street, Auckland Central, with long-term parking at the nearby Downtown Carpark
- Airports
- Auckland (AKL) — 28 km, about 17.5 miles, about 40 minutes, as published by the cruise line
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- Holland America, whose figures these are, notes that ride-hailing is treated as an independent pick-up and is not allowed in the taxi zones, and that pick-up and drop-off parking is limited on turnaround day.
- Easy to get wrong
- Ports of Auckland publishes no cruise passenger pages we could read, so every figure here comes from a cruise line rather than the port.
- Our pages
- Auckland Airport taxi
Cape Town, South Africa
CAPETOWN
Cape Town Cruise Terminal
- Terminals
- Cape Town Cruise Terminal. E Berth, Duncan Road, Duncan Dock, beside the V&A Waterfront and within walking distance of the business district. Long-term parking at the pier is managed by the V&A Waterfront
- Airports
- Cape Town International (CPT) — 20 km, about 13 miles, about 25 minutes, as published by the cruise line
- Published fare
- No authority publishes a fare for this journey. What you are quoted elsewhere is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach or a booked price.
- On the day
- The shortest and simplest airport-to-ship run of any port on this page, with the terminal effectively in the city.
- Easy to get wrong
- Two cruise lines publish the same address and distance, but the national ports authority pages were not readable from here, so the operator name is not confirmed.
- Our pages
- Cape Town Airport taxi
What goes wrong
Six ways this fails, and not one of them is traffic
None of these is a driver being late. They are all information failures, and every one of them is preventable with a field on a booking form.
The short answer The six real failure modes are the wrong terminal in the right port, the wrong port in the right city, the wrong gate at the right terminal, a fare that has been abolished, a flight booked against the sailing time instead of the port’s own published deadline, and ride-hailing that is allowed to drop off but not to pick up.
The wrong terminal, in the right port
Southampton has five terminals behind four dock gates, with no walking route between the Eastern and Western Docks. Seattle has two piers about 8 km apart used by different lines. Sydney has two on opposite sides of the harbour. Piraeus has three the authority does not name. A terminal read off the ticket costs nothing; a terminal guessed can cost the sailing.
The wrong port, in the right city
Carnival sails from Long Beach while Princess, Norwegian, Royal Caribbean and Virgin sail from San Pedro — two ports, two cities, one marketing name. Cape Liberty and the Manhattan Cruise Terminal are in different states. A cruise sold as Tokyo very often sails from Yokohama, 65 km away.
The wrong gate, at the right terminal
At Charleston cars use Gate 2 and taxis, limousines and coaches use Gate 1. At Civitavecchia the only vehicle entrance is Varco Vespucci. At Port Canaveral the motorway exit splits before the port, 54A for the A terminals and 54B for the B terminals. A driver who learns this at the barrier learns it too late.
A fare that was abolished
Miami-Dade eliminated its airport to seaport flat rate, yet a great many pages still quote one. In New York the JFK flat fare stops at the Manhattan line. Quoting a fare that no longer exists is how a transfer ends in an argument at the kerb.
A flight booked to the wrong deadline
Port Everglades asks for at least 45 minutes between a flight landing and terminal check-in. Charleston accepts vehicles and luggage between 11:30 and 15:00. Sydney closes bag drop about 90 minutes before departure. Port Canaveral does not open its lots to embarking passengers before 10:00. These are published figures, and they decide which flight is bookable.
Ride-hailing that cannot pick up
At Canada Place in Vancouver taxis may drop at the terminal while ride-hailing must use level P2 of the parkade — and cannot pick up at the terminal at all, so those passengers walk to a street-level zone with their cases. At Auckland ride-hailing is not allowed in the taxi zones.
The difficult ones
The five transfers that deserve the worry
Ranked by how much goes wrong rather than by distance. Every figure is the port’s own, or the cruise line’s where the port publishes nothing.
The short answer Civitavecchia for Rome is the hardest: about 60 km from Fiumicino with no rail link, one vehicle gate and a shuttle inside the estate. Galveston is the longest, at about an hour and a half from Houston Intercontinental. Cape Liberty is the worst for price, because New York’s flat fare stops at the state line. Daikoku Pier at Yokohama publishes no airport distance at all.
- Civitavecchia, for Rome
- The port publishes about 60 km to Fiumicino and about 85 km to Ciampino, and there is no rail link from either. Its own route is airport, train towards Rome, change at Roma Trastevere, train to Civitavecchia — and at the end of that you are at a station, not a ship. Inside the estate the only vehicle gate is Varco Vespucci, and the berths are reached by a free shuttle through the Largo della Pace service centre, or by a station shuttle charged at €6 each way on board. Three legs, two operators, and no published taxi tariff at any point.
- Galveston, for Houston
- The port’s own figures are about 45 minutes from Hobby and about an hour and a half from Intercontinental — and Intercontinental is where the long-haul lands. That is a ninety-minute ground leg across the whole Houston metro, with no rail link, no port-published airport shuttle and no regulated tariff to anchor a price against. Four terminals, described inconsistently on the port’s own pages, sit on top of it.
- Cape Liberty, for New York
- The worst pricing trap rather than the longest drive. It is sold as a New York cruise and it is in Bayonne, New Jersey, so the $70 JFK flat fare does not reach it. A yellow cab from JFK or LaGuardia runs on the meter under out-of-city rules with the driver’s return tolls added. Newark is about nine miles away, but plenty of passengers book JFK without realising, and the Manhattan Cruise Terminal they are picturing is about 20 km away in another state.
- Daikoku Pier, Yokohama
- Osanbashi is already 79 km from Haneda and 99 km from Narita by Holland America’s figures, with that line noting taxi availability is limited. Daikoku is further out, opens only on ship-entry days, does not let passengers into the building, has no boarding bridges and nothing nearby, and the nearest stations are a 15-minute taxi ride. The city publishes no airport distance to it at all. The one piece of good news is official: a driver dropping off or collecting needs no permit and pays nothing.
- Brisbane, the easy one that still needs a car
- Only 12 km and about 15 minutes from the airport by the port’s own figures — and the port states flatly that the terminal is not currently serviced by public transport. Easy, but unavoidable: every passenger needs a road transfer, which commercially matters more than difficulty.
Timing
The deadline that decides your flight is not the sailing time
Ports publish more about timing than most passengers ever see, and those figures — not the sailing time — are what a flight has to be booked against.
The short answer Work backwards from the terminal’s published cut-off, not the sailing time. Port Everglades wants 45 minutes between landing and check-in, Sydney closes bag drop about 90 minutes before departure, and Charleston stops accepting vehicles at 15:00. Add the ground transfer, which at Galveston is about an hour and a half from Houston Intercontinental.
| Port | On embarkation day | On disembarkation day | Source of the figure |
|---|---|---|---|
| Port Everglades | At least 45 minutes between a flight landing and terminal check-in | Disembarkation typically 07:00 to 09:00 | The port publishes both |
| Charleston | Vehicles and luggage typically accepted 11:30 to 15:00, with early luggage drop-off 09:00 to 11:00 at Gate 2 | Not published | The ports authority publishes the arrival window |
| Sydney | Bag drop generally opens around 09:00 and closes about 90 minutes before departure; arrive at least an hour before | Generally begins about 30 minutes after arrival | The port authority publishes both |
| Port Canaveral | Garages and surface lots do not open to embarking passengers before 10:00 | Not published | The port publishes the lot opening time |
| Singapore, Marina Bay | Check in no later than 90 minutes before sailing | Not published | Published by the cruise line |
| Melbourne, Station Pier | Public access 07:00 to 17:00, extending to 06:00 to 20:00 from 4 October 2026 to 4 April 2027 | Not published | Ports Victoria publishes the pier hours |
| Brisbane, Singapore, Daikoku | The terminal opens only on days a ship is at berth | Not published | Each operator publishes this of its own terminal |
Book the flight against the port’s deadline, not the sailing time
The sailing time is the least useful number on your ticket. What decides whether a flight works is the terminal’s own cut-off, then the ground transfer on top of it. Port Everglades asks for 45 minutes between landing and check-in; Sydney closes bag drop about 90 minutes before departure; Charleston stops accepting vehicles at 15:00. Add Galveston’s hour and a half from Intercontinental to a 15:00 cut-off and a flight landing at 13:00 is already late.
The case for flying in the night before
At several ports the arithmetic simply does not close on the day. Civitavecchia is three legs from Fiumicino by the port’s own route. Galveston is ninety minutes from the airport the long-haul uses. Port Canaveral will not open its lots before 10:00. And a terminal that opens only on ship days, as Brisbane, Marina Bay and Daikoku all do, offers nowhere to wait if you land early. A hotel the night before plus a short morning transfer is both cheaper to insure and far less exposed.
Coming off the ship
Disembarkation runs to the ship’s schedule, not yours, which is why the included waiting on a port pickup is 90 minutes rather than the 60 minutes on an airport arrival. Where a port publishes a window we book against it: Port Everglades gives 07:00 to 09:00, Sydney says about 30 minutes after arrival. Where it does not, the line’s own disembarkation letter is the figure to send us.
Gates and rules
How close your car can get, and who stops it
Port security is the part of an embarkation day nobody plans for, and it is also the part that is published in the most detail. Six things that differ port by port.
The short answer It varies more than anywhere else. Some ports let a taxi stop outside the terminal door — Associated British Ports publishes exactly that for every Southampton terminal. Others admit no passenger cars past one gate and run a shuttle, as Civitavecchia does. Several require photo identification and cruise documents from every adult at the gate itself, and several cap a drop-off at two minutes.
Identity checks at the gate, not the gangway
Port Everglades requires government photo identification plus cruise documents from everyone aged 18 or over at any checkpoint, and its own checkpoints keep different hours: Checkpoint 1 at Eller Drive is open around the clock, Checkpoints 2 and 3 only 06:00 to 18:00. Charleston requires cruise documents, photo identification and proof of citizenship. Nassau checks at the Arrivals Terminal security desk. Sydney x-rays bags and asks passengers to declare hip or knee replacements and pacemakers.
Which gate a car may use
Charleston sends cars to Gate 2 and taxis, limousines and coaches to Gate 1. Civitavecchia admits passenger vehicles only at Varco Vespucci, with Varco Nord reserved for heavy traffic. Southampton spreads five terminals across Dock Gates 4, 8, 10 and 20. Sydney closes Robert Street to public vehicles at White Bay on ship days and routes everyone via James Craig Road.
How close a vehicle gets
Associated British Ports states in each Southampton terminal’s own passenger directions that private taxis can drop off directly outside the cruise terminal. Port Canaveral tells you to drive straight to the terminal. At the other end of the range, Civitavecchia needs a shuttle from the gate and Bergen does not publish whether a taxi may reach the ship at all.
Where you may stop, and for how long
Sydney’s Overseas Passenger Terminal allows two minutes on the lower roadway and you may not leave the vehicle, with no parking or waiting bays at all on cruise days. Canada Place allows 15 minutes or less in the parkade. Brisbane has a two-minute set-down loop that vehicles over 6.5 m or towing a trailer may not enter.
Who may come with you
Valletta lets visitors go no further than the public areas of the Valletta Waterfront. Nassau allows non-sailing family and friends as far as the Arrivals Terminal and no further. Daikoku Pier does not let passengers into the terminal building at all. Plan the farewell for the kerb.
The ride-hailing asymmetry
At Canada Place taxis may drop at the terminal, ride-hailing must use level P2 of the parkade, and ride-hailing may not pick up at the terminal at any time — those passengers walk to a city street zone with their cases. At Auckland ride-hailing is not allowed in the taxi zones. Where a port draws that distinction, a pre-booked car is on the right side of it.
Luggage
Cruise luggage is why your usual taxi is one size too small
The bag count, not the head count, is what decides the vehicle on an embarkation morning — and at most ports the port’s own porters take over at the kerb.
The short answer Book by the suitcase count rather than the seat count: cruise cases are larger and there are more of them, so four adults usually need an estate or a people carrier and eight need the 8-seater. The driver loads and unloads, and at most ports the port’s porters take checked bags from the kerb to the ship.
Cruise luggage is not airport luggage
This is the most common sizing mistake on an embarkation booking. A fortnight at sea with formal nights is a large case each plus a cabin bag each, and often a suit carrier on top. Four adults who would share an estate on a city break need a people carrier here. Eight people with cruise luggage need the 8-seater, not the 7. The fare is per vehicle, so the class is decided by the suitcase count, and getting it right at booking costs nothing while getting it wrong on the morning costs a second vehicle.
Who carries it, and how far
Our driver loads and unloads. At the terminal the port’s own porters usually take checked bags from the kerb to the ship — Port Canaveral, Galveston and New Orleans all publish that arrangement, and New Orleans names its SeaCaps specifically. That is why the drop-off point matters so much: hand the bags over at the right kerb and they are the port’s problem from there, which is the single biggest practical difference between a terminal drop and a station drop.
The one port that formalises the whole chain
Barbados Port Inc. publishes something no other port on this page does: baggage transfer between the airport and the seaport under customs seal, alongside airport-to-seaport transfers, special assistance vehicles on request and pre-boarding security screening of guests and baggage. It states that its arrangement with designated port agency providers supports customs and immigration processing between the two. If you are homeporting out of Bridgetown that is worth knowing about before you plan the day.
Bulky items, chairs and children
Golf clubs, skis, bicycles and dive gear all travel, with notice, and the figure we need is the length of the item rather than its weight, because length is what decides the load space. For a wheelchair or a scooter, send the measurements and weight at booking and the vehicle is confirmed against your date and route before you pay. Child seats — carriers, forward-facing seats and boosters — are free on request, and worth asking for, because the law differs by country and a rank taxi will rarely carry one.
On the day
Ten steps: five to the ship, five back to the plane
Five steps each way. The order matters more than it looks, because two of the ten are fields on a booking form and the other eight depend on them.
The short answer On embarkation morning the driver meets you inside the arrivals hall of the terminal you land in, with a name board, and the first 60 minutes after touchdown are included. On disembarkation day the car is booked against the port’s published window with 90 minutes of waiting, and the pickup point is the one the port allows rather than the terminal door.
Airport to cruise terminal, on embarkation morning
- Put the flight number on the bookingIt is the field that does the most work. It ties the pickup to your real landing time rather than the scheduled one, so a delayed inbound on embarkation morning moves the car instead of losing it.
- Put the terminal name on the booking, copied from your cruise documentsNot the port name and not the ship name. Southampton has five terminals behind four dock gates, Seattle has two piers 8 km apart, Sydney has two across the harbour. The terminal is what tells the driver which gate to use.
- Keep your phone on before you leave the aircraftThe driver’s name, mobile number and the exact meeting point inside your arrivals hall are sent before pickup. Turn the phone on in the aircraft, not after you have walked out of the building.
- Come out to your name, held up inside arrivalsPast passport control and baggage reclaim, in the arrivals hall of the terminal you actually landed in. The first 60 minutes after touchdown are included, which is room for a slow border and a slower carousel. Held longer than that, message the driver from inside the hall.
- Hand the cases over at the terminal kerbAt most ports the port’s own porters take checked bags from the kerb to the ship. Where identification is checked at the gate — Port Everglades, Charleston, New Orleans, Nassau — have the cruise documents and photo identification out before you reach the barrier rather than at it.
Cruise port to airport, on disembarkation day
- Book against the published disembarkation window, not the arrival timeWhere the port publishes one, use it: Port Everglades gives 07:00 to 09:00, Sydney says about 30 minutes after the ship arrives. Where it does not, your line’s disembarkation letter carries the figure, and that is the one to send us.
- Tell us the terminal again, because it can differ from embarkationA few ports turn ships round at a different berth from the one they sailed from, and Rostock assigns the berth per ship. If the letter in your cabin names a different terminal, that is the one the car is sent to.
- Allow for the walk and the queue insideIncluded waiting on a port pickup is 90 minutes rather than the 60 on an airport arrival, because the ship controls the schedule. At White Bay in Sydney, Holland America warns that taxi and rideshare waits can reach an hour, which is the thing a booked car removes.
- Check where the car is allowed to waitIt is rarely at the door. Sydney moves the rank to Level 3 on disembarkation mornings and directs private cars to meet passengers outside the front of the terminal. At Canada Place in Vancouver, ride-hailing cannot pick up at the terminal at all. Your driver will have the port’s own instruction, and it is on your confirmation.
- Leave the airport a real marginDisembarkation slips far more often than it runs early, and an international check-in deadline does not move. Where the ground leg is long — Galveston to Intercontinental, Civitavecchia to Fiumicino, Yokohama to Narita — take the later flight.
Booking
The booking policy as numbers, not reassurance
The waiting allowances, the cancellation window and the payment terms, stated as numbers. The marked lines are the ones awaiting the operator’s own confirmed figures.
The short answer The fare is per vehicle, paid in full at booking, cancellable free up to 24 hours before pickup. Included waiting is 60 minutes from landing on an airport pickup and 90 minutes on a cruise terminal pickup. Child seats are free, there is no deposit, and a group or accessible vehicle wants 48 hours’ notice.
- Waiting included, airport pickup
- 60 minutes from your actual landing time
- Waiting included, cruise terminal pickup
- 90 minutes, because the ship sets the schedule
- Waiting included, hotel or address pickup
- 15 minutes
- Waiting beyond that
- CONFIRM: the charge for waiting past the included time
- Free cancellation
- Up to 24 hours before the pickup time
- Cancelling inside that window
- CONFIRM: the cancellation charge inside 24 hours
- No-show
- CONFIRM: the no-show charge
- Extra stop, such as a hotel on the way
- CONFIRM: the charge for an additional stop
- Child seats
- Free on request — carrier, forward-facing seat or booster
- Deposit
- None. Payment is taken in full at booking
- How far ahead to book
- At least 12 hours, and 48 for a coach, an accessible vehicle or a group
- Payment methods
- Visa, Mastercard, American Express, PayPal, Google Pay, Apple Pay
What the price is quoted against
The vehicle, in the currency of the booking, before you travel. There is no per-person multiplier, no meter and no surge, so the figure does not move because the traffic did. At the four ports where an official fare exists we will tell you what it is, because on a clean off-peak run a rank taxi in Barcelona or Vancouver may well be the better deal and we would rather say so here than have you find out afterwards.
Why an embarkation morning wants booking early
A turnaround day concentrates several thousand arrivals into a few hours, at ports that often have one road in. Brisbane has no public transport to the terminal at all, so every passenger is on that road. Book at least 12 hours ahead, and further out for a coach or an accessible vehicle, which are allocated against your specific date and route rather than held in a pool.
What arrives in writing
A confirmation naming the licensed operator, the driver, the vehicle and the meeting point, with the fare and any charges itemised rather than presented as one figure — which is what an expenses team needs. The figure printed on it is the figure you pay.
A reminder that applies to every amount here: these are published reference figures, not our prices, and they are not guaranteed to be current. The quote is.
Vehicles
Count the cases first, then count the seats
Nine classes, from a saloon to a 50-seater coach. The fare is for the vehicle rather than the seat, so the suitcase count is what decides which one.
| Class | Seats | Large cases | Cabin bags | Who it is for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Saloon | 4 | 2 | 2 | Two of you with a case each. Rare on an embarkation morning, because cruise luggage is not cabin luggage. |
| Estate | 4 | 3 | 3 | Four people whose cases will not close a saloon boot — the usual answer for a fortnight at sea. |
| Executive | 3 | 2 | 2 | Up to three, when the arrival is part of the business rather than just the getting there. |
| People carrier | 6 | 4 | 4 | Six seats, four large cases. The usual answer for a family sailing with a pushchair. |
| 7-seater | 7 | 4 | 5 | Seven people, but only four large cases: the extra belt comes out of the load space. |
| 8-seater | 8 | 6 | 8 | Eight people and six large cases, which is the shape most cruise parties actually arrive in. |
| 16-seater | 16 | 14 | 16 | An extended family or a group off one flight, kept in a single vehicle to one gate. |
| 30-seater coach | 30 | 30 | 30 | Charter groups and incentive parties past minibus size. |
| 50-seater coach | 50 | 50 | 50 | Full-ship charters and group embarkations, booked well ahead. |
What is included
What is already inside the figure you are quoted
Every extra that a meter or an app might add is covered in the fare you are quoted. The conditions behind each line are in our terms and in your confirmation.
A driver at Arrivals
Inside the arrivals hall of the terminal you actually land in, name board up, and the cases are the driver’s job from there to the terminal kerb.
Your flight, followed
The booking is tied to your flight number, so a late inbound drags the pickup along behind it — which on an embarkation morning is the whole point.
An hour of free waiting
For airport arrivals the first 60 minutes after landing cost nothing, enough for the border and the carousel (see your booking terms).
One fixed fare
Agreed at booking for the whole vehicle rather than per head, which is where a private transfer usually beats a cruise line’s per-person coach. Charges are broken out on the summary rather than buried in it.
Child seats at no cost
Baby, toddler and booster seats on request. In Spain a seat is needed for children under 135 cm, with a narrow exemption for taxis on urban journeys, so ask for one.
Licensed drivers
Every journey is run by a licensed local operator, and the driver and vehicle are named on your confirmation before you travel.
Free cancellation
Free to cancel until 24 hours ahead of the pickup time. Inside that, and on a no-show, the booking terms govern.
Someone to call
Phone, WhatsApp or email, from booking until you reach your cruise terminal.
Luggage up to the class capacity is inside the fare. A hotel stop on the way, or waiting past the included time, is priced onto the booking first and never improvised at the kerb.
Trust
Who is behind the car, and what we are bound to
Here is who arranges your booking, what we commit to and where the full wording lives.
Our details
Global Airport Taxi is a trading name of QMH Technologies Ltd: company no. 13506378, VAT GB 469 6859 13, registered in England and Wales, 10-16 Tiller Road, London E14 8PX. Contact: bookings@globalairporttaxi.com or WhatsApp.
Who does the driving
We handle the booking; a licensed local driver does the trip, and your confirmation names the driver and the vehicle.
Payment
You can pay by card, PayPal or Google Pay via secure, certified gateways. Personal data follows UK data protection law and the GDPR.
The promises, line by line
| Promise | What it means | Where to check |
|---|---|---|
| Fixed fare | The fare on the booking page is the one you confirm. | Booking page |
| Flight following | The pickup tracks your flight number and landing. | Booking confirmation |
| Free waiting | Up to 60 minutes after landing at airport arrivals. | Your booking terms |
| Child seats | Free if asked for, with the child’s age noted. | Booking notes |
| Licensed driver | A licensed local driver, named in your confirmation. | Booking confirmation |
| Free cancellation | Until 24 hours before pickup. | Terms, “Cancellations & refunds” |
| Late cancellations and no-shows | Not refunded unless the transport provider is at fault. | Terms, “Cancellations & refunds” |
| Right details | Flight, pickup and contact details must be correct, or extra charges may follow. | Terms, “General booking terms” |
If your confirmation says something different from this page, follow the confirmation. The complete conditions are in our terms and privacy policy.
How it works
From wheels down to the right gate, in four moves
Booking takes a few minutes. These are the four things that happen afterwards, in order.
Book with your flight number
The most useful field on the form. It ties the pickup to the real landing time, so a delayed inbound on an embarkation morning moves the car rather than losing it — and the ship will not wait.
Get your driver’s details
Ahead of the pickup you get the driver’s name, a mobile number and the exact spot inside your arrivals hall. Turn the phone back on before you leave the aircraft, not after you leave the building.
Come out to your name, held up
The border and the carousel both run slower than anyone plans for, which is why 60 minutes of waiting from landing is included on an airport pickup. Held up beyond that, message the driver from inside the hall.
Pay what the confirmation says
Payment is taken online at booking through a certified gateway, and the confirmation is mailed the moment it clears. Whatever figure is printed on that confirmation is the figure, start to finish.
Who we are
The company behind this page, and what it still owes you
The registered details, who actually drives, and an honest list of what is not finished on this page yet.
- Trading name
- Global Airport Taxi
- Registered company
- QMH Technologies Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 13506378
- VAT registration
- GB 469 6859 13
- Registered office
- 10-16 Tiller Road, London E14 8PX, United Kingdom
- Bookings
- bookings@globalairporttaxi.com
- +44 20 3002 9040
- Airport pages published
- 81 countries, listed on the worldwide airports index
- Who drives
- A licensed local operator in each city, named on your confirmation with the vehicle
- Terms
- Terms and privacy
Why this page exists in this form
Because we already sell this journey in the United Kingdom and could see what the rest of the market publishes about it. The pattern is consistent: invented distances, flat fares that were abolished years ago, terminal names no port uses, and worldwide coverage claims that collapse the moment you name a port. So this page was built the other way round — every figure read at the authority that publishes it, every gap left visible, and the ports we cannot reach listed by name.
What is still open on this page
Four photograph slots are marked and waiting on images, and the booking-policy lines marked CONFIRM are waiting on the operator’s own confirmed figures for waiting charges, cancellation inside the free window, no-shows and extra stops. They are shown as markers rather than filled with plausible numbers, because a plausible number in a policy table is worse than a visible gap.
Everything else
Cruise port transfer questions, answered in the first line
37 questions in 7 groups. Start with the group that matches what is worrying you. Each answer leads with the answer, and names the port, the authority or the policy figure wherever one governs.
What it costs, and which fares are real 6
How much is an airport transfer to a cruise port?
It depends on the port, and almost nowhere publishes an official answer. Only a handful of authorities anywhere set a fare for this journey: Barcelona fixes €46 between the airport and the Moll Adossat terminals, Vancouver publishes $42 to Canada Place, New Orleans publishes $36 into the district both its terminals sit in, and New South Wales is trialling $60 from a Sydney Airport rank to the central area. Everywhere else is a meter, a cruise line’s own coach, or a pre-booked fare. Ours is quoted per vehicle before you travel.
Does Miami have a flat taxi fare from the airport to the cruise port?
Not any more. Miami-Dade County eliminated the airport to seaport flat rate along with its zone fares. A taxi now runs on the meter with a $15 minimum for a trip starting at the airport or the seaport, plus a $2 per-trip surcharge, and vans and SUVs add 30 per cent. If you are reading a flat Miami fare somewhere, it is out of date.
Is the $70 JFK flat fare good for Cape Liberty?
No. The Taxi and Limousine Commission’s $70 flat fare covers JFK to Manhattan and nothing else. Cape Liberty is in Bayonne, New Jersey, so a yellow cab runs on the meter under out-of-city rules and you pay the driver’s return tolls as well as your own. Newark is the near airport at about nine miles. LaGuardia has no flat fare to anywhere.
Is a cruise line transfer cheaper than a private one?
It is usually priced per person, which is the thing to check: a party of four or more often pays more in total than a single vehicle costs. Lines also attach conditions. Carnival will only run its Long Beach transfers if your flight lands at Los Angeles by 12:00 or Long Beach by 12:30, on embarkation and debarkation days only, and publishes no price at all. Our fare is per vehicle and stated before you book.
How do you price it?
Per vehicle, in the currency of the booking, agreed before you travel. There is no per-person multiplier and no meter, so a delay, a diversion or traffic does not change the figure.
Why do so few ports publish a transfer fare?
Because the fare is usually set by a taxi regulator rather than the port, and most regulators publish a tariff rather than a point-to-point price. Barcelona is unusual in having a metropolitan authority that sets a named fixed fare for the cruise dock. Vancouver is unusual in that the port authority itself publishes one. Everywhere else the port publishes directions and leaves the price to the meter.
Which terminal, which gate, which rules 9
Which terminal will my ship be at?
Your cruise line puts it on your ticket or e-docs, and that is the only reliable source. Several ports do not publish a line-to-terminal map at all — Port Everglades and Port Canaveral among them — and several assign the berth per sailing. Send us the terminal name from your documents and the booking is set to it.
Can a taxi drive right up to the ship?
Sometimes, and it varies more than you would expect. Associated British Ports states in each Southampton terminal’s passenger directions that private taxis can drop off directly outside the cruise terminal. At Port Canaveral you drive straight to the terminal to set down. At Civitavecchia you cannot: the only vehicle gate is Varco Vespucci and the berths are reached by shuttle. At Bergen the port does not publish an answer at all.
Is there a port where I can check in for my flight before leaving the ship?
At Zayed Port in Abu Dhabi, yes. AD Ports publishes airline check-in counters inside the cruise terminal, so a departing passenger checks in there and needs only passport control at the airport. We have not found another cruise terminal publishing the same.
Is the terminal open when I arrive?
Not always. Marina Bay in Singapore, the Brisbane terminal and Daikoku Pier in Yokohama all open only on days a ship is at berth. Melbourne’s Station Pier opens 07:00 to 17:00, extending to 06:00 to 20:00 from 4 October 2026 to 4 April 2027, and closes to visitors on some dates altogether. An early flight into a closed terminal is a real risk at these ports.
Will someone meet us inside, or at the kerb?
Inside, in the arrivals hall of the terminal you actually land in, with a name board. At the port end it depends on the port’s rules: Sydney’s authority directs private cars and limousines to meet passengers outside the front of the terminal near the palm trees, and on disembarkation mornings the rank moves to Level 3.
What identification do we need at the port?
The port’s requirement, not ours, and some publish it precisely. Port Everglades requires government photo identification plus cruise documents from everyone aged 18 or over at any checkpoint. Charleston requires cruise documents, government photo identification and proof of citizenship. Nassau checks identification at the Arrivals Terminal security desk.
Can a friend come along to see us off?
Often only so far. Valletta lets visitors go no further than the public areas of the Valletta Waterfront. Nassau allows non-sailing family and friends as far as the Arrivals Terminal and no further. Plan the farewell for the kerb rather than the gangway.
Is there parking at the terminal if I drive myself?
Usually, at a published rate, and sometimes not at all. Port Canaveral charges $20 a day and takes no cash. Charleston charges $17 a day and takes no cash either. Cape Liberty charges $35 including tax with no reservation needed. Mina Rashid in Dubai publishes no parking at the cruise terminal, and Nassau has none on site.
What if the ship berths somewhere other than planned?
It happens, and at some ports it is routine: Rostock assigns Warnemünde berths P1 to P8 or a seaport berth per ship, and Palma’s port instruction sends overflow away from its two designated cruise berths. Tell us as soon as you know and the booking is moved; the fare does not change because the berth did.
Timing the flight against the ship 4
What happens if my flight is delayed on embarkation day?
The booking is tied to your flight number rather than your scheduled time, so the pickup moves with the aircraft. On an airport pickup the first 60 minutes after you land are included, which covers a border queue and a slow carousel. If you are held longer than that, message the driver from inside the hall.
How long before the ship sails should I land?
Work back from the port’s own published deadline rather than the sailing time. Port Everglades asks for at least 45 minutes between landing and terminal check-in. Sydney closes bag drop about 90 minutes before departure. Charleston accepts vehicles and luggage between 11:30 and 15:00. Then add the ground transfer, which at Galveston from Intercontinental is about an hour and a half by the port’s figure. Most lines also set their own arrival window, and that governs too.
Can you collect us from the ship at the end of the cruise?
Yes, and the timing is published more often than people realise. Port Everglades gives disembarkation as typically 07:00 to 09:00. Sydney says it generally begins about 30 minutes after arrival. Give us the ship, the date and the terminal and the pickup is set against the published window rather than a guess.
Will the driver wait while we clear the terminal?
On a ship pickup the included waiting is 90 minutes, which is a different allowance from an airport arrival because disembarkation runs to the ship’s schedule rather than yours. Beyond that, waiting is charged at the rate in your terms.
Luggage, children and assistance 5
What vehicle do I need for cruise luggage?
More than you would book for a city break. Cruise cases are large and there are usually more of them, so the class is decided by the suitcase count rather than the seat count. Four people with a fortnight of luggage are an estate or a people carrier, not a saloon. Eight people with cruise luggage are an 8-seater. Tell us the bag count and the class follows from it.
Do you handle the luggage?
The driver loads and unloads, and at the terminal the port’s own porters usually take checked bags from the kerb to the ship — that is the arrangement at Port Canaveral, Galveston and New Orleans among others. One port goes further: Barbados Port Inc. publishes baggage transfer between the airport and the seaport under customs seal.
Are child seats available on an embarkation transfer?
Yes, free, on request — carriers, forward-facing seats and boosters. Ask when you book and give the ages, because the law differs by country and a rank taxi will rarely carry one at all.
Do you take wheelchairs and mobility scooters?
Ask at booking with the chair’s measurements and weight, and a suitable vehicle is confirmed against your date and route before you pay. Several cruise ports publish their own assistance arrangements as well; Barbados Port Inc. publishes special assistance vehicles on request.
Do you carry golf clubs, skis, bicycles and dive gear?
All of them, with notice. The figure we need is the length of the item, because that is what decides which load space it fits, and a cruise party often has these on top of a full set of cases.
Coverage, and where we stop 2
Do you cover every cruise port in the world?
No, and we would rather say so. The network publishes airport pages for 81 countries, and a cruise transfer works where one of those airports is the one you actually fly into. That reaches most of the major homeports, including every one in this page’s tables. It does not reach Iceland, Hong Kong, Thailand, Puerto Rico, Aruba or the Bahamas, and the German airport pages do not credibly reach the northern German cruise ports. The section on what the network does not cover names them all.
My port is not on this page. Can you still take me?
Ask before you book the flight. If an airport in the published network serves it, almost certainly; if not, we will tell you rather than take the booking and hope. The ports we know we do not reach are listed on this page by name.
Booking, paying and changing 8
Can one vehicle do airport, hotel, then port the next morning?
Yes, as two bookings or one with an extra stop, and it is worth pricing both ways. An extra stop is added to the booking before you pay rather than agreed in the car. The charge for it is in your terms.
How far ahead should I book a cruise transfer?
At least 12 hours, and further out than that for an embarkation morning, because turnaround days concentrate thousands of arrivals into a few hours. For a coach, an accessible vehicle or a group, allow 48 hours.
Can I cancel?
Free up to 24 hours before the pickup time. Inside that window, and for a no-show, your booking terms govern and they say so in figures.
Do you operate at night?
Yes, every hour of every day. Embarkation mornings start early and long-haul arrivals land at awkward hours, which is most of the reason this service exists.
Who actually drives?
A licensed local operator, named on your confirmation along with the vehicle before you travel.
How do I pay?
Online at booking, through a certified gateway: Visa, Mastercard, American Express, PayPal and more. The confirmation is emailed once payment clears, and the figure printed on it is the figure.
Will I get a receipt for expenses?
Yes. The confirmation itemises the fare and any charges rather than presenting one lump, which is what a corporate expenses team needs.
Can you quote a group or a full-ship charter?
Yes. Up to a 50-seater coach, and more than one vehicle where a group needs it. Send the flight, the terminal and the head count with the bag count and the quote comes back per vehicle.
How this page was made 3
Is this page the same as your UK cruise port pages?
No. We already run route pages from Heathrow, Gatwick, Luton and London City to Southampton, Dover, Portsmouth and Harwich, and those go into far more depth on one road. This page is the worldwide view: which terminal, which gate, which fare is real, and which ports the network does not reach.
Which authority stands behind each number here?
Each one was read at the body that publishes it — a port authority, a terminal operator, an airport operator or a taxi regulator — and the section it appears in names that body. Where only a cruise line publishes a figure, the page says which line. Where nobody publishes one, the page says nothing rather than borrow a number from elsewhere.
Some of your own sources contradict each other. What then?
We say so. Hamburg’s terminal index lists a cruise centre as under construction while its own press release announces the opening. Kiel’s overview and detail pages disagree on Norwegenkai. Galveston’s pages disagree about which lines use Terminal 16. In each case the page reports the disagreement instead of picking a side quietly.
Book it
Book your cruise port transfer: three fields, one figure
One form, one figure, for the vehicle rather than the head count — and the terminal confirmed before the driver is dispatched.
The short answer Pricing a cruise port transfer takes three fields: the flight number, which ties the pickup to your real landing time; the cruise terminal as your documents name it, which fixes the gate; and the bag count, which fixes the vehicle. The total covers the vehicle rather than each passenger and cancels free until 24 hours before pickup.
Three fields, then your fixed price
The flight number ties the pickup to your real landing time. The terminal name, copied off your cruise documents, tells the driver which gate to use — and at a five-terminal port that is the difference between a transfer and a missed sailing. The bag count picks the class. The total for the whole vehicle is on screen before any payment page is.
Get an instant quoteBook your transfer
Paid by Visa, Mastercard, American Express and more, in full at booking, with 24 hours of free cancellation behind it. And the standing caveat of this page: at the four ports where an official fare exists, a rank taxi on a clean off-peak run may be the better deal, and we would rather tell you that here.
Regulators revise these. Nothing above is a quotation, and nothing above is promised to hold until you travel.
An executive car from the network fleet, a Mercedes E-Class or similar. Photograph: Global Airport Taxi.
Land, walk out, and board.
The figure is settled before you leave home, for the vehicle rather than per person, and a driver is standing in the arrivals hall of whichever building you actually land in with a name board up. The booking follows the aircraft, so a late inbound moves the pickup and costs nothing, with 60 minutes of waiting from touchdown included. Give us the terminal name off your cruise documents and the gate follows from it. Child seats are free for the asking, and the whole thing cancels free up to 24 hours out.
- Fixed price
- Free cancellation
- Free child seats
- Flight tracking