Can't help but remember (my wife helps me here
) about a cruise out of Ft. Lauderdale. We had tickets, non-stop, on Southwest (sounds good so far, right) that put us into Ft. Lauderdale airport 3 hours before cruise departure. What is wrong with this? It was spring and no chance of snow, really. We boarded our flight, this time out of Louisville and it departed almost on time (well, it was an hour late --- but we had 2 hours to spare.)
Then we spent some time on the runway waiting for tower to clear the flight, wife getting anxious. We left late, late and headed n-s to Ft. Lauderdale. Pilot, mid-flight, came on to say that we'd be late landing because Ft. Lauderdale, while they had 2 runways to use, were banned from one of the runways and there was a stack-up waiting on the 1 runway. He said the locals hated the noise over the other runway.
Long story short, and those of you cruising out of Ft. Lauderdale know how close the cruise terminal is to the airport. We were the last ones to board.
BUT -- we made it.. AND we were able to skip the lifeboat drill (so I was happy.)
End of story, we now, most always try to arrive the day before.
Dean (but I liked missing the lifeboat drill)