JFK Layover

hoooooooot

Hi All,

Am travelling to San fran/Vegas this summer, on the return flight we land in JFK at 7am and our JFK-DUB flight is 15 hours later at 10pm!! :eek:

Anyway my main questions are can we at least leave our luggage and head in to the city for the day or are their visa/security issues with leaving the airport?

Thanks in advance for any help cheers

lil_lisa

Once you have cleared immigration, you're free to roam around the country as much as you like. Pick up your bags and leave them at
JFK Luggage Storage. Then, just make sure you are back at the airport roughly an 1 or 1.5 hours before your next flight, allowing time to get your luggage and check it for your next flight.

endofrainbow

lil_lisa wrote: »

Once you have cleared immigration, you're free to roam around the country as much as you like.

OP is flying domestically to JFK - there won't be any Immigration...

depending on your airline, you may be able to check your bags straight through to Dublin which would leave you free to head into the city without hauling your bags with you .

InTheTrees

hoooooooot wrote: »

Hi All,

Am travelling to San fran/Vegas this summer, on the return flight we land in JFK at 7am and our JFK-DUB flight is 15 hours later at 10pm!! :eek:

Its a Bonus to your holiday isnt it? Plenty of time to get into the city and wander around a little and then head back to the airport.

Have fun.

clairefontaine

I would even consider getting a hotel room in Manhattan or near the airport for the day. Have a nap, a good meal, and ready for leg 2 of the journey. The transatlantic/trans continental trip is tough going.

lil_lisa

Oh apologies OP, I read it backwards. Yeah, your luggage will probably be checked all the way so the airport will technically be storing it for you for free :P

However, be sure to check the full details of your luggage when checking them at your first destination (i.e. San Fran or Vegas, whichever one starts your return flight home).

hoooooooot

thanks for the replies folks yeah hopefully it will be a bonus to the trip but can imagine we will be pretty tired
just glad to hear we wont get stuck in the airport for the duration!!

seanman is me

Have you being in NY before?

If not, being there for less than a day will leave you very sorry you are leaving so soon.....

Make the most of it!

iusedtoknow

If you're taking the red-eye from SF to NY, it isn't actually that bad. You leave SF at 9 or 10 and get into NY at 6. It's not impossible to sleep on this, an eye mask and ear plugs will see you right. I've done it, and in honesty, you can keep going.

You'll be tired on the day in NY, don't try and do to much and you'll be fine

ProudDUB

lil_lisa wrote: »

Once you have cleared immigration, you're free to roam around the country as much as you like. Pick up your bags and leave them at
JFK Luggage Storage. Then, just make sure you are back at the airport roughly an 1 or 1.5 hours before your next flight, allowing time to get your luggage and check it for your next flight.

That could be cutting things a bit fine imo. For an international flight from JFK, I wouldn't dream of arriving at the airport less than two hours before the flight departs. JFK has a terrible reputation for all kinds of delays. It is a massively huge, sprawling hot mess of an airport, where getting thru security queues can take years off your life. Most of it seems to be always under some sort of construction and unlike most US airports it is very poorly sign posted. There can also be long walks to get to your gate, only to find that it has been changed at the last minute, to a different one at the other end of the terminal. The OP will probably be knackerd after a taking a red eye from the west coast and traipsing around Manhattan for the guts of 10 hours. The last thing they need is a mad dash to get to their gate to catch their flight home & possibly missing it due to not giving themselves enough time to navigate JFK itself.

InTheTrees

ProudDUB wrote: »

That could be cutting things a bit fine imo. For an international flight from JFK, I wouldn't dream of arriving at the airport less than two hours before the flight departs. JFK has a terrible reputation for all kinds of delays.

Ten at night should be much quieter though.

ProudDUB

InTheTrees wrote: »

Ten at night should be much quieter though.

The flight takes off at ten. That is not when the OP will be navigating around the airport. The place should still be pretty busy between 8-9, which is when the OP would be in the airport itself.

I agree that that time of the evening is generally a lot less busy than earlier in the day, but it IS still JFK. God only knows what delays they could run into. I know I sound like a terrible worry wart, but did I mention that this is JFK? I have had some godawful experiences there over the years, as has my sister. It is the one US airport we avoid, when we are flying home, if we can possibly help it. :P

clairefontaine

JFK is always busy. Seriously your body clock will be telling you it's 4am. You will be pretty tired.

On red eye flights melatonin is great. It's over the counter in the US.

And if you don't get a hotel room, you will be really stressed and exhausted getting onto another red eye 12-14 hours later.

So I imagine you are either traveling Aer Lingus which has now been moved to the Jet Blue terminal and is VERY busy, not liked the old very chilled out terminal which was calm and airy.. Or you will be in the Delta terminal which is the pit of hell. TSA sucks in there too. Jet blue terminal has some long treks and is so busy it's hard to hear your name on the loud speaker when they are calling your name out and you are asleep in some corner.

yew_tree

Yeah JFK is a bit of a maze and not the nicest airport. I have flown there a good few times and wouldn't like to be rushing back from Manhattan for a flight.

Actually off topic I will be flying to NY again in May but will be using newark for the first time....is newark a much nicer better run airport? Handy you can get the train into penn in any case.

ProudDUB

yew_tree wrote: »

Yeah JFK is a bit of a maze and not the nicest airport. I have flown there a good few times and wouldn't like to be rushing back from Manhattan for a flight.

Actually off topic I will be flying to NY again in May but will be using newark for the first time....is newark a much nicer better run airport? Handy you can get the train into penn in any case.

I have never flown via Newark, but when my mother was alive, she would only ever fly to the US on Continental, as they fly via Newark. I can't go into specifics of why she liked it so much, as I've forgotten what they were. I just know that she thought that it was a much, much better/easier/nicer airport to fly into and out of, than any other of the other NY area airports. You couldn't pay her to fly via JFK.

clairefontaine

I like Newark. Very chilled out airport.

lil_lisa

Yes, OP, again I read your itinerary backwards. You should schedule to be at the airport roughly 2-2.5 hours before your flight schedule.