54401BIC
Phone the harbour in advance to arrange cages for luggage. You should tip the harbour crew UK £5 for each cage used. Hand luggage must be taken on board by passengers.
· Phone the railway company to discuss use of Baggage Car for suitcases. Check arrangements for changing trains at Swansea.
· Group has lunch on the ferry.
· Fishguard train station is immediately outside the ferry terminal building.
Procedure at Ferry Terminal
Talk the group through the procedure for boarding/disembarking the ferry on the way to the terminal. Remind them to have lunch on board. The ferries take sterling and euros, but will give change in sterling.
Check in Procedure
Once you have unloaded the group, check the coach and ask the group to wait whilst you go to the ticket desk and pick up your ticket, if necessary. Inform the desk you have a group with luggage and ask them for your cage(s) and to have them collected in a few minutes. The cage may already be there, in which case load it up and hover until it is towed away. Hand luggage must be taken on board.
Lead the group through check-in to the departure lounge and wait. Sit the group near the embarkation doors and stay together; you will most probably have only one boarding pass.
When you board, grab some tables all together so that the group has a base. Be sure they all know where to go when foot passengers are called for disembarkation. With middle-schoolers you may prefer to make a meeting place at the tables and walk them off together.
Arrival
Baggage retrieval can be a little tricky. Walk the group through passport control etc, out onto the train platform. Give them a time to be there for the train. Meanwhile you chase up the luggage – keep asking for it and eventually it will arrive.
Welsh ports have in recent years been undertaking regular passport checks so ensure that group members have passports handy and on their person before boarding the vessel.