# Heathrow to Ireland - when to arrive at airport?



## saluki (Jun 7, 2010)

My family & I are visiting London for a few days before heading to Ireland. I need to book a flight from Heathrow to Shannon but am trying to figure out how far in advance that I need to arrive at Heathrow. I would like to do a 9:50 a.m. Saturday morning flight on Aer Lingus.

It sounds like there is some sort of simplified arrangement when flying between the UK & Ireland, but this is a new one for me. Insight would be appreciated.


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## helenbarnett1963 (Jun 8, 2010)

UK to/from Ireland tends to be treated more like a domestic flight than an international one - at least for EU passport holders - especially nowadays when you need photo ID (i.e. a passport) to fly anywhere.
if you have a US passport, I assume you would still need to go through immigration when you arrive in Dublin.

your best bet is to phone Aer Lingus in Dublin and ask them, or check on thier website.

As you are departing from LHR you sould still aim to check in a couple of hours before the flight - check-in and secuity queues can be very long at peak times, and you may have a long walk to the gate. And if you do happen to get through everything quickly you then have tiem for breakfast!

for a 9.50 domestic flight from LHR we would aim to be arriving at the airport between 7.30 and 8.00am, and would probably stay at a hotel at the airport the night before to avoid a too-early start.


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## Carolinian (Jun 8, 2010)

You can probably find a better price out of one of London's other airports, and that way you can also avoid what one British journalist referred to as ''the hell that is Heathrow''.  Heathrow was also rated as the worst airport in Europe in a survey of travel writers of the ''In Your Pocket'' travel guide series.

I would try an Aer Lingus flight our of Gatwick, but Ryanair is another option, and they would probably be out of Stansted or Luton.


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## saluki (Jun 8, 2010)

Carolinian said:


> You can probably find a better price out of one of London's other airports, and that way you can also avoid what one British journalist referred to as ''the hell that is Heathrow''.  Heathrow was also rated as the worst airport in Europe in a survey of travel writers of the ''In Your Pocket'' travel guide series.
> 
> I would try an Aer Lingus flight our of Gatwick, but Ryanair is another option, and they would probably be out of Stansted or Luton.



The flight times from Stansted do not work. There is a noon flight on Ryanair out of Gatwick. I was just leaning to the 9:50 am flight from Heathrow as it would get us to Ireland earlier & is about 12 miles closer that Gatwick to my hotel (& I would prefer Aer Lingus to Ryanair from what I've read).


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## Carolinian (Jun 9, 2010)

saluki said:


> The flight times from Stansted do not work. There is a noon flight on Ryanair out of Gatwick. I was just leaning to the 9:50 am flight from Heathrow as it would get us to Ireland earlier & is about 12 miles closer that Gatwick to my hotel (& I would prefer Aer Lingus to Ryanair from what I've read).



I have done the early morning flight from Gatwick to Dublin on Aer Lingus a couple of times, and agree with you that Aer Lingus is a better airline than Ryanair.


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