cdoobiest

Going to be in Victoria with wife and 2 kids flying out of YYJ at 6am flight Delta to Seattle then 2.5 hour connection to Boston.

Do I need to get to YYJ 1.5 hours ahead of time. Looks like small airport. We are staying downtown Vic, probably have to leave early am like 3:30-4am and drive to YYJ and return rental car. How is drive at night?

Also, I believe you don't clear customs until you arrive in Seattle. We all have global entry, so hoping for decent turnaround time so I can enjoy the Amex or Delta lounge in Seattle!

Thanks in advance for info.

s0ssos

No point getting to Victoria early (was there a few years ago), very simple. I think I got there 1 hour in advance and it was fine.

SometimeTraveler

The drive to the airport will take about 45 minutes and at that time in the morning traffic will be very light and its a good easy drive. As mentioned above you you won't need a lot of time at the airport so 1 hour should be enough. If your flight is at 6 leaving your hotel at 4 should give you plenty of time. Not sure of the customs situation, I'll leave that for someone else to answer.

smallmj

Don't forget to include enough time to return the rental car.

EmailKid

It actually takes more like half hour from downtown to the airport, and unless there is some off airport location that I'm not aware of, it's less than five minute walk from rental car to the terminal.

Agree that about an hour before departure is good - I tend to get paranoid and normally aim for 75 minutes, but so far always ended up spending a lot of time in the airport before departure. There is a Tim Horton's (and Starbucks) before security, but of course you cannot take your coffee inside the "lounge" as one of the screening officers called it a couple of weeks ago. It's a waiting area, a lounge awaits in SEA @:-)

YYJ is a tiny airport, and IIRC even DL's CRJs get the walk to plane without a jetbridge.

Last time arriving in SEA we were delayed by ATC in SEA, so arrived almost two hours late, and there were a couple of widebodies in front of us, so it took about an hour, but that has not happened to me before in 15 years of flying this route (along with SFO, YYC and YVR). That early in the morning SEA should be a breeze.

Fragola

I just returned from Victoria and rented a car. Alamo and Enterprise are actually off airport but only a 5 minute shuttle ride away. The other rental agencies are inside the airport.