You can read my recap of our ship, NCL Encore here <—
The embarkation process was pretty seamless, although there was a lot of waiting and several check-points before getting on the ship. This is the first time we have booked transpiration from the airport to the pier through the cruise line. The benefit being that I think we officially “checked in” one we spoke to the NCL personnel at the airport. I was a little fearful we would miss our 30-minute check-in window because there was just so much waiting. We waited at least 20 minutes for the transportation bus to arrive for our pick-up. But, once we dropped off our baggage and boarded the bus, we arrived at the convention center across from Pier 66 for our COVID test.
The line for COVID testing was long. I am not sure what the hold-up was but I do know that if you follow the instruction and sign up ahead of time, it went a lot faster. You are whisked to an area for a swab, my gal was quite aggressive, and then sent into a big waiting room while you hold your breath until you see your number and the numbers of those in your party. We got the okay to board! A few more check points later and we finally made it.
We boarded the ship about an hour after we were dropped off for our COVID tests, so not bad for overall timing. The buffet was first up as we were starving and a short time later we were able to get into our rooms. I went back to the lido deck so I could take some photos of the Seattle skyline.
We hit up the District Brew House to share two beer flights and then eventually made our way back on the lido deck for sail away.
After watching the Cruise Monkey’s videos, I just had to get myself a big hand to wave during sail away. I was a little delayed in getting up there in time so I pretty much waved to the water. HA! But, it is the experience that counts. As we pulled into Icy Straight Point, I got my big hand back out and waved at the guys helping us dock. I’ll will be packing this again on future cruises. It cracks me up you can see the guy on the slide behind me!
Our first day was a sea day, which was pretty low key. There was really high winds and very rough seas so the boat was really rocking! We attended the Cruise Next cocktail party for latitude member, which I was able to take Mom and Dad with me. I am still thinking about that delicious smoked margarita we enjoyed.
We had reservations for dinner at Cagney’s Steak House and literally oohed and aahed over every bite. It was amazing. Mom and I attended an evening show called Company of Men and called it a night.
Our first Port of Call was Icy Straight Point, which we did not dock until 2pm.
It is a recent economic development between the towns members and Norwegian Cruise Lines where the locals are stakeholders. These were the first ships to sail to Icy Straight Point, which will be a regular stop on all future Alaska cruises. The storm that we encountered as we made our way north had damaged the zip line and the gondola, which was a huge bummer. I also heard the nearby Native village of Hoonah was not accepting visitors due to COVID. For anybody with an excursion, they really lost out. I also heard that whale watching was amazing so anybody that did that really lucked out!
We did not have an excursion booked and made our way on foot to the canary, which is an old salmon packing plant that is now a museum attraction. It was really neat.
The highlight of Icy Straight Point is the beautiful scenery, a locally brewed red ale beer, and fresh halibut and fish. It was delicious! We also had beautiful weather and thankfully a break in the rainy season of September/October.
As there wasn’t much to do, we boarded the ship again and eventually convinced ourselves we needed another bite to eat. Oh man were we stuffed. It was a great first few days to start off our cruise.
I’ll be back with more.
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