Sunday
Today was embarkation day! Jamie and I got up relatively early and were able to look outside to see our ship. Well, we saw PART of our ship. The ship is HUGE. I think I spotted our cabin. But no, not really. The balconies all look the same from where we were at the hotel.
After getting everything mostly packed up, we headed down to the hotel restaurant for some breakfast. On the way, we heard from Lizzie that they had landed an were on their way in a cab from the airport. So we waited for them to arrive, stowed their luggage in our room and then had a very hearty and very expensive breakfast. Thankfully, since I’m a high metal status with Marriott, two of the meals were free, so we all just split the remainder.
I had the corned beef hash, which in my world is more of a, well, HASH. This was huge chunks of potatoes and corned beef. It was very good and very filling, but the coffee must have been a Starbuck’s cousin because it was dark and bitter, just like my husband in the summer. Haha.
After breakfast, we headed back to our room and finished getting ready to go to the ship. I had chosen the Marriott, not just because I paid for it with points, but because of it’s close proximity to the cruise terminal. The NCL terminal is Pier 66 and we were right next door and across the street. So we dodged the traffic, dropped our luggage off and went to get in line to board.
While in line to board, we ran into Bob and Marge, so all of our tribe were present and accounted for. Jamie and I checked in and something happened when the lady was scanning my passport. She said I had a different name on the reservation than I did on my passport. Since I’ve had the same name, passport and NCL account for many years, I didn’t see how that was possible. Apparently, when checking Jamie in, she didn’t do something right and tried to scan me in as Jamie. I told her that would not do, as that would mean my husband had married his cousin. She was too freaked out to appreciate my humor. She was saying she was going to get fired. She had to go over to a supervisor. I told Jamie that the primary concern was me getting on the ship. If she still had a job at the end of the day, that would be nice. I’m so caring.
Anyway, after the kerfuffle, all was well. I remained myself and was given a key card and we continued on our way. The boarding was actually very smooth. We didn’t have to wait and the line kept moving, albeit slowly. But soon enough we were walking onto the gangway. I should have probably taken a picture of Jamie getting aboard her first cruise ship, but it was so freaking hot in the terminal that we were wilted. We did allow them to take the normal cruise photo. We’ll see later what it looks like.
After our muster check in, Bob and Marge headed for the buffet and the remainder of us went out to the outside deck to enjoy the beautiful Seattle weather. Since in previous cruises, the cabins have always been ready by 1:00 pm, the group separated to head to our cabins around 1:15. Except the cabins weren’t ready. So we re-grouped on the pool deck sitting beside the pool. Jamie and I had a mudslide to get the vacay started. Finally, the cabins were ready around 3pm so we split again.
Our cabin was the normal NCL sized balcony stateroom, but I was pleasantly surprised to see that our balcony is twice the size of the normal balcony. And the chairs seemed wider and were able to recline. I will remember this cabin number for the future. It would be very well used in someplace other than Alaska.
The thing these days is that I guess they can’t assume that two women traveling together aren’t a couple, so they had the beds connected. I left a message for the room steward to please separate them.
Our luggage came after a bit and we were able to unpack and get things settled just prior to meeting Bob and Marge for dinner at one of the main restaurants. We had a very lovely dinner. I had a shrimp scampi pasta. This is a dish that I had remembered when Gregg and I cruised back in December. It was really, really good. Everyone enjoyed their meals and we had a nice conversation.
After dinner, Jamie and I retired to the the cabin to the find the beds separated and everything ready for the night. We had plenty of storage room for all of our goods and plenty of outlets for our electronics. The day was a nice one and we’re looking forward to the upcoming sea day. Stay tuned.
