My wife and I cruised with Norwegian Sky in 2000 thru the Panama Canal and enjoyed it so much we decided to do it again. Unfortunately, it took us 12 years.

I was looking at the cruise line websites since May of this year and HAL was the line that offered what we were most interested in regarding dates,excursions and ports of call. I noticed that the closer to embarkation dates, prices on unsold cabins were discounted. We are both retired so we were flexible on our date of departure. I did want to go in July as I felt the weather would be better than any other time of the season. As soon as I saw the price discounted for the July 14 cruise I phoned the number listed on the website talked to a HAL representative and she told me that there were no cabins available at the advertised rate, she mentioned that there were other cabins at regular rates but I quickly declined. As soon as I got off the phone with her I called a cruise specialist on an on-line site that I had talked to previously, told him about the advertised special, he quickly checked it out, told me Yes! there still were cabins available at the advertised special and in a matter of minutes were guaranteed a VH or better stateroom with a balcony. We both feel a balcony is something we will always want.

We arrived in Vancouver on Friday July 13th, to make sure we were at the port the next day, I'm not superstitous but "better safe than sorry" . We stayed at the Coast Plaza Suites and Hotel on Denman Street and used public transport to get to Canada Place where the ships dock. Read more