We flew to Vancouver from Los Angeles the night before the cruise.  We stayed one night at the Days Inn downtown, clean but very small, but for one short night it was fine.Pre-cruise we took a 3.5 hour city tour with Land Sea tours.  They picked us up in the hotel lobby and took all our luggage on the van.  They then switched us onto another van and we were a little worried whether they would get all of our luggage, they did, everything was fine.  The tour was very good, we saw and learned a lot. We went through Stanley Park with a stop at the totem poles and a stop to look at Lion's Gate bridge.  We also had a short stop in Granville Market which was a pretty cool place, one could spend several hours there and not be bored.  We then went to the observation tower and had a short walk through gas town.  The tour dropped us at Ballentyne Pier. People were friendly in Vancouver in the hotels and restaurants, even on the street when we needed advice about public transport.  I would love to go back and spend more time in this beautiful city.Embarkation was delayed, so large crowds gathered, but they had the lines arranged very efficiently.  The back up was due to the previous cruise being delayed because the tide was too high and they had to wait for it to go down so they could get under Lion's Gate Bridge!  We waited in line for about 45 minutes and then we were getting onboard the ship.  The cabin was ready so we were able to drop our carry on luggage there, then we headed to the Windjammer for the welcome aboard lunch.  As usual, the food in the buffet was spotty, some is delicious, other things not so good.  One reason why my DH and I love RCL is their ships are so beautiful and the Serenade is no exception.  I really enjoyed the glass elevators, what a view.  In fact, the views are great everywhere.  The decor and artwork on the ship was wonderful from the whimsical statues on the pool and golf decks, to the more classical pieces. It is in wonderful shape. We had an Ocean View quad room, two beds pull out from the ceiling.  The room was well laid out and we had plenty of room.  Having a window at ocean level was kind of cool.  Our fellow cruisers ranged from babies to elderly folks.  Lots of multi-generational family groups.  As usual, Adventure Ocean was pretty wonderful and our 11 and 9 YO sons enjoyed that.  They spent less time there than usual because they are old enough now to go on excursions and Alaska is the place to do that (more on ports later). Not too many rude passengers, some bad habits/behavior at the buffet, but that is becoming normal and a reason I try to avoid the buffet.Our cabin steward was very efficient and pleasant to us.  She took pride in her job and asked us many times if everything was good, it was.  Our wait staff in the dining room was the same, not overly friendly, but efficient and pleasant.The captain was Canadian and on our cruise the last day was Canada day.  They decorated the ship with flags and red and white.  The many Canadians onboard wore appropriate patriotic t-shirts.  The day we docked was the 4th of July and again they decorated.  It was a little strange to be in Canada on the 4th..Glacier, we went to Dawes glacier and the captain got the ship up close to it.  It was fun to see the floating ice on the way there and how it increased as we got closer to the glacier.  Got some amazing photos up on deck.  It was cold up there but not as bad as on our whale watching tour.The rest of the cruise we had warm and sunny weather.  The kids were finally able to rock climb and mini golf.  So a very complete cruise.Entertainment:  A comedian that was not that funny.  Magician who was really good and did a close up magic show in one of the lounges on the last day.  One guy did singing impersonations, he was really good and funny.  Cruise director was a young man, he was good, funny.  Entertainment was not that great compared with some other RCL cruises, perhaps this is where the cruise line is cutting back?Disembarkation was fast, we are Diamond members and were in the customs line by 8:15.  Customs line was long probably took .5 hour.Spent one final day in Vancouver.  Stayed at the Pan Pacific an amazing hotel.  Took public transportation to Grouse Mountain, and thoroughly enjoyed our time there. The view from the tram was wonderful. Then took public transport to do some shopping on Robson.  The weather was about 80 that day.  Ended the day by walking to the Spaghetti Factory in gas town, dined al fresco, good food, reasonable prices, excellent service, highly recommende.  Did a little souviner shopping, the kids got one of the Olympic mascot fuzzy creatures.An excellent cruise and vacation, all the preplanning really paid off.