My husband and I are in our 50's and this was our second cruise. We chose it because the travel agent recommended the Pearl and I liked the itinerary. It didn't disappoint. We got into Seattle a couple of days early so we could visit the Boeing factory and see a little of the area. The tour of the factory was interesting and worth the trip to Everett if you like planes.

From reading cruise reviews I knew we could get on the ship early so we came to Pier 66 around 11 am. There are porters there who will take your bags on the ship or you can check them in yourself. Since my husband had to return the car to Budget downtown I let the porter handle things and tipped him. Budget brought my husband back to the boat for free, a nice surprise. We had paid extra to return the car downtown since we rented it at the airport. That added $10 per day on our rental fee but was still cheaper than taking a cab from the airport area to the ship

After a speedy check-in we were directed to the Garden Cafe where we had a good lunch. We wandered around the ship until around 1pm when we went to the room. Our bags had arrived. We had a balcony cabin mid-shp on deck 9 and were happy with the room. There was a small sofa and a table area as well as a small refrigerator and coffee maker. The cabin was in excellent condition as was the whole ship. We were especially thrilled with the bathroom as the shower was almost full size, not like our previous shower on Royal Caribbean Voyager. There was adequate storage and we were glad we paid extra for the balcony since we spent a lot of time looking out for whales and watching docking and scenery. Read more