Review ~ Norwegian Star ~ Sept 13-20, 2008 Inside Passage

We decided to arrive in Seattle a day early so that we were not rushing around before our cruise. We arrived at the Sea/Tac airport around 10:30 am and left for our hotel (Seattle Sheraton). We took a taxi to the hotel, total cost approx. $35. We arrived at the hotel and no rooms were available, we left our bags and decided to explore the city. First, we ate some lunch at the Cheesecake Factory, lunch was delicious. Onward to do some sight seeing. We walked all around the City, it was quite beautiful. One thing that was amazing was all the Starbucks, one on every corner & middle of the block. We headed towards the famous Pike's Market. This is a busy spot. We watched the "fish throwing", very neat. The beautiful, gorgeous flowers at the market that you can purchase were very cheap (I wished I would have stopped on my way back home). This stop at the market was well worth it. There were tons of Okies in Seattle for the Sooner/Huskie game, so a sea of red all day. We headed back to the hotel to freshen up, our room was ready. We headed out a little bit later to go see the Space Needle. We walked a few blocks from the hotel to the Monorail for the ride directly to the Space Needle. Round trip ride on the monorail is $4 pp. The price for the Space Needle was $16, and well worth it. We spend quite awhile there. The weather in Seattle on this day was awesome, clear blue skies. I took some great pictures from the top, and you could see landmarks very easily. Mount Rainer was in the background, and is huge! After some time at the Space Needle we decided to go to dinner, we ate at PF Changs, once again delicious. We got ready for the cruise the next day, Saturday, Sept. 13th. The hotel check out was smooth and had a taxi within 10 minutes.

September 13, 2008 ~ We arrived at Pier 66 at approx 10:15 am, checked our luggage, and were on our way through the ship screening, after this we were on our way to get our pictures taken and our ship cards, this was a very smooth process and took less than 10 minutes. After this we waited until they called for us to board the ship. One thing that did not happen was we were supposed to get a number ticket as this was the way they boarded people. I asked a terminal employee and she just advised us to go with the group that was already boarding. Fine by me! We walked onto the ship and were greeted with champagne. We did walk to the Market Cafe for some lunch. Lunch was ok food was not bad, as some of the previous post suggested. We then headed to the pool area, and got some drinks from Topsiders, and did some exploring some of the ship. We ended up on deck 13 at the Bier Garden, good view, but very windy. Walked around the ship some more, and looked at the shops, some items were cheap (booze) and some expensive (jewelry). Our room was ready about 2 pm. We were on deck 11 in a mini-suite. This was a very spacious room for the two of us. We decided to go walk around some more. We ended up at the Red Lion Pub to watch some sports, made our way to the Spinnaker Lounge, they were doing some karaoke, and it was a good time. After the karaoke a band played, they were ok, but at this point I was tired. We went to our room; I took some pictures & video from the balcony, and captured a very beautiful sunset and went to bed. Read more