Vision of the Seas Review

Vision of the Seas - Alaska

Review for Alaska Cruise on Vision of the Seas
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two cruisers 723
First Time Cruiser • Age 20s

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Sail Date: Jun 2004

I will start by saying that this was the trip of a lifetime. We couldn't have asked for a better vacation. Following is the detail of what we did and seen on our cruise. I know it's long. But I hope you'll find it informative. There were times when I was reading the reviews that I had wished I had just a little more info. So I decided to share just a little more than I was used to reading. Reading these boards before we went certainly helped us to plan our vacation ahead of time and it made everything go very smoothly as a result. We have many AWESOME pictures that we plan to provide a link to after we have the chance to get it all set up. So stay tuned. Here goes:

PRE-CRUISE TRAVEL, ACCOMMODATIONS & EMBARKATION DAY:

We flew to Seattle the morning of 6/24 the day before our cruise. We took an airport shuttle for $11 each to our hotel, the Best Western Executive Inn. The shuttle service was Gray Line Shuttle and there is a booth just outside of the baggage claim. They go to most hotels. And are cheaper than a taxi or than most of the shuttle's available. They first put us on a big bus and took us to a downtown hotel where we transferred to a smaller van that delivered us to the door of our hotel. It was a slight inconvenience having to change from the bus to the van. But it went quickly considering the van was waiting for us as soon as we got off the bus. Here is their website: http://graylineseattle.com/airportexpress1.cfm The hotel was booked through Travelocity and it was $129 including all taxes. The reason we chose this hotel is that the bus that went to Vancouver called Quick Shuttle picked up right outside this hotel. The cost was only $33 a person from Seattle to Vancouver. We booked it online. Here is their website: http://www.quickcoach.com/ The hotel was only a block away from the Space Needle which was very convenient. We went to the top for about $13 a person. There was a carnival at the bottom, several museums and several shops. We ate at a restaurant right next to the Space Needle called Michaelangelo's for a late lunch. It was a pretty neat little place. We were very tired after getting up at 3:30 in the morning to travel, so we didn't want to go far for dinner. So we went to the hotel's happy hour which I believe was from 5:00-7:00 and had ½ price appetizers and $1 beers. This was a pretty good deal. In the morning, my husband walked to McDonald's which was less than a block away and brought breakfast back to the room. We were in a bit of a hurry since the bus was scheduled to leave at 8:30 AM for Vancouver so this was convenient since the hotel didn't provide a continental breakfast. There was a restaurant, however, that did. And they had room service available as well. But it was pretty expensive. The bus ride took about 5 hours. We stopped once at the Bellingham, WA Airport to pick up a few more passengers. Customs took a while at the Canadian border as they have to off load all the luggage and all the passengers so the bus can be checked and the passengers each screened individually. We stopped twice to let passengers off in downtown Vancouver before finally arriving at Ballentyne Pier at about 2:00. The porters were waiting at the bus and we didn't have to wait for our luggage to be taken off. We were told to go straight in for check-in. There were no tips involved here. Check-in only took us about 15-20 minutes. We talked to some people who arrived later than we did and it took them over an hour. So we must have just showed up during a lag time. We then checked out our outside cabin #3128 with a window. It was very nice. I liked it better than the window room we had on the Carnival Celebration a couple of years ago. And that room had quite a bit more square footage.

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