I'm sure what follows will be a long review, even before it's written. First let me tell you that my traveling group was comprised of myself and hubby (early 40's) and our two young teens, and my brother and sister-in-law (mid 30's) and their just turned one-year-old son. We have cruised several times before, but never to Alaska and never on NCL.

Left Pittsburgh on Friday morning and arrived in Seattle before noon with time change. Took a minivan taxi and one regular taxi to our hotel -- I think both cost about $20 with tip. I might be a couple of bucks high or low on that. We spent two nights at the Red Lion Hotel on Fifth Avenue. I booked the rooms on priceline quite a while ago for $80 bucks a night. Hotel was a clean, great location hotel in the heart of downtown. We're all walkers so we walked all over town from this location. Elephant & Castle Restaurant is located in the hotel, but service was pretty bad so I wouldn't recommend it. Hotel also has a terrace restaurant that was more efficient for breakfast. During our time in Seattle we visited Pike Market which was fun and provided lots of gawking opportunities, the space needle, some shopping areas, and the rest of the family visited the new Sci-Fi Museum on its second day open while I took my nephew to the Children's museum in the lower level of the food court at the space needle. They enjoyed the sci-fi but didn't feel it was worth the admission price of $12.95. Had beautiful clear days in Seattle with very warm (mid 80's) dry weather. Ate dinner one evening in the food court near the space needle (which would have been good if there wasn't a Shania Twain concert in town that night overwhelming the restaurants) and the other night we wanted a good crab dinner so we headed for a place called the Crab Pot on the waterfront. It had a long wait and few non-seafood choices so we tried a place called The Fisherman behind it. This meal was a disaster. The waiter brought our main course before our appetizer and salads - about 5 minutes after we had ordered. Upon being told we hadn't had our appetizers and salads yet, he didn't offer to return our meals but simply brought the other stuff later. Four of us had ordered Alaskan king crab for $31.95. No exaggeration, there were two legs and claws on our plates. The waiter said it was sold by weight. From now on, we'll have our Alaskan crab in Pittsburgh. It's cheaper and better. Monorail was down while we were there but we followed it from below and walked to the space needle in about fifteen minutes. We loved walking around Seattle!

Sunday morning we took a cab and a town car to Pier 66. Both were about $15 with a tip. Got to the pier around 10:30 and easily dropped bags. For most people (including my brother) the process was very smooth and efficient I'm glad to report. For us, it was close to a nightmare. I had carefully read NCL's literature and interpreted it that since I am a parent to my children I could travel with them without further documentation. I still believe this is what their literature says. But... they have a different name than I do, and because they are also of a different race, adopted as toddlers and now early teens. We all handed our passport to the agent and she said, "Where are these children's parents?" I told her I was their parent, have full custody, etc., etc. Because of the name difference, she said that I must have a form signed by their adoptive father whose name they carry. Yikes. Moments of absolute panic. They kept our bags and took us upstairs to where you check in. We were taken to a back office and I was given a fax number and a form, where if I could get hold of my ex, convince him to go to a place where he could receive the fax and send it back, we would be good to go and could board. If not, we were sunk. I got hold of him, he was in a good humor luckily, he drove to a local Staples store and received the fax, signed it, and sent it back. Our delay was of about an hour but boy did I sweat. The whole thing still irritates me. The form gave ME permission to seek medical treatment for them in his absence. The irony is, I pay for all of their medical stuff and they are fully covered under my current husband's insurance policy. So the only person who has no involvement in their medical care had to give his signature authorizing treatment. So to all non-traditional families, be careful and don't read the NCL literature literally. (By the way, the agents blamed Canada for the strict policy. We never had this problem on another cruise since I have full custody so I'm not sure what the real issue was.) Even with this panic, we were on board and in our cabin by 12:30 pm. Read more