I am a NCL latitudes member and we wanted to take a February cruise with some Carribean ports we hadn't visited yet. The Epic's itinerary fit the bill.
We started our cruise by staying the night before embarkation in San Juan. The San Juan Airport has an easy to use taxi stand near the baggage claims. We spent $20 from the airport to our Old San Juan hotel called the Hotel Milano. I loved this hotel. If you go look at some of the review sights, this hotel gets mixed reviews, but it is in the middle of the Old San Juan and is not a chain hotel. It reminded my wife and I very much of a hotel we stayed in Switzerland. Because 3 ships were in port, Old San Juan was mobbed and we were not able to have dinner at the hotel, however, the hotel employees guided us to a very good restaurant for dinner that is more frequented by locals than by tourists. It is called Mojito's Restaurant around the corner from the hotel. Before embarkation, we had breakfast Cafeteria Mallorca, which is around the corner from the hotel in a different direction. A mallorca is like a sweet panini filled with ham and cheese. Very delish. Great coffee, too and local cops eat there. I highly recommend this place for breakfast.
After breakfast, the hotel looked after our luggage until it was time to go to the port so we could walk around the old city. The ride was from the hotel to the port was fine. No problems. Embarkation was a pain because they were screening everyone for the Coronavirus. They took us into the port building a few hundred at a time and sat us down to fill out surveys about where we had been and if we had any symptoms of the virus. By the time we got onto the ship, it was dinner time which we ate at the Garden Cafe.