NCL Pearl Cruise 7/4/10

Sunday: We spent the weekend in the Seattle area on the Olympic Peninsula, if you are looking for something more outdoorsy than Seattle; this is the place to be. Sequim, Port Angeles and the Olympic National Park, with more sun than Seattle (the clouds tend to go on the other side of the Olympic Mountains). There is also a wonderful Drive through zoo in Sequim (Olympic Game Farm) this used to be the Disney Nature film set for all those Films that Disney did back in the 60s and 70s (remember "Charlie the Lonesome Cougar"?). It is still family owned and just a really nice, non zoo-sterile, place to really get up close to animals (and more bears than you will probably see in Alaska!). We took the Bainbridge Island ferry back to Seattle (drops you a few blocks from the ship). We had a Budget rental car and they have a really nice facility near the pier with a shuttle service. I found Budget to be much nicer and simpler to rent from than the last time when we rented from the Pier vendor (National). We got to the Ship a little before 11am, the longest line was for security (we missed the Suite baggage check and security area, so we were in the general boarding), found their scanners to be tighter than the TSAs today (always a crapshoot). Since we were suites we were escorted to a private area for check-in and cookie munching, we were the first suites to check-in and waited until about 11:15, when our butler came to escort us on the ship - The first ones onboard!! He let us drop our stuff of in the room, and then took us to Cagney's which was not opened yet, so we walked around deck 13. Lunch was great and I can see why everyone raves about the Cagney's suite perks. We then wandered the ship until 1:30 (that is when our butler told us to expect to get access to our room. Sure enough about 1:30 they quietly opened the doors and we were outside on our balcony when the page announced that the deck was now open. The only snafu was our luggage; we had the suite priority tags on our bags, but found others were getting theirs before ours. We told our room steward and he said that they had screwed up the luggage loading, but within 10 minutes, he found our luggage and got it to our room. We had an AD room, decent size, weird double door closet (access from Bath or hall). Had the upgraded bath soaps, the espresso machine, a full set of dishware, and the robes/slippers. Plenty of storage and the bed is Wonderful! The balcony is what makes the room, large and we were on the end, so only 1 neighbor. Had issues with kids dropping food from above, but that is to be expected. However, being on the back of the ship is perfect for Alaska as the rear provides a wind barrier.

Something I never see reviewed is the TV, so here it goes. It is a Phillips flat screen, with hard to access side inputs (for the toys I bring). At least on mine the TV input button was not working, but my room steward got me a remote that could get me to the input menu from the sleep button. The panel had 2 Svideo, 1 component - though not standard colors, and 2 composite, and 2 s-video. If you remove the bottom drawer you will find a Svideo and stereo plugs on the floor. The DVD player is a cheap Coby that uses composite. None of the input plugs are labeled, so it is a hunt peck, for instance the component was tough to figure at as its inputs were not standard colors. Also 3 black RCAs at the top, which I have no idea what they are. Read more