We took this cruise to celebrate my 60th birthday. There were 5 people in our group and this was the first time any of us had sailed on Holland America. Since I was the one to choose the cruise I was very hopeful that it would be a pleasant experience for all of us, and I do believe it was.

We drove to Seattle and stayed there the night before the cruise. Once we were out of the car (Seattle is very congested and hard to navigate) we loved Seattle. Lots of things to do within walking distance of the Space Needle.

The day of debarkation went rather smoothly. I had pre-reserved on line our parking near the pier. The staff at the pier was extremely helpful and pleasant. On other cruises there were porters outside the terminal who would take luggage that was pre-tagged, however, we had to take our luggage quite a distance before we could actually release it to be taken aboard. We arrived at the pier before 11:30 although I would have preferred to wait a little longer to avoid the crowd that is there at the very beginning. My brother who arrived at the pier only 20 minutes later, had much less of a wait time. Read more