A pleasant 7-day Alaska Cruise

This is our first trip to Alaska, and our second trip with NCL. NCL Pearl has similar lay-out as all other cruises ships. The crew is pleasant and helpful. If you looking for "eating" then NCL Pearl may not meet your expectation. The buffets (Garden Cafe, The Great Outdoors) is OK, same food every day. Comparing between the two main dining rooms, the service in the Summer Palace is much. much slower than the Indigo although they server the same menu. The entertainments on my trip (Aug 24-31) gears more to the 60's and early 70's. It's so-so for us. The highlight is The Crew Talent Show,

Seattle - Embarkation was quick and organizeed. With in 45 minutes after deposited our luggage at the port, we were in our room.

Juneau - Wet and rainy. There is a free shuttle from the dock to the tram way station. We bought a round trip bus ticket to Mendenhall Glacier, and spent all the time there. Be prepared for the return trip.The last bus supposed to leave the Glacier at 6:00 pm. We took the one at 5:30pm and it was very crowded.

Skagway - We book a White Pass-Yukon Rail & Bus tour.  They picked us up at the dock and took us to the train. It looked like each tour group had its own rail car. It was a very scenery trip on the way up. You can stand out on the platforms either at the front or on the rear for the rail car to take picture. We rode back to town by bus, and stopped at several places to take pictures.

Glacier Bay -  It was wet and cloudy. But we stayed on Deck 7 Promenade to stay dry. We enjoyed all the views of different glaciers. The ship turned around for very body to see all surrounds. You probably need a high power camera to capture the beauty of the glaciers because they are at a quite distance from the ship.. But the pictures from our compact camera are good enough for the memory of the trip.

Ketchikan - Wet and rainy again. We saw the Great Lumberjack Show, and walked to the Creek Street. Ah, don't forget to take your picture at the Welcome Arch.

Victoria BC - We took the shuttle bus ($US 10.00/person/round trip) from the dock to downtown. We wandered around Inner Harbor. There was the Classic Boat Festival at the time. We saw quite a few luxury yatches. We visited the Canadian Royal Navy Oriole.

Seattle - Disembarkation was also quick and organized.

In general, this is a pleasant trip for us.