Motegi

Hi' date=' I have the same tour in Victoria as you did. If it starts raining hard while there, can you go back in the bus or are there covered areas?

 

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There is a coffee shop and other covered areas by the entrance. The gift shop is actually very nice there and has lots of unique things especially for those who appreciate gardening.

Plus they have “free” community umbrellas all over that you can use while you are there. Just pick one up, use it, and return it where you board the bus. Our driver said that he would have the bus where he dropped us off but I’m not sure if he stayed there the entire time we were in the garden or whether he just came back to pick us up.

Regardless I think the rain in Victoria on our visit was a rare occurrence. The driver said that unlike the rest of the northwest they rarely get any rain in Victoria

I think a sign would be sufficient near the entrance that says that items left unattended will be collected and held.

Also that as a public shared space seating should not be reserved for extended periods of time for the courtesy of other guests.

my wife has already asked this, and i told her the limit is how much i can carry, not how much the ship can. :)

lol!

So cool! Our flight doesn’t leave till 4 pm - can you leave the ship later or do you have to leave with the 1st group?

 

 

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I think you can leave anytime before the final call.

But I imagine that the customs line would be longer the later you choose to leave.

If you have time you could always disembark early, walk to Pike Place Market, and get a coffee or breakfast. Then catch a taxi from there.

For our Disembarkation Pam and I chose to do the Port Valet service for this cruise through NCL. As I had posted earlier in this thread it is a free service offered in conjunction with the Port of Seattle that you arrange through NCL after you get on board.

The service will take care of your airline check in and boarding passes and will take your luggage directly from the ship to the airport and check it in for you. By signing up the standard airline luggage fees will be applied to your shipboard account. As a bonus any overweight luggage fees will not be charged.

They will distribute a form to your cabin for you to fill out with all of your information at the beginning of the cruise.

For the Bliss Alaskan Cruise I believe you have until Tuesday evening to sign up.

They distributed the boarding passes and luggage tags as well as stickers to our cabin on the second to last evening.

We had our bags packed and tagged outside our cabin before 11PM on Friday. NOTE: The “Port Valet” decals inside the envelope are to be worn on your shirts at the time of departure. This was not explained anywhere inside the envelope and I only discovered this by calling guest services. Many people mistakenly put the stickers on their bags.

On disembarkation day those who are participating in the Port Valet are able to walk off as part of the first group.

We took a flat rate taxi from the port to the airport. It was a flat $40. The shuttle bus is $20 per person. For a single rider the bus makes sense. For parties of two or more a “flat rate” taxi makes sense because you don’t have to wait until the bus is full to depart. The pricing of Uber and Lyft were higher than the taxi.

Never had an issue.

Agree with the above reply. If you are driving to port just bring multiple bags.

Day 7 - Victoria, BC, Canada

June 8, 2018

Pam and I did the Butchart Gardens excursion through NCL. We were a little concerned with how late the ship gets in and how late the excursion starts but the daylight lasts much longer there and the garden does have lighting.

It was sprinkling lightly throughout our visit but it didn’t dampen our experience at all! The garden was huge and the number and variety of flowers and trees was mind boggling. It is no wonder that this garden has been honored as a world heritage site.

It began raining harder on the way back but our tour bus driver still took us through town for a tour and provided some history. We didn’t get to stop in front of the parliament building due to traffic but it was raining pretty hard at that point anyway.

We were back to the ship by 9PM well before the 9:30 All Aboard.

After a quick trip to the cabin to drop off our jackets and things we made our way to the atrium to watch the “Perfect Couple” game show and grabbed dinner afterward at “The Local”.

Jim Badger’s performances in the evenings at District Brewhouse were one of Pam’s highlights of the cruise!

One of the cocktails they have “on tap” there was the “Cool as a cucumber” which I really enjoyed!

Besides the hot chocolate in COCOs, is there any other hot chocolate options available? I did not see it on the Starbucks menu.

I believe you could get it up on the observation deck at the self serve stations.

Thanks! I looked at the 150-600, but thought it would be heavy and bulky, so went with the 18-400. (Will be my 1st trip with it) I also have the Sigma lens 8-16, which I plan on taking. This is our 1st trip to Alaska and Seattle.

 

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Sounds good. The 400 should have sufficient reach for most of the wildlife. The main use for my 600 was for the bears and the bald eagles. The whales I could capture with a shorter lens.

Hope you had a wonderful trip. I have a quick question. Which deck did you disembark while in ports ?

 

 

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In Alaskan ports you disembark from Deck 4 but usually they have you take the elevator to Deck 5 and then take the stairs to Deck 4.

In Victoria there were two different levels to disembark from.

In Seattle you disembark from two locations on deck 7.

In the elevators there is a “gangway” button which I believe will automatically

take you the right deck.

When you say "holding", how are they holding sections?

When you walk up to a section of seats (a sofa and multiple side chairs and they say “no, these are taken.” There may be hats or jackets on the seats.

And you see that nobody ever comes by to sit there.

Day 7

Friday, June 8, 2018

Victoria, Canada

Yes I am on the Bliss now and there ARE some chair hogs in my opinion. Certain people laying across entire sofas with their legs up. People sitting in one chair and holding an entire section while the rest of their family has gone shopping/game show/go karting/laser tag/spa/etc.

Each time I’ve been there have been many people just lying down on a lounger or sofa and sleeping for hours at a time. In my opinion if you are going there to sleep why not go back to your cabin? The observation deck is for OBSERVING. It’s not called the nappping deck!

For a single traveler finding one empty seat is probably never an issue but for parties of two or more it will be tough to find seating together during the busier times.

Despite all of this I still think that the observation lounge is a fantastic feature on the Bliss and I’m really glad that NCL chose to design the ship with this space in mind. I just wish that some of the fellow passengers were more courteous.

We are taking the same helocopter/dog sled excursion and you mentioned you can take your camera with a strap and noticed your camera strap. Is it a crossbody that snaps at your chest or do you also have a backpack on? Trying to decide if I want to take my DSLR on the excursion and if I might be better getting a crossbody strap. I will be using a Tamron 18-400 lens.

 

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It’s a Quick Rapid strap that I got on Amazon. It has sliding clips for two DSLR bodies and padded straps like a backpack. It is like a harness and has a clip in the front to hold it together.

They also make a single camera crossbody strap as well. I brought that one too.

For the dogsled excursion you are not allowed to bring any bags of any size onto the helicopter. But you can bring cameras.

I brought two DSLR bodies with an Tamron 18-270 zoom and a Sigma 10-20 wide angle lens for the dogsled excursion. For the Tracy Arm Excursion I used a Tamron 150-600 telephoto and the Sigma 10-20.

Were the little igloos dog shelters?

Yes those were the dog shelters. And the little tents in the background were the people shelters. The staff lives out there 24/7 on the glacier with the dogs.

Manhattan MDR Food

Tuesday

June 5,2018

Corn and Crab Chowder:

Really just a creamed corn soup. Didn’t find any crab. Very lightly seasoned.

Asian Noodle Salad:

Light. Fresh. Delicious

Hawaiian Pork Belly:

Pineapple flavor. Cooked just right

Grilled New York Strip:

Always a safe choice

Manhattan MDR Menu

Tuesday

June 5, 2018

Juneau Continued

Afterward we were introduced to our team of dogs individually and allowed to interact with them.

Finally we reboarded our helicopters for the return flight. We took a different route over some new terrain on our way back. The pilot was super friendly and we found out he was also from Florida like us!

We were back in the ship by 11:30 and had plenty of time to have lunch onboard and drop things off in cabin before our 1:15 PM Tracy Arm Excursion in the afternoon.

Again this was a FANTASTIC excursion and we HIGHLY recommend it! Not only was the helicopter ride incredible on its own but being on the glacier and visiting with the dog sled teams was an amazing experience!!!

Juneau Continued

We landed on Norris glacier at the dog sled camp and were greated by the camp staff who gave us a talk about the camp and the dogs. This was followed by a quick safety briefing to familiarize us with the sleds. Then we were divided into groups of 4 to ride/drive the sleds that they had prepared for us. We each took turns driving over the snowfield with periodic breaks in between to let the dogs rest and cool down. These dogs loved to run and you could tell that even during their rest stops they were anxious to get going again! They all looked very happy and well cared for. We were told that the dogs are brought to the camp from breeders all over the state to train there for the Iditarod. Some are given shoes and some are even given mascara around their eyes to cut down on glare from the sun!

Juneau Continued

We booked the Juneau Dog Sled World and Taku Glacier Helicopter Adventure through Alaska Shore Excursions. They picked us up at the Tramway and took us by van to their heliport. There we actually met up with a large group who had booked the same excursion through NCL (and paid more) for the helicopter safety briefing. We were given lockers to store our bags and provided life vest waist packs and boot covers. You are only allowed to bring what you can carry on your person in your pockets. Cameras on straps are allowed.

We were then divided up into groups by weight and headed to our assigned helicopters where we were seated also by weight. I believe there were 4-5 tourists for each helicopter. They gave us each a headset to communicate with the pilot in flight and buckled us in. The four helicopters took off in unison and we were taken along the scenic route over the Taku Glacier to the dog sled camp. The Taku is apparently the only glacier in the area that is still growing. Our flight was extremely smooth and the scenery was absolutely breathtaking. Pam and I had our reservations leading up to this as neither of us had ever been in a helicopter before. But now that we have, our worries have been completely replaced with exhilaration and awe.

Looks like I fell a little behind on my travelogue! This cruise has been so packed full of activities it’s hard to keep up! I’ve taken thousands of pictures with my two DSLR cameras as well as two iPhones so it’s gonna take a while to process them all...

Anyway here’s a recap of our morning excursion in Juneau that preceded the Tracy Arm Excursion in the afternoon.

We pulled into the harbor in Juneau to a full on Fireboat Tug welcome. They were very excited to see the new Bliss in port and every person we ran into when they found out were on the Bliss were asking about the GoKart track and the other onboard amenities. It’s the largest ship they’ve had there. We pulled in the at AJ dock location which meant that we had to take a shuttle to the main gathering area at the Mt Roberts Tramway Station on Franklin Street. Norwegian hired a bunch of complimentary motor coaches that were running constantly to and from the Tramway Station while we were in port. The ride to and from was very quick, but keep in mind that you have a bus ride so factor that into any excursions you plan on your own as they usually depart from the Tramway location.

Silas, our cruise director and his assistant, Mandy, were on the dock and greeted us by name! Jovo the hotel director also was on the dock and greeted Pam by name and chatted with us about our plans for the day.

I have to laugh at the Starbucks comment. I'm a WA native (live 2 hours north of Seattle). There is, indeed, just about one Starbucks on every block in Seattle! In other parts of WA, it's very common to see more than one coffee store on a block, just not necessarily Starbucks. We are passionate about our caffeine here! :)

LOL! You must all be addicted to caffeine to support that number of shops!

The coffee growers must love you!

I really appreciate you guys using your valuable vacation time to post all this info. I am not sure what type of cabin you have, but I am trying to get info on the mid ship balcony cabins. Specifically if when you look down over your balcony you can see water. It appears to me in most of the videos and pictures I have seen there is a deck obstructing the view. I hope that's not the case as I have a BA cabin booked for May 2019. Thank you in advance if you are able to find out.

We have a midship balcony on deck 13. Although it’s categorized as midship it is a little forward of the forward elevators.

From our balcony you can definitely see the ocean when you are looking down. It’s true that deck 8 does jut out a bit because of the “Waterfront” design but not so much as to where you can’t see the ocean. I’ll see if I have a photo that demonstrates this. Perhaps if you are on deck 9 it may be more of an obstruction because of the angle

Thanks so much for all of the great reviews, tips and pictures! I can't wait to be there the end of June. 1 question, as a friend just returned and said they had a rough sea day coming back down from Skagway. How is the weather today and are there any rough seas?

 

TIA

Yes. Actually the wind picked up significantly in the afternoon in Skagway and I think it’s affecting the seas as we make our way back. The wind was so strong I understand that some of the afternoon excursions were cancelled. We had a hard time even walking back to the ship against the wind. Another thing is that we aren’t in the inside passage for the return trip so it’s not as sheltered.

We don’t get seasick easily but I know some other people aren’t liking it. I would compare it to the seas leaving the port of Miami. It can be a little rough leaving there sometimes.