Just off Pearl Alaska July 14 to 21

Just off Pearl Alaska July 14 to 21. Almost perfect weather !

I will post my comments within a few days but first I will try to answer any questions from people leaving soon.

Our experience was limited to: no specialty restaurants, no beverage packages, we were in an outside cabin no balcony, we did stay in Seattle one day before and one day after, we are Latitudes Gold.

Questions?

Tom

I know that it is super subjective, but how was the entertainment and food? We have been on Pearl twice including Alaska, is she looking her age or did dry dock keep her young and cute? If you had any "klunkers" for excursions would also love to hear. Happy you had good weather, I keep hearing this season has either very good or not so much! Thanks!

We were on that cruise, and the entertainment was great. They had second city there doing improv and a few other good entertainment acts such as a tribute band for Frankie Valley and the Four Seasons. The entertainment was the highlight of what Norwegian brought to the cruise.

The food, was awful. Not awful as in utterly disgusting, (Because no cruise line could get away with gross food), but awful considering that is part of the expense of the cruise. When I took a cruise 5 years ago with Royal Caribbean, the buffet was good (I did get bored of it, but the food was good), and the dinners in the dining area made me feel like I was going to a fairly nice restaurant. The dinner I had at Cagney's (what they try to pass as a fine steakhouse) was pretty comparable to the dinners I had every night on my last cruise. The main dining room had poorer quality than an applebees on the Pearl.

The steak served in the dining rooms was plain awful. It had an odd texture, almost spongy but dense and tough for the cut of meat (NY Steak). The rarer you got it the better it was, and they did have a good chimichurri sauce that we put on it one time.

Usually the buffet would have a few things that actually tasted good. That tended to be the Indian food. Breakfast was a better part of the food offered. The eggs in the eggs benedict were poached perfectly, but the hollandaise was very bland. I had to add lemon to it. Though I did appreciate that they kept the eggs poached well, as some of the Las Vegas buffets like Paris leave them in the warmer and then the yolks harden. There were also waffles and french toast, and bacon and sausage, hot cereal, and a few other things. There was strawberry sauce for the waffles... Pretty standard breakfast buffet, it wasn't bad.

Any of the desserts like pies or cakes were poor quality and lacked flavor or had wierd textures. Chocolate decadence is one of my favorite desserts, but this one tasted just like regular flourless chocolate cake instead of being rich with flavor like anyone who knows real decadence. Even the decadence at Cagneys was subpar. I ordered an apple pie at Summer Palace that was basically hardened congealed apple paste. The pies and cakes tasted like healthy alternatives to whatever they were trying to be. I remember going to the big chocoholic buffet after dinner at Cagneys (which served to remind me what good food is) and not finding anything that had enough flavor to consider a dessert.

As I said earlier, the Indian food had good flavor and I would usually eat that, but I am no reliable judge on the quality of Indian food. I just liked what they were serving, and the chef was Indian so I can guess it was alright.

But one of the things I had liked before about cruises was that it was like having a hotel and going out to eat every night, and I felt like this cruise was more like eating from a hospital cafeteria, or having a subpar experience eating out at one of those restaurants to which you will likely never go back.

Now I used to work in foodservice, and I remember learning about how plating and presentation can fool people into thinking something tastes good. Plenty of people seemed happily oblivious to the poor quality of food they were eating. And we are not wealthy individuals with overly-refined tastes. I regularly eat low-grade meat ect, but honestly, I could cook a better top round london broil than what was being passed off as New York steak in the dining rooms. After finding no higher quality between the dining rooms and the buffet, we opted for the buffet a lot. There was a lot of "what is that?" followed by "well they say it is char sui chicken, or "they say it is decadence".

Ultimately, it seems NCL is sacrificing quality to drive people to their specialty restaurants. Then you might want to count the cost of booking someone with better food with a line that charges a little more than them so that each dining experience can be good. Good food is important to me on a vacation. And it isn't much more work to make it taste good even if you are using budget ingredients. I do that all the time.

-John

I know that it is super subjective, but how was the entertainment and food? We have been on Pearl twice including Alaska, is she looking her age or did dry dock keep her young and cute? If you had any "klunkers" for excursions would also love to hear. Happy you had good weather, I keep hearing this season has either very good or not so much! Thanks!

The only entertainment we experienced was the "Oh What a Night" tribute to Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, and it was really great. We are not big on shows but they were spectacular.

As far as the food goes, we like the food on NCL in general. The fruit and salad fixings are always fresh and good. Breakfast is great. Lunch and Dinner could use a little more variety, especially in the MDRs which kind of pushes you to the buffet. I will post some specific comments on food later.

The service overall was great.

The ship was enjoyable, we like the Pearl and sister ships which have the Great Outdoors and the Spinnaker Lounge, unlike the Dawn and Star.

The captain said that the Pearl is due for drydock in April.

We didn't take any excursions so can't comment on that.

We reserved our cruise about a month before sailing and got a lowest price inside cabin with GTY (no cabin number). We reserved directly with NCL and were assigned a PCC (Personal Cruise Consultant). When the price dropped we contacted the PCC and he was able to upgrade us to an Oceanview but obstructed. At least we would have daylight. We were prepared to see how an inside cabin worked, for the first time, but now it will have to be later.

The air approach to Seattle was beautiful, clear skies and the snow capped mountains.

We were travelling light, one carry on each plus backpacks/shoulder bags. We took the Light Rail from the airport into Seattle and it was a pretty long walk from the airport gate to the Light Rail station, but all enclosed.

You have to buy the ticket at a kiosk ($2.25 for adults, 75c for Seniors age 65 if you brought your Medicare card) and you can use a large bill but all the change will be in coins, including dollar coins.

The Light Rail trip to Westlake is about 35 minutes. From there you take the 5th and Pine escalator/elevator and right there is the monorail entrance where you buy a ticket at a booth from a person ($1 Seniors). There are no stops, it goes directly to the Seattle Center where the Space Needle is.

We looked around Seattle Center, lots going on, then took a taxi from there to our hotel, the Mediterranean Inn, for $6. It was actually walkable but we were a little tired at that point.

Lots of reasonably priced restaurants in the area of the hotel on Queen Anne and Roy streets.

Forgot to mention earlier that my wife and I are in our 70s.

We got up early and walked from our hotel to the Olympic Sculpture Park, which is free and obviously used by locals for walking, running, and sitting as it is a pretty location at the water. It was an easy walk downhill to it but tough coming back uphill.

We checked out at 10:30 and (being tired from the walk) took a taxi for $7 to the terminal.

Checkin was a breeze and we were aboard by 11:30 and left our luggage in the room. We even emptied our suitcases, even though the steward later said he wasn't finished dusting. Ha. It looked ready to us.

We had lunch in the Summer Palace, which was nearly empty and relaxing. Anyone should go there at least once to see the furnishings and paintings (with informative labels) with the Romanov theme.

Took photos from Deck 7 on sailaway. Great views of Mt Rainier.

Drill at 3:15. No life vests needed, met at appointed station inside the ship.

Dinner at Summer Palace early. We only bought glasses of wine instead of bottles, a package or bringing wine aboard.

By the way, you have to go to the aft elevator to get to Deck 7 and then walk down to Summer Palace.

At 6:30 we went to Spinnaker Lounge up on Deck 13 for more views going out, but it was being occupied by private party of the ACBL (American Contract Bridge League, I think). Disappointing and we thought they could have found a smaller room to occupy. Also seems that cruise lines could publish in advance what large groups are aboard each cruise.

We met someone from Holland America ashore one day and they were pretty upset that a large group of some organization was on their ship.

Anyway, for the rest of the cruise we didn't encounter a similar problem with the ACBL.

By sunset we were done for the day.

Forgot to mention earlier that my wife and I are in our 70s.

We got up early and walked from our hotel to the Olympic Sculpture Park, which is free and obviously used by locals for walking, running, and sitting as it is a pretty location at the water. It was an easy walk downhill to it but tough coming back uphill.

We checked out at 10:30 and (being tired from the walk) took a taxi for $7 to the terminal.

Checkin was a breeze and we were aboard by 11:30 and left our luggage in the room. We even emptied our suitcases, even though the steward later said he wasn't finished dusting. Ha. It looked ready to us.

We had lunch in the Summer Palace, which was nearly empty and relaxing. Anyone should go there at least once to see the furnishings and paintings (with informative labels) with the Romanov theme.

Took photos from Deck 7 on sailaway. Great views of Mt Rainier.

Drill at 3:15. No life vests needed, met at appointed station inside the ship.

Dinner at Summer Palace early. We only bought glasses of wine instead of bottles, a package or bringing wine aboard.

By the way, you have to go to the aft elevator to get to Deck 7 and then walk down to Summer Palace.

At 6:30 we went to Spinnaker Lounge up on Deck 13 for more views going out, but it was being occupied by private party of the ACBL (American Contract Bridge League, I think). Disappointing and we thought they could have found a smaller room to occupy. Also seems that cruise lines could publish in advance what large groups are aboard each cruise.

We met someone from Holland America ashore one day and they were pretty upset that a large group of some organization was on their ship.

Anyway, for the rest of the cruise we didn't encounter a similar problem with the ACBL.

By sunset we were done for the day.

Did they have lobster on the menu for the first night?

Do you remember who the ship officers were??

Did they have lobster on the menu for the first night?

Yes, and coincidentally I am about to post comments on the food !

We did not go to any specialty restaurants, and once had some snacks at Blue Lagoon.

We generally eat seafood but not meat, so cannot comment on meat.

The foods we liked the most:

MDRs: appetizer portobello mushroom with goat cheese, dessert Bread and Butter Pudding, Smoked Salmon Tartare appetizer (me only), Cheesecake dessert, Wild Mushroom Quesadilla, Salmon almost always good no matter how prepared, Any kind of dessert with the word truffle or mousse, Fruit Plate at breakfast.

Garden Cafe: Breakfast: Oatmeal or Cream of Wheat, Fresh Fruit very good, Croissants, Grilled Tomatoes (me only), Poached eggs, Grits.

Lunch and/or Dinner: Cauliflower and Fennel dish, most every Indian dish (a few too spicy for us), Make your own Salads (everything was fresh), Asparagus in anything cold or hot (sometime I just picked it out of the pan), again desserts with truffle or mousse in the name, Orange pound cake, again Salmon fixed any way.

General:

The Garden Cafe will make Veggie Burgers to order; they are pretty good.

Not much variety in the MDRs so we did a lot of meals at the Garden Cafe and just used the MDRs when we felt like avoiding the crowds.

We had lobster tails on the first night (without the turf of Surf and Turf). You can get two tails or one tail and some salmon. Or in fact I suppose you can get most anything you ask for. The lobster was OK but once in a cruise is enough for me.

Confirming what I have seen posted, I was disappointed to see no chilled fruit soups.

Do you remember who the ship officers were??

Ship Officers names and photos were on a board, I think near Library Deck 12:

Master (Captain): Carl Gunnar Hammerin – Sweden

Staff Captain: Mattias Andersson - Sweden

Chief Engineer: Oesytein Undrum - Norway

Hotel Director: Mirsad Bucuk - Croatia

Food and Bev Director: Messiah Ritzinger – Germany

Cruise Director: Pedro Serra - Portugal

The Captain was very congenial, great dry humor. He also seemed to be clearly in charge.

He said that he alternates with another Captain every 10 weeks.

I thought that all the officers conducted themselves well, and I consider that at least partially a compliment to the Captain.

Quite a few more names on the board, I copied some beyond the above but not all.

If you have a question on any other officer, ask and I may have the name.

We were on that cruise, and the entertainment was great. They had second city there doing improv and a few other good entertainment acts such as a tribute band for Frankie Valley and the Four Seasons. The entertainment was the highlight of what Norwegian brought to the cruise.

 

The food, was awful..........

 

Ultimately, it seems NCL is sacrificing quality to drive people to their specialty restaurants. Then you might want to count the cost of booking someone with better food with a line that charges a little more than them so that each dining experience can be good. Good food is important to me on a vacation. And it isn't much more work to make it taste good even if you are using budget ingredients. I do that all the time.

 

-John

Hi John,

Thanks for contributing your thoughts on the same cruise. Weren't we lucky with the weather !?

We are not big on eating out, have only cruised on NCL, and probably have low expectations. And we generally think that itinerary is more important than food.

We are going to be on a cruise on Oceania in November. We are really looking forward to see how we react to a cruise with food that is supposed to be a step above NCL.

Tom

Thank you for all of the comments! Fingers crossed we get the same great weather!

A notice had been left in our cabin that we had $150 OBC which we had obtained before the trip by cashing in miles accumulated on a NCL Mastercard (gives double when used for NCL purchases). I didn't realize until Day 2 that I had to bring the notice to Reception in order for them to put the credit into our onboard account.

A day at sea, started with getting coffee at the Blue Lagoon machines and sitting on the opposite side windows in the Moderno.

We found the detailed map showing our voyage, on the wall just around the corner from Reception. I had a map of the area from AAA, and marked it up with the voyage routing.

Checked out the Library. Could only check out or return books 930 to 11 and 2 to 4. Library open but not staffed rest of day.

We went to Musicians “Tribute to Legends” show in the afternoon. Each musical group or person on the ship did a number or two. Gave us a good idea of which performers we liked. Iguana Latin trio was our favorite.

We went to a Salsa lesson in the afternoon at Spinnaker. Fun, crowded, good instructor.

At 7 we went to the show “Oh What a Night” tribute to Frankie Valli and Four Seasons. Really good show. No more shows for us after that. We did hear that the comic Magician Jeff Hobson show on Day 5 was outstanding.

Restaurant hours on Sea Day (other days sometimes slightly different hours):

Breakfast Garden Cafe, partially open 6-7, fully open 7-1030; Great Outdoors 730-1130; Summer Palace 730 -930.

Lunch: Garden Cafe 1130-3; Great Outdoors 12-230; Summer Palace 12-130; Topsiders deck 12 12-430. Of course Great Outdoors and Topsiders was weather permitting. We had good weather !

Dinner: Garden Cafe 5-930; Summer Palace 5-9; Indigo (the other MDR) 530-10; Specialty Restaurants 5-10.

Snacks: Garden Cafe 3-5 and 930-1030 PM; Casino 11 PM-1 AM.

Always open: Blue Lagoon (free) and delivered Pizza ($5). I think that there may be additional charge for Room Service including Pizza between Midnite and 5 AM. We didn't use Room Service or Pizza delivery.

After a day at sea, waking up the next day gave us some great views as we travelled toward Juneau.

And we saw a bunch of orcas along the way !

As we approached Juneau, the views were spectacular.

Arrival 2 PM. We had a free shuttle to town. It is probably walkable depending on which berth you are on, but we were at the furthest berth.

Visitor Center was helpful. We stopped at many stores and the post office along Franklin St, on the way to the long uphill climb to see the old Orthodox Church, which was interesting historically and still active. On the way down was the Observatory Bookstore, I recommend it. Lots of old books and maps, and interesting lady to talk to.

The town is very pretty in its situation with mountains around, many parks, and flowers everywhere.

Some people took tours, or just a bus, to the Mendenhall Glacier and enjoyed it. If you want to walk on the glacier, I think you have to take a helicopter tour.

We took the free shuttle back to the ship around 5 PM and enjoyed a half empty ship for awhile.

We listened to the band Exotique which does good jazz routines.

Ship departed at 10 PM.

We have been on Pearl twice including Alaska, is she looking her age or did dry dock keep her young and cute?

Hi tobyt,

Sorry I didn't answer this question. We had not been on Pearl before, but 3 years ago we were on the Gem in Med, which is almost identical.

We thought the Pearl looked "young and cute" for sure !

Tom

Awake at 5 AM, daylight and already docked at Skagway. This would be a long day, ship departing at 8 :15 PM. A lot of long tours by railroad and bus, many across the Canadian border to the Yukon.

Early breakfast and walked off the ship at 8:30, easy walk to town.

A little shopping, then the Klondike National Park Museum, very informative about the Gold Rush history.

We also went to the Skagway City Museum which was in its own way also informative about the Gold Rush as well as Native history, wildlife and how people lived in the early days. Well worth the visit.

A little more shopping and looking over the narrow gauge train.

We walked back to the ship in early afternoon and enjoyed more hours with a half empty ship. Warm enough to go up on Deck 13 outside and soak in the sun, with an Alaskan IPA.

After dinner we did some dancing to the music of Iguana, the trio we enjoyed.

At 10:30 we watched the sunset from aft windows of Garden Cafe.

Glacier Bay ! National Park rangers came aboard at 7 AM.

Everyone received a good handout/map published by NP Service, with info on the glaciers, and also on the history of the area with glaciers advancing and receding over the years, affecting the lives of the Natives.

Foggy early but turned sunny, warmer and calm for the glacier watch.

Heading toward the Margerie Glacier, we saw humpback whales. There were also some animals sitting on floating ice chunks which may have been seals or sea lions, couldn't tell which.

This day we wore our cold and rainy weather clothing which was nice, but we could have survived with less.

Close up to the Margerie Glacier, on crowded Deck 13 and 14, we saw and heard the calving, pretty loud roar. Very impressive.

Interesting to see how some glaciers were very dark and dirty at their edges and some more white and clean.

There were lots of other glaciers along the way.

We could see Mt Fairweather which is 15,300 feet, the highest in the area. This is supposedly not often seen from the bay.

The ship started to leave the area around 2 or 3, and then we had a chance to see and photo things we missed on the approach.

On this day we bought a Frequent Cruise Credit of $250 with an OBC of $100 so it only costs $150.

Thanks so much for your review. We are off to Alaska on the Pearl in just over three weeks (8/18).

Great review! Thanks for sharing your trip with us.

We have another 7+ weeks until our cruise on the Pearl to Alaska and are getting more and more excited even though this will be our 9th cruise to Alaska on NCL. Our last cruise there was over 3 years ago, so it can't come soon enough!:)

Great review! Thanks for sharing your trip with us.

We have another 7+ weeks until our cruise on the Pearl to Alaska and are getting more and more excited even though this will be our 9th cruise to Alaska on NCL. Our last cruise there was over 3 years ago, so it can't come soon enough!:)

Hope you enjoy your cruise. In another 7+ weeks you will likely need to bring warm clothes for sure !

I don't think I have ever heard of anyone who didn't enjoy cruising Alaska. And many people like you go back again.

Tom

Thank you for all of the comments! Fingers crossed we get the same great weather!

I am wishing you have good weather too. Enjoy !

Tom

Thanks so much for your review. We are off to Alaska on the Pearl in just over three weeks (8/18).

Thanks and enjoy your cruise !

Tom

Woke up and we were already docked at Ketchikan. We had a leisurely breakfast at Summer Palace while the tour people were getting off.

The ship docked right in town. We walked off about 8 AM. A cloudy day around 65 degrees, comfortable for walking around town.

We started with the Discovery Center, free admission with Golden Age Passport. Very excellent museum which concentrates on the history of the Rainforest area from early times to the present, covering wildlife, geology, people and industry. Highly recommended.

There were a few totem poles at the museum and they are all over town, many with explanatory plates. Very nice small parks and flowers all over town.

We had planned to go to the Totem Heritage Center but at that point we were totemed out.

We walked along Creek Street which is a picturesque boardwalk along and above the creek, with many shops and restaurants. We looked for salmon along the creek, but too early in the season for the major runs. We did see a few at a bigger bridge in town.

Two guys were near Creek Street holding birds which provided nice upclose photo ops: one a big bald eagle, another a small owl. We had previously seen an eagle sitting atop a utility pole somewhere.

The ship departed at 1:30 PM.

The rest of the day was lunch and dinner and hanging around the ship.

The Garden Cafe had Oysters Rockefeller at dinner, but I didn't think they were that good.

Around 9:45 I went to the Blue Lagoon to have some snacks and listen to the music from the Atrium. Unfortunately the music (in this case Arvin and Emily) was way too loud. We thought this was a common fault throughout the cruise.

Victoria schedule was 6 PM arrival, Midnite departure. Plenty happening on board during the day.

As frequently, even though it was about 55 and cool in the morning, we ate breakfast at Great Outdoors.

At 10 AM, I went to a technical discussion of the Pearl at Spinnaker. They gave us a nice handout with facts and figures. The Captain, Hotel Director and Chief Engineer were introduced by the Cruise Director, and each gave a brief summary of their backgrounds.

The Chief Engineer then did a presentation, with slides, of a lot of technical stuff.

Then they opened up for Q & A to be answered by all 3 as appropriate. Fortunately a lot of the audience asked questions and the session lasted quite awhile.

Not to be missed !

From 12:30 to 2:30 was a Bavarian Fest at the Great Outdoors. German music piped in. Beers, German or otherwise, were 3 for the price of 2. (At other times during the cruise it was 6 for the price of 5). Lots of German food, mostly meat but we found other food, especially liking the Herring in Sour Cream and the Dumplings. A great time !

After dinner we walked off the ship at 6:30. There is a shuttle service to downtown that costs $10 round trip or $5 one way. It is a fairly long walk to town but very pleasant if you have the time and the weather. You can choose to go around along water to the right, or around along water to the left, or straight across. If you don't want to walk back, just take the shuttle back.

We walked more or less straight across, through residential areas where most houses had nice flowering gardens.

We ended up at the Inner Harbor which was loaded with people having a good time. Two big events were going on: an International Buskers Festival, and the NW Deuce Days Antique Car Show. Old cars and buskers everywhere. I read that on the next day (Sunday) they closed streets and had even more cars displayed.

We went into the Empress Hotel, which has multiple lobbies and is impressive both inside and outside.

Then we went further into downtown, where it is busy with stores and shoppers.

We took the $5 US shuttle back to the ship about the time of dusk, after a really enjoyable time in Victoria. The city is a great stop and contrast to the Alaska ports.

We had a late dinner (yes another dinner) at the Garden Cafe which was open until midnite only on this day.