Alaska Southbound on the NCL Sun - August 2017 Trip Report!

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Saturday, August 12th: Ketchikan [1:00pm-8:00pm]

 

Dailies for the day!

 

 

 

 

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Since we weren't arriving in Ketchikan until 1:00pm, we were able to sleep in a bit!

We had a quick breakfast and then went to the sushi demonstration, which was in the one of the dining rooms. It wasn't the best setup, but it was neat to see.

 

After that, we went to get ready for the day. We had booked a kayaking trip with Southeast Kayaks, but were worried because, for the first time that week, it was raining!

 

Right at 1:00pm, as we were docking, we got a call from Southeast Kayaks that they had to cancel our kayaking trip - it was just too rainy and windy, and it wasn't safe. Of course we were disappointed, but there wasn't anything we could do. Since we were already bundled up, we decided to just walk around and explore Ketchikan despite the rain.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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We got off the ship and walked around a bit. We went to the Southeast Alaska Discovery Center for a bit. It is small, so we were only there for about a half hour. They also have a theater but we didn't go in.

 

 

 

 

After leaving the center, we headed towards Creek Street.

 

 

 

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We walked around Creek Street, which was a lot of fun. The stores were interesting, and a lot of the buildings had plaques that described their history.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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After Creek Street, we headed toward the salmon ladder. It was really interesting to see so many fish swimming against the current!

 

 

 

 

We did a bit more shopping, and then decided to have a late lunch at the Fish House. It was a small place with a walk up counter and tables in the back. We ordered smoked salmon chowder and halibut tacos.

 

 

 

This was our view during lunch - the rain never let up!

 

 

The food was a great, and it was a perfect place for a quick lunch. After we finished lunch, we decided to head back to the ship to relax for a while.

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That evening, we did not have dinner reservations for the main dining room. The orginal plan was to go kayaking, and I wasn't sure if we'd want to have dinner or just hit the buffet. Since we were back on the ship early, we got ready and decided to see if we could walk up to the dining room. We went to Seven Seas around 7:30pm, and were seated right away.

 

Here are the menus.

 

 

 

 

For starters, I had the potato leek soup, and Justine had the lime and dill shrimp.

 

 

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For entrees, I had the chicken parmigiana and Justine had the beef teriyaki.

 

 

 

Here is the dessrt menu.

 

 

I had the lava cakes (again :D) and Justine had apple pie.

 

 

As it has been the whole week, the food and service were good. However, dinner that evening took nearly two hours! That was the longest all week, and the server was very apologetic but it did drag a bit.

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After dinner, we went to see the World Beat show in the Stardust.

 

 

This show was my favorite of all of them. It had songs and dances from a variety of cultures and it was well done!

 

After the show, they did a special tribute to the cruise ship staff. The staff do work really hard to make sure everyone has a good time on board!

 

 

 

After the show, we headed back to our room and came back to the best towel animal ever!

 

[tatibus0913]

subscribing. loving your review!

 

Thanks!! It's been fun writing it :)

[tatibus0913]

Sunday, August 13th: Day at Sea

 

Dailies for the day:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Disembarkation Info - It's always depressing to get this in your room!

 

 

 

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For our last day, we wanted to relax since we were pretty tired from all of our excursions! We slept in a bit, and the went to breakfast in the main dining room.

 

Breakfast menus:

 

 

 

 

I ordered the Smoked Salmon Eggs Benedict, and I believe Justine ordered french toast with a side of potatoes and sausage.

 

 

 

It was a nice leisurely breakfast, since we didn't really have to be anywhere :D

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After breakfast, we went to Battle of the Cake Masters. It was funny, with cruise director Dan, the head pastry chef and an audience member all making a cake!

 

 

 

Afterwards, we went to play Deal or No Deal in the Stardust. It was $25.00 for one card, so we just got one. It was fun to play along, and one of the contestants won $300!

 

 

After that, we went to the photo gallery to but a few pictures. They were selling a scrapbook kit, so I picked up one of those as well.

 

 

That afternoon was the crew talent show. There was singing, dancing, and some comedy. It was so fun to see the crew on stage performing!

We headed back to the Observation lounge to have a drink and enjoy the scenery of the inside passage.

I believe this was a Bahama Mama.

 

 

Then, it was time for our massages. We had booked a 50 minute couples massage as a treat for ourselves. The massages were good, but what ruined the experience was the hard sales pitch at the end to buy some lotion. We had to say no thank you a few times before they would let us leave the room, which was a little annoying.

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After the massages, we had dinner reservations at Moderno. We had eaten at Modern on the Dawn a couple of years ago, and loved it, so we had wanted to eat there again.

 

Menu:

 

 

Unfortunately, this restaurant had the worst service of our cruise. They seemed a bit short staffed but there were only a couple of groups in the restaurant. When we were seated, our server came by a few times and said he would be right back but didn't bring water or offer to take drink orders. We sat there for a bit until he was able to come back.

 

I ordered a Strawberry Caprihana, which was really strong.

 

 

They brought over some rolls, and then we went up the salad bar.

 

 

 

Then they brought over the sides and started bringing around the meats.

 

 

We had a little bit of everything, and it was all pretty good.

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We also had dessert - I don't remember the names of them but they were pretty good.

 

 

 

All in all, this was our least favorite specialty dining restaurant. The service wasn't great, especially compared to what we had seen all week. We may have had higher expectations since we had a such a good experience on the Dawn prior.

After dinner, we went to a few shows. We started with Broadway Cabaret in Dazzles. It always amazes me how well the performer sing. Then, we saw the magician in the Stardust, who was a lot of fun. The final show of the night was a late night show with the comedian. It was definitely "late night" and not kid friendly, but we enjoyed it!

 

[tatibus0913]

Monday, August 14th: Disembarkation & Vancouver

 

We were a little sad that our Alaska adventure was over, but at least we had a day in Vancouver before we had to fly home!

 

We decided to do self disembarkation and take our own luggage. Right at 8:00am, they announced that we could leave the ship. We hopped in an elevator, scanned our cards to leave, and were in Canada Place in a matter of 10 minutes. They barely glanced at our customs forms or passports. I have never gotten off a cruise ship that fast!

 

Our flight wasn't until 11:00pm that evening, so we had decided to rent a car for the day. We went to the Alamo counter in Canada place, picked up our car and off we went.

 

We went to Granville Island first.

 

 

It took a little bit of driving around, but we eventually found free 3 hour parking.

 

We went to the Granville Public Market, which was really interesting with all of the different stalls.

 

 

 

We got some donuts from Lee's Donuts, which were amazing!

 

 

 

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After we walked through the Public Market, we wandered around Granville Island as the stores were starting to open up.

 

 

 

 

Then we went to Granville Island Brewing. We got there right as they were opening, and they got busy pretty quickly. They do serve food, but we just got beers.

 

 

 

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After Granville Island, we headed back to the waterfront near where the cruise ship docked to take some photos and then have lunch.

 

 

The Olympic cauldron was cool to see!

 

 

There are also some other statues around.

 

 

 

And of course, some great views of the water!

 

 

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For lunch, we decided to go Tap and Barrel.

 

 

They had outside seating, and it was a gorgeous day. Tap and Barrel also serves a lot of local beers, so that was a also a big draw. We had a beer, and ordered a few appetizers - fried pickles, poutine and a pizza.

 

 

 

 

 

Everything was good, and we had an enjoyable lunch outside!

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After lunch, we headed to the Vancouver Aquarium in Stanley Park.

 

 

 

They had some really interesting exhibits, and we started by going downstairs to the touch tank with the sting rays.

 

 

 

There were some salmon swimming against the current in on exhibit, and this frog in another.

 

 

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There were also some outside exhibits, with penguins, sea lions and dolphins. We caught the end of the dolphin show, but there are various shows and presentations all throughout the day.

 

 

 

 

Back inside, there were some tropical exhibits, turtles and alligators!

 

 

 

 

We spent a couple hours at the aquarium and really enjoyed it!

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After the aquarium, we left our car at the Aquarium and walked towards the Seawall and the beach area.

 

 

 

 

 

There were a lot of people walking and biking.

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After spending some time on the beach, we headed over to see the Totem Poles.

 

 

On the opposite side of the totem pole area, we were treated to a great view of the Vancouver skyline!

 

 

We headed back to the car, and drove over to Prospect Point, so that we could get a closer view of the bridge.

 

Once we got there, the NCL Sun was under it, heading back to Alaska!

 

 

 

Our final stop in Stanley Park was this hollow tree.

 

 

After we left Stanley Park, we decided that we should drive towards the airport. When we were almost at the airport, we saw an outlet mall that we decided to stop at to kill some time. It seemed pretty new and it looked like they were still adding new stores.

 

After wandering around for a bit, we dropped off the car at the airport and went through security. We were pretty early, so we had a quick dinner and just hung out until we could board at 11:30pm.

 

Our first flight was from Vancouver to Toronto, which was uneventful. Once we got to Toronto, we had to go through U.S. Customs. We were nervous because we only had an hour and a half layover.

 

Once we got off the plane, we had to walk to another terminal and go through security again. We weren't allowed to keep the water that we had bought in Vancouver, so keep that in mind if you have to do this. Secuity took a while, and then we went to a kiosk to scan our passports. After the receipt was printed, we had to wait in another line to have an officer look at our passports and take the receipt from the kiosk.

 

Once we got through, we ran to our plane with seven minutes to spare! It was a bit stressful, but we made it home!

 

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Recap

 

This was truly a once in a lifetime trip. We had a few bumps, but they didn't take away from an amazing experience.

 

After taking this trip, I do recommend that anyone who wants to cruise Alaska should consider a one-way cruise and spend a few extra days in Alaska. We could have easily spent at least a week in Alaska before the cruise!

 

I also highly recommend NCL. I can't compare to other cruise lines, but the staff worked really hard to make sure everyone on board had a good time. The food and drinks were also really good.

 

Thanks so much for taking the time to read this, and please let me know if you have any questions about anything we did!

[jenniferandwhatnot]

Great review! Thanks for posting all of the menu and food pics - yum. You also gave me a few ideas about excursions that I am looking into. Thanks again! Oh- and I totally know what you mean about receiving the disembarkation instructions on the last day - so depressing!