alainamarie

Day 9 - Victoria, BC 6/3/18

I finally checked this off my list - Buchart Gardens! It was raining when we got off of the ship, but the weather cleared up and it ended up being a beautiful afternoon/evening.

We opted for an excursion via the cruise line, we were picked up at the port and dropped off downtown (we made the request with the bus driver to be dropped off downtown). Pick up was easy - finding the bus was seamless because there was great signage and tons of people working the area to assist.

Just found your trip report and love it. I was on an Alaskan cruise three years ago and would love to go back, but in the meantime I'm having fun reliving it through your photos. Best wishes to you and Paul for a happy life together.

Thank you so much! I will get to Victoria and Vancouver soon. I appreciate the sweet sentiments!

Alaina

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quote=alainamarie;56245550]

 

 

 

 

 

 

So here's the sad news - after we got back to the hotel, we grabbed our luggage and made our way to Pier 66 just before 11. I have no pictures because it was pure CHAOS. People were EVERYWHERE. So many people disembarked from the previous cruise and were in lines everywhere. People trying to check in didn't know what to do with luggage and porters/port staff didn't know where to tell us to put our luggage. Paul and I walked back and forth with our luggage trying to figure out where to go and eventually found someone who said "leave your bags here". There was other luggage in the area, so we went inside to check in. It was 20 minutes of insanity and I have no pictures to show for it! What a mess - it's my 9th cruise and it's never happened before. I had tip money for the porter in my pocket and didn't even have anyone to hand off luggage to.

 

 

Check in and security were a breeze and we had about 15 minutes to wait for our boarding number to be called.

We went to Alaska on the pearl and the luggage issue was the same. To bad they haven't fixed that by now. We had stayed at a hotel through NCL so they took care of our luggage and boy was I grateful for that.

It was just mass chaos - I have been to several different cruise ports and none were like this, sooo disorganized. It didn’t help that the jewel got in late and had people who were on board for 3 weeks from Hong Kong getting off. I’m sure customs was rushed since the ship was late. So there were lines of people who had just gotten off in addition to people getting on and trying to figure out luggage. I sure hope things are much better for Bliss!

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Hello there! I really can't speak on kids because we sailed as two adults. I have heard wonderful things about NCL's kids program and the team club through friends. We did see a lot of families and kids.

 

Sorry I can't be of help with this!

I meant to say teen program - not team! I worked with someone who had 2 teenage kids and they adored the teen program and my friends hardly saw their kids because they had so much fun!

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Thank you so much for this photo review. It has really helped our planning. I wondered how you got to the King George Lodge in Ketchikan for your crab feast?

 

Thanks so much!

I still have a couple more days to post - stay tuned!

When you book George Inlet Lodge via their website, they provide transportation to and from. They gave us an assigned time to meet at the visitors center at berth 2. It was very easy to find - all of the information is on your confirmation. Super easy! Allow 20-25 minutes each way.

Hope you enjoy it as much as I did (twice!).

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They need a new recipe I think! We were on the Getaway in May and the miso soup was seriously inedible. The rest of the meal was good!

 

Loving your review and dreaming of cruising to Alaska. :)

I agree with you- I don’t know how anyone eats it. Everything else was delicious! Thanks so much for reading along - be sure to make it to Alaska one day! Such a dream!

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Our last towel creation - :loudcry:

I will post the dailies tomorrow. I am hoping to get to Victoria at some point this weekend, but it may not be until next week.

Hi. Thank you for your post. Would you say the Norwegian Jewel is fun for kids?

Hello there! I really can't speak on kids because we sailed as two adults. I have heard wonderful things about NCL's kids program and the team club through friends. We did see a lot of families and kids.

Sorry I can't be of help with this!

Day 8: Sea Day #2 - 6/2/18

I slept in until almost 10 and met Paul for breakfast at Garden Cafe. Had the typical breakfast fare then walked through the shops. There was a $10 sale going on, but nothing worth buying. We ended up in Magnum's and ran into friends. I had a few pina colada's because it sounded good. Paul and I headed to O'Sheehans for a snack - WHY DO WE KEEP GETTING MOZZARELLA STICKS?!! Paul also had the wings and I had a chicken sandwich.. food wasn't even hot, barely warm -BUT -- the service was much better!

Back to the room - I started packing while Paul went to read his kindle in Spinnaker. I took a nap until 6-ish and then we got ready and went to Magnum's for round 2. We had dinner reservations at Teppanyaki and for some reason, I thought they were for 8 (they were actually for 830). So we were told to come back - totally my fault. We went back to Magnum's then were finally successful with being at Teppanyaki at the right time.

Miso soup was GROSS - couldn't take more than one bite. Everything else was great! Paul had the shrimp and filet and I had the seafood (scallop and calamari).

We went back to Magnum's but didn't stay long. We crashed around midnight.

Nice review so far. Looking forward to the rest of it.

 

 

 

We are doing Alaska for our 10th anniversary next year.

Thank you so much for reading! Just a few more days left to this review.

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Our towel creation for the night -

Dailies -

It might be fun to use the ferry system to explore some of these places again. I know they don't run daily but I wonder how hard it would be.

I'll have to look into it!

Great review. We have never done an Alaska cruise but it’s on the bucket list for sure!!

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Be sure you do it one day! It's so worth it! This was my second one and I could easily do more!

Thanks for reading!

I will post dailies tomorrow. Did anyone notice I put the incorrect date on the subject of this review?! Omg how did I mess that up?!?! [emoji33]

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I'm excited for you! I know how hard it is (and how lucky you have to get) to get great photos of wildlife. My number one goal this trip is to see Grizzlies (at least one--and you've already seen two!!) as we didn't get to see those on our last trip. We've seen Orcas, humpbacks, mountain sheep, black bear, salmon, seals, etc.....but no bears. I'm so jelly right now!!

Aww you are so sweet! We had a wonderful trip and beautiful weather - I will just call it lucky!

I wasn’t able to photograph the other bear in Skagway since it was on the drivers side, so I wish I had a few more shots for ya!

Thank you for reading!

We really liked Sitka too and would love to go back and spend more time.

 

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I could easily spend a long weekend here - my husband would love to fish here a bit more.

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https://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2642510

NCL Jewel 9 night 5/26/18 - 6/4/18.

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Paul and I hung out in Spinnaker for a while talking with friends (Hi Doug and Debbie!!!) until after sail away.

We went back to the room for showers and then stopped in at O'Sheehans for some cheese sticks, chicken tenders, and of course - a Manhattan for Paul. The cheese sticks are so gross, I don't know why I keep trying them! Maybe in hopes they get better? Let me try to describe them - the cheese never gets melty almost like they are old frozen cheese sticks or perhaps it's just really fake cheese? I don't know! And don't get me started on that gross and watery dip they serve them with! :o

Chicken tenders were delish! Honey mustard they serve it with was also delicious as well.

We listened to some music while at O'Sheehans and this guy was so good! We heard him many nights while we were at Magnum's.

After our snack, I had "Dragan Juice" at Magnum's. We ran into our New Zealand friends there and stayed until Cagney's dinner reservations at 8.

This was our second dinner at Cagney's and Paul loved his Bison steak. I disliked this 2nd go round because my 8oz filet was overcooked, but I was too full to send it back so I ended up picking at it. I ordered it medium-well and it was basically burnt and dried out. I ate a few bites and lost interest. We also tried 4 new sides and really loved the creamed corn. Between my chicken tenders a couple hours earlier and my soup/salad, I wasn't hungry for steak because otherwise it would have gone right back. Paul is still talking about his Bison steak, by the way! :D

There was also a table of 10 seated next to us, they were all crew, but we couldn't get a good enough look at the patches on their shirt sleeves. They were sharing 6 bottles of wine among the 10 of them and were incredibly loud and it became obnoxious. I ordered the chocolate brownie and it tasted old and packaged. Even Paul agreed, so we drank our coffee and happily left. I talked to someone a couple nights later and she loved the chocolate brownie, so go figure. Food is so subjective!

Our waitress this time was not as great as the other restaurants. Unfortunately, she was also assigned to that table for 10 next to us, so we were forgotten for a while after our entrees came out.

I will say, my husband and I both agree that we love Cagney's and Le Bistro the most. We actually liked the atmosphere of Cagney's slightly more. Perhaps it's more of our style than Le Bistro, but we still enjoyed Le Bistro a LOT.

After dinner, we went back to Magnum's and met up with a bunch of friends to end our night. We stayed until midnight and went back to the room to crash. Thankfully tomorrow is a sea day!

I went to the buffet and had a little lunch. Then I went to spinnaker to grab one of the nice green chairs so I could chill and wait for Paul. He texted me that he found halibut fish and chips and they were delicious. Sure beats my pitiful buffet lunch!

I sent a couple of photos to my mom - I texted her a picture of my camera since I didn't have wifi to send electronically to my phone.

Here are the two teasers I sent her -

She didn't seem as excited as I was, but then again, she's never been to Alaska!

I was going to send her this photo, but then I realized it's hard to tell it's a whale!

We saw one more whale on the way back in to the dock!

This is the dock area that Davey has his boat at -

Note: You have to take a free shuttle from the cruise ship dock to downtown. This took about 10 minutes but drops you in the center of downtown. I walked around a little once we used the restroom, but I didn't feel like shopping. Paul wasn't done with his excursion yet, so I headed back to the ship.

I hit the shuttle back to the ship at a perfect time - it was right at noon and no line.

This is the area where the ship is docked. Not much you can do around this area.

Puffins!

Eagle's nest

Here are a bunch of photos from the boat. It was a beautiful day, so we were very lucky!

Day 7: Sitka 6/1/18

Paul booked an excursion through the cruise line - Sitka Salmon Sportfishing. He didn't catch anything, but had fun fishing. I don't think he enjoyed this excursion nearly as much as he did halibut fishing in Ketchikan

I was invited by a friend to join her family on a boat excursion booked independently. Puffinsandwhales was a private charter with Davey and he was wonderful.

I would love to make a trip back to Sitka and spend several days seeing this beautiful town. This town has NOT sold out to jewelry stores, etc. It's kept it's original charm and Davey seemed very proud of it - and he should be! His love for Sitka and wild/sea life is outstanding and he was such a knowledgeable guide.

Right away we saw a humpback! We later saw another whale, otters, puffins, and so much more.

And then the cutest little otter - I named him Paw Paw.

I will hopefully get to our day in Sitka in the next day. Thanks again for reading along!

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Our home is in Talkeetna, 2 hours north of Anchorage. We office out of Anchorage - so spend a major portion of our lives there. Your pic’s have been amazing. I have never made it to Hoonah. Unfortunately, our cruise does not include Icy Strait. Thanks for taking us along on your journey. The good news is - we feel we are going into this cruise w/out too high of expectations - the Jewel only has 2 cruises after ours, b/4 heading to dry dock. I highly recommend European or International cruises. We use them as samplers to determine where we would like to return for extended travel. We laugh as we find w/ mileage tickets, we can generally fly to Barcelona or Rome for the same # of Miles or less than to cruise out of Miami. As a rule, if we are leaving Alaska - we try for 2-3 weeks to make it worthwhile.

 

 

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Thank you so much for being such a faithful follower! I would LOVE to visit Talkeetna - I have so much land to cover in Alaska! My husband is flying to Yakutat in September to fish, I’m a little jealous! (Not of the fishing)

My next port to cover is Sitka and I must say, I fell in love! If you ever do travel to ISP, be sure to include something else as there isn’t too much to see/do. Very small, beautiful town.

Do you work in tourism?

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Our towel animal for the night -

Day 6 Daily -

Moderno -

I would say that we really enjoyed it. It wasn't our favorite, but certainly not our least favorite. We LOVED the grilled pineapple and want to make our own. Salad bar was nice, but I wouldn't say it's comparable to those of Brazilian steakhouses at home. It was good enough and I enjoyed a delicious salad and a pasta salad with shrimp.

I enjoyed the lamp chops, sirloin, and the chicken. Coconut flan for dessert was great!

This meal is not worth repeating - once is enough on a cruise. I would eat here again, I just don't foresee myself eating here twice in the same week.

Sorry guys, no pictures of food because it came out so sporadically.

We left dinner and went to Magnum's Wine & Champagne bar for some concoctions by Dragan. I enjoyed my regular - Dragan Juice - it's soo good! Unfortunately, Magnum's is out of whipped cream so they had to start substituting milk. How does a ship run out of whipping cream??? I don't understand.

We were out until midnight before retiring.