eileeshb

One of the toughest packing decisions for this trip is the camera kit. I used to do a fair amount of pitchside rugby photography so I have a semi decent collection of lenses and a couple of dSLRs. This is a recurring theme in the Photography and cruise technology forum and as a result the main thread on the topic for Alaska has been pinned by the forum moderators. The complicating factor is obviously the length of travel and limits in baggage. I have fit all of the kit into a backpack in the past that was so heavy I got pinpoint bruises on my shoulders. I was hoping to trim the selection for this trip but it looks like I’ll have to suck up the weight and bring 2 of the big lenses. The other CC members on the photography forum are telling me to bring my 70-200mm /f2.8 lens but the whale watching excursion provider is recommending bringing the longer zoom lens, 100-400/f4-5.6. That excursion provider also runs a photo safari during the summer months when there are more hours of daylight so I’m inclined to take their advice. My dSLRs are not full frame and are about 10 years old, but they have a high frame rate so should work for nature photography as effectively as they did for sports.

I spent quite a while deciding which whale watching tour to do, Gastineau reassured me that the whale watching area is pretty sheltered so even if it’s rough on our route from Seattle to Juneau the conditions inshore may be ok. I’m more used to completely exposed coasts with waves hitting buildings. I did ping Gastineau about the lens questions and their FAQ recommends the longer lens for whale watching.. looks like I’ll have to bring both big lenses and use the phone for wide angle on the excursion.

I'll be on Norwegian Bliss in a couple of weeks and for some weird reason if you look up that cruise at the moment the itinerary also says Tender for Juneau. I will ask once aboard to find out why it's changed on all future NCL itineraries. There hasn't been any communication from NCL to say that it has changed to a tender port for my cruise so my fellow guests on the roll call and facebook are all continuing with the assumption that we will be docked. It doesn't make any sense that Juneau would suddenly become a tender port as they are already restricting the number of ships allowed to visit so it's not like they're running out of dock space.

I've booked Teppanyaki for dinner before we get to Victoria so we'll possibly try to get a pedi cab or the like at the pier if either of us have any money left at that stage 🤑

Remember there’s a shuttle bus for Ketchikan if you’re not doing an excursion, the last bus from Ketchikan to ward cover is over an hour before the ship depart.

Deal or No Deal is being advertised in the entertainment list for Bliss for my upcoming cruise, thankfully Six and Jersey boys will also still be on. I think the current cast for Six will be the last for that show on Bliss. The main production (broadway type) show casts change every 6 months or so. I saw brand new casts twice on Escape and Breakaway for 2 other shows, both had their teething issues on the first night. Another show that’s not renewing is Priscilla on Epic, they had a bunch of issues with that show after the covid resumption with cast members getting sick.

It’s intermittent for me, sometimes I can choose a specific cabin other times not and I’m in the EU too.

For those wondering.. as Irish citizens we have to apply for the US ESTA permit which remains valid for 2 years. I already have one from my last trip to the USA, but AC just got one for the first time. I did notice there’s now an app for the esta application so I have that loaded on my phone in case CBP start asking for proof. We will complete immigration and customs here in Ireland so we are treated as domestic travellers when we reach Boston. Back when I was doing regular business trips I once had a connection in Newark that was about 30 minutes and when I got off the flight for Ireland, the connecting flight to Phoenix was at the gate directly across from the gate I walked out from. This time around it will be a 4 hour layover in Boston en route to Seattle. We will be flying with Aer Lingus to Boston and then with Alaskan to Seattle.

This will be a first attempt at a live review from me so here’s some background. I am from Ireland and this will be my 6th NCL cruise, first time to Alaska. I have been to the US over 20 times since I was an undergrad on a J1 visa in the 90s, I spent 13 years working for an American multinational and have cousins stateside. Alaska will be the 14th state I’ve visited. I booked this cruise in January 2022 and at the end of 2022 one of my friends (AC) decided to come along for her first cruise, we are both booked in Studio cabins so we’ll have our own space once we’re on the ship. It will also be her birthday on the last night of the cruise and she’s so excited she’s already asking where we’re going next year! As this is a long haul trip we’ll be flying in on the 11th so we’ve 2 full days to be tourists in Seattle and being from Ireland the weather isn’t going to be a major change for us. We just weathered the first named storm of the North Atlantic storm season, without any damage to our areas though the south coast got a bit of a whack.

I picked up a set of filters including a CP and an ND which thankfully will fit either the 70-200 or the 100-400 as they both take the same filter size.

Unfortunately my itinerary has us in Juneau in the afternoon so the excursion is at 2.30pm. But you’ve just reminded me to reach out to the excursion provider, it’s Gastineau guiding who run a photo safari excursion earlier in the season. The daylight hours for my trip will be limited so they don’t have that excursion running.

Hmm.. I’m trying to avoid bringing both the 100-400 and the 70-200 just for the sake of the weight and space. Thankfully the same filters will work on both, the 100-400 one is the old push/pull zoom design so it actually fits into the 70-200mm case. I do know I don’t want to add the teleconverter(also sigma) to the sigma because it just doesn’t focus quickly enough for moving objects like whales and it will downgrade it to an effective f4. But it might work for catching roosting eagles or relatively stationery seals… hmm.. I’ll see what the weather forecast looks like for Skagway and Ketchikan.. Juneau will be the whale watching on a small boat.

My Alaska trip is fast approaching.. I'll be in Seattle this time 2 weeks. At the moment I've opted to bring the following kit Canon Eos 7D & 7D markII Canon EF L 100-400/f4.5-5.6 with a set of filters Canon EFS 10-18/F4.5-5.6 Canon EF 50/f1.8 ii I decided against bringing the sigma 70-200/f2.8 as I figure my phone will cover most of that range (new Samsung S23 ultra). I do also have the original Canon kit lens EFS 17-85/F4.5-5.6 but again I think the phone will cover that range. But please tell me if I'm daft to leave the 70-200mm at home.

Are you planning to depart the ship early ? AFAIK US authorities do not approve of such, the ship gets fined and will pass the cost onto you.

Generally night 2 is “dress up or not” night assuming it’s not a late departure from a port. So you see a few more people dressed up and a few more photographer stations setup with backdrops or key spots around the main decks. On the breakaway/+ class ships there’s usually one by the glass staircase and sometimes the captain is there for a while to pose with guests. I’ve yet to buy any pictures on the ship, but I kinda liked a couple on my last cruise so if there’s any that nice this time around I will order them as I’ve a reasonable discount now. I will have friend with me on her first cruise so I’ll be advising her to use my cabin number with the photographers.

It’s bad wording from NCL that is commonly misinterpreted by novice cruisers. On embarkation day everyone must be aboard 2 hours before departure, and at the end of the cruise it takes about 2 hours after docking before they can allow guests to depart. During the cruise at each port of call you can usually get off the ship within 30minutes of arrival and all aboard is usually 30minutes before departure BUT this is not guaranteed and can vary depending on the port, weather, tides… etc. Always check what the all aboard time is before leaving the ship. If the port is a tender port rather than docking then the times are far more subject to variation, and if it’s a port that involves a shuttle bus also check when the last bus will be,

That’s because this thread has now morphed into a discussion on @Deacon123’s experience when NCL cancelled their cruise but refuse to return the deposit. @jimb98 was the OP for the topic and wanted to know what would happen if he cancelled a cruise as a UK customer. people responding are not being specific as to which they consider OP or which scenario they’re commenting about.

the upsell happens if you do any treatments like getting a massage or something. They will try to sell you various Elemis products. Thankfully I haven't had any sales pitches while I was in the Thermal Spa. I honestly can't remember if there was conditioner in the locker room showers, I tend to bring my own as I've found too many bulk products have ingredients that I'm allergic to.

chances are Six will be gone so that leaves Jersey boys as the only large production show, the Beatles cover band will probably do one night in the theater. They are now putting the "Deal or No Deal " game show in the theater and then there'll be various other solo/duo acts which may change cruise to cruise.

I'm aware... I upgraded to FAS+ so I'll have unlimited internet anyway, hopefully most of those signed up for the M&M will check.

Hmm, note to self: bring paper and a marker suitable for creating a sign in case redirection is needed.

Oh heck… I’m organising the m&m for my next cruise but I don’t have real names/cabins for most of the roll call. How did you let people know about the changes?

I’m going to make a suggestion you may not like…there are now a few “internet “ banks, basically banks with no physical branches. The most popular one in Ireland is Revolut. It will primarily be my revolut account that I will be using in the states. Their app notifies you for every one off transaction that occurs. I transfer funds to it from my normal account so I can use it for small purchases and some online subscriptions as it’s easier to kill those subscriptions on the revolut app than it is through the banks or even the products own apps ( I’m looking at you amazon prime). Revolut also doesn’t charge foreign transaction fees to a certain threshold. The only negative with them is that I can’t lodge cash directly with them, I have to go via my “normal” bank, and you are also limited on how much cash you can withdraw per month. Their location based security can be fun with phone/watch payments.. the Irish ISPs aren’t very precise with their router programming so the router in our shop will regularly claim it’s in some other part of the country while the card machine says it’s in the correct town, revolut checks what the router says v card machine if they don’t match it declines to pay. The workaround .. the cardholder has to turn off the WiFi on their phone so revolut is no longer getting conflicting location data.

I work in retail and we still have customers who ring to check what stock we have and want to pay over the phone but I can’t trust those sorts of transactions unless it’s someone we know . just this week there were over a thousand failed/blocked/refused transactions on our website by someone who obviously got a collection of cards. Stripe process our web payments and all but 3 of the fraudulent ones were halted by them, the 3 that stripe missed we knew were dodgy, each one was trying to buy a tidetable for our local beach in Ireland but had buyers whose address was 5th avenue New York, California! card fraud is rampant, I get a couple of phishing/smishing attempts every few weeks on my phone so taking someone’s details over the phone is not going to be possible for very much longer. btw as a small retailer taking card or cash payments costs us money, the banks charge a fortune to accept cash lodgements but they also charge for processing card payments! there was one day in June this year when the power was knocked out all over the village for a half hour or so, everyone working in the shops just sat outside eating ice creams as none of us had working tills or card machines until the power came back. The main annoyance for us was our security alarm went nuts while the power was off and wouldn’t even accept the shutdown code. The tax authorities do not like cash businesses and would far prefer if everyone did cashless, but the pensioner voting base here is strong and forced the government to slap the banks for threatening to convert to mostly cashless branches. Oddly this was shortly after the government had smacked the taxi drivers for refusing to take card payments.

I was checking glazers cameras in Seattle for some accessories and spotted they have the tg7 listed for pre-order but the specs look to be the same as it’s predecessor.