bluesea777

@mking8288 the cast off time is actually 3.00pm, so there's 5 mins to go. Summit is at 4.00pm.

On disembarkation/embarkation days for both Spirit (Wednesdays) and Jewel (Mondays) in Seward NCL charters a train for the passengers, separate from the regular daily Anchorage-Seward train. The NCL chartered train leaves from right next to the ship at 6am (or so) and goes to Anchorage airport. This train is for passengers who book either Seward to airport or Seward to Hospitality Center. People who book the latter will be bussed from Airport train deport to the city when the train arrives at Airport before noon. The same chartered train leaves the Airport at 1pm for the embarking passengers, arriving at the ship at about 5:30pm. You booth either or both of the above chartered trains through NCL. The regular train leaves from Anchorage Railway Depot at 6:45 am daily for Seward and takes 4.5 hours. The return leaves from Seward at 6pm to arrive in Anchorage at 10:30pm. You book these trains via Alaska Railroad or some travel websites. These trains have GoldStar dome option at extra cost, but the NCL chartered trains do not have GoldStar dome carriages. "I called NCL, and they told me that I only needed to schedule a flight by noon (they said rule is 7 hours after ship arrives in port, or 5 AM)." The person you spoke with is INCORRECT!! They have no idea that the train takes 5 hours! I saw this at the bottom of the excursion detail page: You should be fine!

This one, hands down! You're familiar with the Joy, so you'll do fine!

Dear Yvonne, I am immensely enjoying reading your thread, very informative, and your writing style is so good! You are so good with your Dad and I'm so glad he is also enjoying himself on the Spirit! As you enter the second week on the Spirit I hope you'd consider trying out the Taste dining room, if you haven't been there. I don't know if you like lentil but the rosemary lentil as one of the vegetable side dishes in Onda is delicious - I don't particularly like lentils but this dish was so good. You might want to consider trying out Henry's Pub again one evening - not for the trivia, but after dinner and/or show when the pub isn't crowded/busy. Maybe during the 2nd show when the pub has emptied out. Since your Dad likes beer, you might ask Froilan to make him a mini beer for fun. The Pub has varieties of beer, whiskies and brandies. This pub remained untouched (except for floor and fresh paint) during Miss Spirit's dry-dock/refit. ENJOY the second week on Miss Spirit! P.S. some warning .... I think you already know this, but the Star is going to be a bit of a downgrade to the Spirit, but you'll enjoy the cruises regardless. The ports you're going to be visiting will be spectacular! The Garden Cafe on Star is different to the Spirit and Jewel - you queue up, you cannot walk up to the stations.

Well, we did SN on the Spirit in May/June. We arrived in Anchorage at noon 3 days before the cruise. Did a 30 mins sightseeing tour on the floatplane in the afternoon, took the early morning train (in the GoldStar dome) the following day and toured Seward and visited the Sea Life. The next day we went on Major Marine's 7.5 hour Kenai Fjords National Park cruise (saw wild life, went to 2 glaciers, sailed over ice, had a drink with ice from iceberg!), and then the next day's the embarkation day! We had a very enjoyable and fantastic 3 days pre-cruise and were so happy that we switched from NS to SN. We were going to do NS, but had trouble getting flights to Vancouver from Bermuda when AC operates 3 times a week to Bermuda, found hotels extremely expensive, got overwhelmed with the number (like a thousand or so) of AirBnBs, plus the fact we'd been to Vancouver before and it's a been there done that (sorry Yvonne). So I researched Anchorage/Seward and found it better for us, so we switched the first Van-Seward leg to Seward-Van leg. In Vancouver during the turnaround we opted to stay on the ship but had to leave the ship to go thru the US Border pre-clearance with our passports in the terminal. Took just 20 minutes (most was spent walking along the length of the terminal several times!). We ourselves were able to find and book reasonably priced flights between Bermuda & Anchorage with just 2 layovers each way. Seeing that you're in Michigan ... thought it might interest you that we overnighted in a Chicago O'Hare airport hotel on way out and caught the Alaska Air non-stop flight from O'Hare to Anchorage the next morning! We were faced with choice of overnighting in either Seattle or Chicago, and the latter won in hotel prices and flights from Bermuda. Sorry Yvonne to be off topic ...

But it's not that simple! It involves $$$$$, re-registration, and all the legal crap, etc. NCL would not going thru that if the Spirit is being chartered by Lion Travel for only 4 months. As it turns out the name Endeavour was possibly created by Lion Travel as promotion.

Why are you off topic? 🙄 Asia, not Alaska 🙃

BTW, the family balcony cabins are the same as the regular balcony cabins, only difference is the former has one or two more berths than the latter.

The balcony cabin bathrooms are better than the Sun’s! Spirit went thru $100m dry dock refit in Jan 2020 and the ship is so lovely and new. If the cruise is a port intensive one you don’t really need Club Balcony cabin. We were on Spirit for 14 days Alaska B2B and were in deck 8 ocean view cabin - loved the cabin and location. In our honest opinion we like the Spirit a lot better than the Sun, so you should be fine, if not better, with the switch! Spirit has the best aft Spice H2O and forward Observation/Spinnaker lounge of the fleet … here are the pictures …. I would advise you to stick with balcony on the Spirit.

I'm happy to learn that Spirit will be back in NCL's hands starting Oct 2024!

I need to take that back ... just saw on NCL.com that Spirit will be back in NCL's hands next year Oct 2024, doing Asian itineraries. 😁

Looks like Spirit is going to be renamed when she gets to Asia .... Found this on Lion Travel Taiwan website.. Wonder if NCL will ever get the beloved Spirit back ever again? 😧

Norwegian Cruise Line Endeavour | (liontravel.com) Translate the page first .... and scroll own to see itineraries ....

Found this on the Lion Travel website (Taiwan) …

Tip: when taking landscape photos on your phone make sure the shutter button is on the right side of the screen. If it's on the left side, the photo is upside down so you need to turn your phone around. Enjoying your live review and photos, and WELCOME TO BERMUDA!!!

@amygutman okay, I’ll answer your questions but it’s hard …. I’ve been on all the NCL ships except the Sky and Prima. Each ship has its own pros and cons. I have a few favorite itineraries and ports so it’s difficult for me to pick. I would say our new favorite is the Spirit - we were on her for 14 days last month, and also 17 days on her in Feb 2020. Best forward Observation/Spinnaker lounge of all NCL ships, best aft Spice H2O. Best cabin: Club Balcony cabins on Breakaway Plus ships. Best port: too numerous to say.

It’s permanently bubble-#rapped. My fave is the one on the Joy ….

Hey, this is NCL boards … so your fave ship doesn’t qualify 😆🙃

The previous cruise was a 6-day chartered Sun-Sat and it stopped in Bermuda for an overnight only. This 8-day cruise was Sat-Sun(+1).

No, as I said before and as @KateQ22003 said, the platinum dining vouchers are not transferrable to anyone outside your cabin. Each of the two platinum dining coupons that you receive in your cabin must be used in different restaurant. Both cannot be used in same restaurant, even on different nights. The dinner vouchers as part of free at sea perks are in your name ... they are not transferrable to anyone else. Same with the dinner vouchers that you purchase in your name.

If you are solo in cabin (meaning no one else is in same cabin with you) the platinum vouchers are for you only, you cannot have someone sharing the dinner with you. If you have other people in cabin with you you may use the vouchers for yourself and one other from same cabin. You cannot give your vouchers to other people to use. As you hand over your voucher to the hostess you need to present your cruise card as well - this card has your latitude level printed on it - and the hostess writes your room number on the voucher. The Dining package vouchers are non-transferable meaning when you buy them they are for you only to use.

Discontinued about a decade ago.

Why? We were there last month and the shuttle buses were plentiful and there were the ‘Walmart’ shuttle buses - ideal for the crew members! Hint: get the excursion that picks you up at Ward Cove and gives you the option of dropping you off in Ketchikan or taking you back to Ward Cove. We chose the former and they dropped us off by Creek Street. We enjoyed walking that and went to waterfront and enjoyed the halibut n chips at Crabs and Go and then walked to Berth 4, enjoying the stores and stuff along the way, to catch the shuttle back to ship. We enjoyed the drive - a chance to see a bit of Alaska, lol. Also the store at Ward Cove is great, selling clothes and outdoor wear at reasonable prices.

The new itinerary for Oct 10-20, 2024 cruise is now up in NCL.com. @clojacks - care to look it up and compare the price to the one you already have. If new price is higher, consider keeping the new itinerary?

@omahabob please reread @JIMESOPUS's post .... he said an improvement TO the Prima christening. We're on the same TA as well.