cuterlmt

the only times we used a taxi was to get from the ship to hotel (1-1/2 hour wait!!) and hotel to airport.

Otherwise we walked or took buses or the train. The hotel we stayed at had a button to push to call a cab and they got there within a few minutes - by the time we got the luggage outside, they were there.

If you can, you should try to do alternative transportation from the ship to your hotel. The wait was awful! I know people have talked about going up to Pan Pacific to get a taxi quicker. Or maybe you can get a shuttle ride or something that you arrange beforehand. I didn't hear any particular reason why the wait was so long, and it was only a 2 ship day.

Thank you for sharing, Did you rent a car in vancouver? What hotel do you recommend? Also, is it easy to find the bus stop/where to the totem pole park? Thank you in advance

We did not rent a car. I really didn't want the stress of driving in a town I didn't know and dealing with parking, which I've heard is difficult in Vancouver.

We stayed at the YWCA hotel as recommended by some folks here. I know it sounds kind of odd, but it was a decent hotel in a good area of town close to everything, including the train station which was about two short blocks away, although we didn't use it much. We walked to the false creek ferry stop, and walked around town a bit. It was about $120 a night USD, with a senior discount, with one double bed and a private bathroom. They do have rooms with shared bathrooms, either in the hall or connected to another room. I think they have rooms which have as many as 5 beds!! It was incredibly inexpensive compared to the other hotels I looked at. If you are still looking for a room, I would suggest posting on the West coast departures or the Canada board. I got a lot of help from those boards with people actually giving you rates for your dates. I also used trivago and tripadvisor a lot. I initially booked with booking.com but found it was cheaper to book directly with the hotel.

The hotel was clean and the people were very nice and incredibly helpful with directions and a great map.

As far as the bus stop for the totem poles, I went to the visitor center and asked for directions and they gave me great directions. It is right on the main road in town, and about a 5 minute walk from where we were docked. It was pretty well marked, and actually had the schedule taped up on the pole next to the bus stop. It was the Silver line North, and then you take South back.

I made a comment on another post (I think) about how helpful the visitor centers were. We stopped at each one (except the one that was closed in Seward for the holiday). I had a list of things I wanted to do and so I got directions and other help from the visitor center staff that really made it so much easier. Although I had some directions from folks here or research I had done, it was much easier talking with someone with a map in hand and seeing the city.

I hope you enjoy your trip!

In the specialty restaurants they have to give you a receipt even if the meal is covered by a dining package. The receipt has the full charge and then the reversal. I am sure that the first they present has space for the addition of a tip.

It does have space for a tip. We usually tipped on the account versus cash. Partly because we had OBC that I bought before the trip. We didn't use much of it though. And are awaiting our refund via the mail.

Holidayhelen, I don't know where you're staying in Vancouver, and I'm sure you already have a hotel.

A couple of comments - the weather was very nice while we were there. We found a really great breakfast restaurant called the Jam Café that is on Beatty street. It is right by the train station Expo Line, Chinatown/Stadium station. There was a bit of a wait, but the food was really wonderful there. Good coffee, great bacon eggs benedict.

I would also recommend going up the Vancouver Lookout tower to have lunch or dinner at the restaurant. If you tell the folks at the elevator that you are going to the restaurant, you don't have to pay to go up in the elevator. It has a revolving restaurant - I believe it goes 360 degrees in an hour. The food was good, a bit pricy, but nice views. We went for dinner, but lunch would be less expensive. They do require that you buy an entrée per person. You can find their menu online. If you go between 3 and 5, it's only appetizers and drinks. We opted for dinner.

I would also recommend Fly Over Canada - it is a lot like Soarin' over California, if you've seen that at Disneyland. It is at Canada Place on the left side, way in the back of the terminal. Really fun ride.

We enjoyed going to Granville Island, but picked a lousy restaurant for dinner so I can't make a recommendation there.

We also loved the Capilano Suspension Bridge. There are a lot of things to do there, and we really enjoyed it.

We wished we had more time in Vancouver as I wanted to go Stanley Park and Grouse Mountain, and explore more, but we just didn't have time.

We don't have subways in the town I live in and I haven't tried to use a subway in many, many years, but I found the map we had with the subway stations on it and the markings for which line it was very helpful. We got the map from our hotel. We found the subway very friendly and easy to use, although we only used it once, after our dinner at the Lookout.

Enjoy your time there!

yes, they did have the crab cake appetizer at Cagney's when we were there. It was very good.

The LeBistro menu is not current as of our sailing 8-28 to 9-11 on the NCL Sun. The Cagney's menu is current.

There is no lobster, no artichoke appetizer and some others were missing on the menu.

Unfortunately I did not take a picture of the menu.

Hubby did like the French onion soup in LeBistro better than the MDR as well.

I loved the mushroom soup - so decadent - as well as the beef filet and the lamb chops.

no covered pool on the Sun. I saw a few people swimming here and there, and people using the hot tubs, but not much. I did not try them out, although I brought swimsuits and thought about it.

We loved Vancouver. Hopefully your hotel has a pool.

Shadowmeboy has a wonderful review of the NCL Sun for last season, and I think VegasChic does as well. There is no way any of the pictures we took would compare. I studied those reviews over and over again.

Have a wonderful trip! I was surprised how quickly the time went and how sad I was to leave.

There were a lot of highlights - some great laughs at the comedy shows, the glaciers, Hubbard, Mendenhall, the dolphins swimming alongside the ship during our last night's dinner at Le Bistro, the people.....

So I'll give a little summary of what we did where - and certainly, if there are questions, please feel free!

We were on the NCL Sun for back to back cruises. We had decided to do back to back, before I ever read about Denali or anything else. I had received one of the cruises as a VIP at a land casino, and won the other one at the land casino on the same weekend. We had a limited time to decide what we wanted to do with our certificates (one week), and had been researching Princess cruises to Alaska. We had sailed Princess years ago and enjoyed it, but alas, they certificates were for NCL. So we're stuck with NCL. I thought it was a great deal, having to pay the admin fee and port fees and tax. We did specialty dining, partly because the drink package wasn't really worth much to us since we don't drink much, and partly because we were getting a drink card from the casino to use. It worked out great.

In every port we went to (except the first time in Skagway), we stopped at the Visitor Center. They were always close to the dock and helped provide a great deal of information and directions.

So for the first trip, we went to Ketchikan, Juneau, Skagway, and Seward. We only pre-purchased one excursion, which I researched like crazy. Hubby is a train nut, so we took the Yukon Rail and Bus through Chillkoot Charters. It was wonderful. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

In Ketchikan, I had researched that they had a historical museum and the Southeast Alaska Discovery Center, which is operated by the National Forest Service. This day we were in Ketchikan, it was raining, but not cold. So we went first to the SE Alaska Discovery Center - it was free with our lifetime senior pass. Very nice way to introduce us to Alaska, which a good video and nice exhibits. We walked up to Creek Street and had planned to do the funicular, but it was broken down and I really didn't want to walk up Married Man's trail in the rain. So we walked around Creek Street and saw several seals/otters in the water, waiting for the fish. They poked their heads in and out. There were more by the bridge of the street, versus on creek street. We also went to the Tongass Historical Museum which cost $3 per person. They only had one exhibit as they are in the middle of renovation, so we just enjoyed that exhibit, which was quite beautiful.

The nice thing about no excursion, is that we had a relaxing breakfast on the ship, and didn't have to get off as soon as we docked. Knowing we were going back meant we could save something for the next week's stop. We did shop a little bit in Ketchikan at Tongass, but also decided to wait on some of our purchases, again knowing we'd be back. They had huge end of the season sales, so that was nice.

On our second trip to Ketchikan, the following week, we decided we wanted to go to Totem Bight State Park. We took the city bus which was $2 per person each way. It was a bit of a ride out there, but they were on time, and it was nice to see different parts of the area. Totem Bight State Park was so beautiful. It was raining on and off, and a little chilly. The State Park is very forest-like, and gorgeous. They have lots of totem poles and good information about them. We took about an hour to look around and take photos. The info on the bus was easily accessible, and well marked. After Totem Bight, we got dropped off at the federal building and decided to walk around Creek Street again. There were some shops we wanted to look in again, and we wanted to see if we could see seals/otters again. We did see a couple seals/otters, but not as many as before. We could hear a LOT of yelling and screaming and finally figured out that was the Lumberjack show! We stopped by Tongass at the pier and picked up those items we picked out the week before, and headed back to the ship.

The next port was Juneau. It was again rainy, but colder than Ketchikan. I was very happy hubby and I had purchased rain jackets for the trip. We don't get much rain where we live, so I don't I'd ever had a rain jacket. Had an umbrella, but that's it. We decided to take the city bus out to Mendenhall Glacier. Again, it was interesting to see the city. It was $2 per person each way. It is a good walk to the Visitor Center. I will say this was probably the worst thing we did to save money. It was very rainy, wet, cold, and I had forgotten my rain boots at home. My shoes and socks were soaked by the time we got to the visitor center. Had it been a nice day, I would have been fine. They had a fireplace (fake) where you could warm yourself and dry your jackets. I sat there for a bit to rest and get dried off. The visitor center was wonderful! They had nice exhibits and a cute little shop to find things. I had wanted to do the walk to nugget falls and other hikes, but the weather was just too bad. We did decide on the rainy walk there that we would try to go back on the $45 bus. Thankfully they took us, after we paid the fare. It was still raining pretty good. We went back on that bus, and took the bus to our ship and went to our cabin and changed.

The second trip to Juneau we had talked about going back out to Mendenhall but Hubby wasn't feeling up to it, so we just walked around the city, and shopped at the sales at the T-shirt store, where everything was 50% off. Our time in Juneau this time was much shorter, so we didn't have time to do much else.

In Skagway, we had pre-planned the train trip, which we both enjoyed. Carcross was cute, the food was good, donuts were fabulous, and seeing the baby huskies was neat, although we didn't get to hold them. We did see some people ride on the dirt trails with the huskies. It was interesting to see how excited the dogs got when they knew the trainer was picking some of them to pull a sled. When we got back to Skagway, we decided to visit the town on our next trip as we were pretty worn out from the trip. We had a really great guide, James from Ireland, who had wonderful stories. That is one of the things I enjoyed the most on our Alaska trip, was the people we met and heard from. They really touched me.

The second time we were in Skagway, we decided to take the bus into town and just walk around. I believe it was $2 per person each way. We visited the National Park center which was great. The ranger there was nice, and allowed us to be made junior rangers. They had awesome badges and we passed the test and took the oath and were awarded the badges. Their center is getting ready to close down for the season. She also gave us some maps of some hikes to do, but hubby didn't want to do any of them. So we walked around town, and then got a ride back to the ship.

Our mid-way stop was Seward, and we had decided that even though we could stay on the ship, we wanted to go explore. Again, we took a shuttle into town. Unfortunately, it was a holiday so the visitor center was closed as was the library. There wasn't a whole lot of info out there about Seward, mostly info about going to Anchorage. We decided to take the shuttle into town and look around - thankfully the shuttle didn't strand us at the closed visitor center. Hubby wanted some free wifi so we went to "The Sea Bean" which was easy to find, and we spent about an hour there catching up with family and friends. There were a couple of shops around there that were cute. We ended up going to the Alaska Sea Life Center, which I had planned on anyway. Supposedly they had a discount coupon (20%?) at the visitor center, but with the visitor center closed, we paid full price. It was well worth it. We saw the rescued baby walrus, sea otters, seals, puffin, and all kinds of other wonderful things. They had a very nice touch tank and some beautiful artwork as well. It really is a well put together center. I think we spent at least two hours there. If you go there, towards the end of the exhibits, there is a great place to take pictures, that's free. And you can post them on your facebook page or send it to yourself via email. It has several different backgrounds that you can use, and produces a pretty decent picture. I am not one to get pictures taken or buy pictures of myself, but these were great! The kids were having a great time and really loved all the exhibits, and it was fun to watch them interact with the sea life. From there we took the shuttle back the ship.

There were a couple of differences between cruise 1 and cruise 2. On cruise 2, we went to Icy Strait Point, and cruised Sawyer Glacier. We also got to see Hubbard Glacier again which was still magnificent. I think I could see that Glacier a million times and still be in awe of it.

So for Icy Strait Point, it was raining (again) for most of the time we were there. We took the shuttle to Hoonah and walked around. We went to the canoe shop because there was a "Sale" sign, so I couldn't resist. I am so glad we stopped in there! The gentleman who owns is a retired state trooper. Hubby is a retired police officer. He was wonderful to talk to and showed us his halibut hook, and explained how it was made, why it's made that way, what it's made with. We also saw some fur from otters which was very soft. The woman who works there is also a local, grew up in Ketchikan, but moved to Hoonah when she married, and I spoke with her for a while. She told me about a recent Totem pole that was put up. She explained that her clan is a certain clan name, and in Hoonah a different. The Totem pole was dedicated to her clan, and she had to dedicate to someone and dedicated it to her mother. Talking with her was very moving. She directed us to the carvers shed, which I had heard about and planned to go to.

There we found the carver, carving, and talking to folks. It was wonderful listening to him about the history of totems and carving. He has carved all of his life, and was carving a particular piece, all by hand, no machines, just hand tools. We walked around some more and then took the shuttle back.

Even though we didn't really do much in the way of "excursions", I felt we got a lot out of the ports that we normally wouldn't have, by meeting the people. I was surprised how many people come to the towns to work for the season, who don't live there and only live there for the season. It was nice talking to locals and people who grew up there.

Again, please feel free to ask questions. It may be kind of unorthodox kind of trip, but we enjoyed it immensely.

We took the silver line last week and it worked great. It is a city bus, so you will see locals using it as well.

Totem Bight is worth the $2 fare, plus the $5 cost to get into Totem Bight. This fee is new. It is just gorgeous. You can easily do it in an hour. Well worth the cost. We did this on our own, very easy to do. Just find the bus stop across from Tongass store #3, and you'll get there. When we came back, we walked around Creek Street on our own, saw some seals.

Also, I would highly recommend the Southeast Alaska Discovery Center. I believe we got in for free because of our National Parks Pass. It's close to the port. They also have a Tongass Historical Museum up by creek street but only had one room open when we were there. They charged $3 to get in. I believe they said the construction would be done by the Spring. It was a beautiful exhibit and they have nice, clean bathrooms. lol. You can catch a bus at the port to get up there, but we found it to be a very nice walk.

oh and as for signage and staff at the pier-

We cabbed it dropped our luggage with a porter immediately. The cab driver took my $20 in cash and gave me Canadian back, which I was fine with.

We went in, and there were people all along the way to help. I didn't feel like the signs were that helpful, but the clipboard ladies were. We sailed through everything.

When we were waiting for the cab on Monday, 9-11, the only good thing about that is that we got to see all the incoming folks, and how excited they were about going on their cruises. I was really surprised how long we had to wait for a cab. It was very organized, although, I'm not sure making cab drivers back in is the most efficient way to get their passengers. But for the way the place is set up, it's probably what works, with getting luggage in and all. Our cab driver wasn't great at backing in and took two spaces.....

Hello Casey's dad! Casey says hello!

We met her on our back to back cruises from Vancouver to Seward (and back) on the NCL Sun, 8-28 to 9-11.

I found her within the first few days, then kept seeing her everywhere. I don't know how to post pictures, but took one of her.

She is delightful, and very hard working!!! You should be very proud!

We flew into SeaTac and took a Shuttle to King Street Station since we were going to take the train to Vancouver that evening. our flight got in about 11 and we got to King Street Station pretty quickly. The Shuttle trip was about $32 plus tip, and was a shared ride, but we got dropped off first.

From King Street Station, we had directions to go to Skyview Observatory at the Columbia Tower. We chose this instead of the usual touristy Space Needle because 1) we wanted to be within walking distance of the train station, 2) it was cheaper ($9 each because we're "seniors", 3) it was taller. It has a wonderful exhibit of all of the things you were seeing and the history. It was a great choice! We loved it. The Space Needle looked absolutely miniscule from the Skyview.

It was a bit of hike to it from the train, some of which was uphill. There was also a fair number of homeless, etc. We were only approached by one person. But there was a group of young men drinking on the other side of the street, with several with sleeping bags and such.

We went from there to Pike Place Market, which was packed. It was Sunday afternoon, so I wasn't surprised but it bothered my husband. I had read about restaurants and had some in mind and found Lowell's and they had halibut fish and chips, which was perfect for my husband. You have to line up to order and then, hopefully, find a place to sit. We were able to get up to the third floor, shared a table, but were able to get our own table right before our food came. The food was fantastic, the view great. Great place. I wish we had more time to explore when it was less crowded, but it was just difficult for my husband. He has some vision and hearing issues, and so it gets very overwhelming for him.

We ended up walking down the stairs all the way down to the waterfront, per someone's suggestion here, and enjoyed the walk on the water most of the way down to the train station. It was pretty flat, thankfully, after about 5 levels of stairs to get down there. We were on the beginning of our adventure, and so no waiting for the darn elevator!

We enjoyed the train trip (Amtrak) to Vancouver. The King Street station is quite beautiful.

Customs and immigration was easy in Vancouver. Although it took a bit to get through the line. The taxi line was kind of nuts because one woman was yelling at everyone and did not want to get in the line. And the first taxi wouldn't take us because our luggage was "too big" so we had to wait for another. Same car, but more willing to take us.

He took us to the YWCA Hotel which I would recommend to anyone. Several folks here suggested it and most of the reviews on trip advisor were good. It was relatively inexpensive. It was after midnight when we got there, the doors were locked, and they had someone at the front desk who let us in. We got in our room and fell asleep, excited for the next day.

I had read about local restaurants and had decided long ago I wanted to go to the Jam Café which was about two blocks down the street from our hotel. We went there, waited in line about 30 minutes, and had a delicious breakfast at this charming little place. (We would go there for our other two breakfasts in Vancouver! We just loved it!)

After that we got a cab and headed to port, which was very easy embarkation process. The only wait we had was waiting after checking in through immigration and with NCL, etc. Waiting to board the ship.

If you have any questions about the cruise, ports or anything on the ship, please let me know. I am not going to do a trip report, but am happy to answer questions. We did back to back from Vancouver to Seward, back on 9-11.

Since I didn't want to fly home on September 11th, and because folks here encouraged staying in Vancouver, we planned a couple more days at the YWCA. Again, breakfast at the Jam Café. The first day (the day we got off the ship), we went to Granville Island. We got a little lost getting there, but had a good map, and asked along the way. We had wanted to leave from the Edgewater Casino dock but somehow ended up at the Yaletown dock. We took the ferry over and walked around - much calmer than Pike Place, but also a mid-day Monday. I had researched where to go to eat, but we saw a restaurant that hubby wanted to try so we did. Not really worth the cost - only ok. The service was good and wait staff was nice, but the food not anything special. It was the Sandbar. We walked around a bit more and then headed back to a different dock, this time the Edgewater Casino dock. Spent some of our Canadian dollars there and headed back to the hotel.

There was some kind of incident happening that had police and paramedics and was roped off. Sounded like someone was threatening suicide, unfortunately, but we were able to manage to find our way back to the hotel.

The next day, we had decided to go to Capilano Suspension Bridge. We went to Jam Café again, had a delicious breakfast and went to Homer and Robson to catch the free shuttle to Capilano. Enjoyed our bus driver's commentary and the scenery so much. Loved Capilano. A bit expensive, but we both felt it was worth it. We did all of the trails, all the treehouses, all the stairs, and had some nice soft serve ice cream on the other side of the bridge. Saw fish in the pond and squirrels around trying to steal food.

We ended up getting the bus back to Canada Place instead of by our hotel, thinking we could take the subway home from there. We had looked at the map and had seen the station by Jam, so thought we'd be fine. We went to Fly Over Canada. We both thought it was better than Soarin' over California, which we both loved.

From there we walked to the Vancouver Lookout. Unfortunately they don't serve lunch or dinner from 3 to 5pm, just appetizers and drinks, and decided to look around the shops and head back at 5.

If you tell them you're going to the restaurant, you do NOT have to pay to go up. We had a lovely, tasty dinner, hubby with the Pasta Arrabiata with Shrimp, me with the special, steak and prawns. Delicious meal, great view. I did go into the bathroom up there because I read on tripadvisor that the bathrooms were incredibly small. Maybe it's me, or maybe it's because I just spent two weeks in a tiny cabin bathroom, but I thought they were adequate.

We decided to go to find the train station, got our one time compass cards and took the train back to close by our hotel, which I believe was the Chinatown/stadium station. Very safe, very fast, very clean.

The next morning, we ended up at Jam Café. Our flight wasn't until 4:25pm and I wasn't comfortable enough going anywhere so I ended up taking some photos of the mural on Beatty between the Jam and our hotel. We got a cab, and headed to the airport. We were there too early to check our luggage, so had to wait, but with full bellies, until 3 hours before the flight. It was pretty smooth. The only thing that was bad was that they did not have an A&W in the airport - I had researched this because unfortunately, in our vicinity, they have gotten rid of all of them. It is still on the airport's website. The only thing they had fast food wise in our terminal that we could get to was Tim Horton's. While their fritters and donuts are the best ever, they are not Papa burgers and diet rootbeer floats.

All in all, I wish we had more time in Vancouver, and will hopefully get back there some time soon. We enjoyed the beautiful city, and felt very safe everywhere we went. We only saw some panhandlers by the train station down by the waterfront. Not much else.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask!

And thanks to those who helped with our planning. I took lots of notes, and used a lot of what I found here and there on the boards.

Since I had so much trouble finding info about my cabin, I thought I would post this information here. Do NOT hesitate to book this cabin if you can. We had it for two weeks, back to back to Alaska.

Ship -Sun

Deck - 10 - Norway

Stateroom # - 0132

Stateroom Category – IA

Starboard or Port Side - port

Quiet Stateroom? (With comments on problems) – pretty much. We heard noise one night.

Was stateroom a connecting stateroom? - no

Balcony View - Not a balcony

Any specific problems with this cabin? - sticky door which you had to make sure to shut securely.

Any other comments? - This cabin was huge. It was an inside sideways cabin, different from those I found on youtube or seen pictures of. The cabin faced the foot of the bed. Against the wall with the door was the desk, shelves, huge walk in closet, drawers and shelves on the side with the safe in the cabinet. On the left of the door was the bathroom, and then another 1/2 closet with drawers underneath that. On the other side of the wall, there was a cabinet with shelves that was floor to almost ceiling. Next to that was a king size couch bed. Next to that was the bed. Each side of the bed had a night table.

Only one plug in for cell phone cords and such.

We loved our bus/train ride to the Yukon with Chillkoot! So worth what we spent. My husband loved it, and our driver was very personable and had great stories.

Skagway itself is small. If you have kids, make sure to go to the National park station so your young one can get a Junior Ranger badge. It is a nice little center, and very nice folks working there.

Embarkation was great. 2 ship day, along with the Disney Wonder. We came at about 1030 or so. We didn't try to get priority boarding with CAS. The only thing we waited any time for was getting on the ship. They had us all wait for a bit. Served us water and fruit drink while we waited. Customs/immigration/picture taking, easy peasy. And we ended up putting $100 cash on our account which we did on the ship, no problem.

Disembarkation was a breeze as well, HOWEVER, we waited over an hour and a half for a cab. I wish I would have not been so tired, and tried to figure out how to get to Pan Pacific instead of waiting there.

There were a couple of other hiccups. I mentioned back to back - we got a letter a few days into cruise number 1 saying, you don't have to do anything for cruise 2, just enjoy time in Seward or stay on the ship, and your key will work, etc. I confirmed that with guest services as well as making sure our account was still good. On Monday morning, we got the accounting of our room charges and had money due. I checked with guest services and told them we just wanted to make sure it transferred onto the next cruise. We still had plenty left in OBC and cash, On Wednesday, our key didn't work and we got a note saying we had no funding for our account. First, the key didn't work, so I took care of that - new keys. Then later in the day, had to call because of the letter. They took care of it, with a supposed call to their financial department.

When we left Monday, we were able to get all of our cash deposit back. They said the rest would be sent via check in the mail. We'll see how long that takes.

We had a blast. I would recommend staying in Vancouver a few days before or after.

We did after and are so glad we did. We loved Vancouver (thanks all who helped us plan, especially martincath and xlxo).

We stayed at the YWCA hotel in Vancouver and would highly recommend it. Even my picky husband was ok with it. Spent several hours at Capilano (so beautiful) and did some other touristy stuff. I wish we had planned a longer stay in Vancouver, and we will go back, even if we don't have a cruise planned. Beautiful city.

If you have any questions about any of that, or taking Amtrak from Seattle to Vancouver, I'd be happy to offer anything.

Unfortunately I am not the picture taker, hubby is. And didn't save dailies or menus, but I can answer questions. I was surprised at how different the menus were from Shadowmeboy's cruise last year, most particularly lunch. We ended up at the buffet a lot for lunch.

Wonderful, wonderful trip of a lifetime.

We had a blast. I would recommend staying in Vancouver a few days before or after.

We did after and are so glad we did. We loved Vancouver (thanks all who helped us plan, especially martincath and xlxo).

We stayed at the YWCA hotel in Vancouver and would highly recommend it. Even my picky husband was ok with it. Spent several hours at Capilano (so beautiful) and did some other touristy stuff. I wish we had planned a longer stay in Vancouver, and we will go back, even if we don't have a cruise planned. Beautiful city.

If you have any questions about any of that, or taking Amtrak from Seattle to Vancouver, I'd be happy to offer anything.

Unfortunately I am not the picture taker, hubby is. And didn't save dailies or menus, but I can answer questions. I was surprised at how different the menus were from Shadowmeboy's cruise last year, most particularly lunch. We ended up at the buffet a lot for lunch.

Wonderful, wonderful trip of a lifetime.

Thank you so much for your input. Very much appreciated.

We leave next Sunday for our back to back cruises to Alaska on the NCL Sun, from Vancouver.

I have a few lingering questions - I did some searches, and thought I found some answers, but just want to be perfectly clear. You all have been so incredibly helpful and I can't believe it's almost here!!!

We get into Seattle Sunday morning, and are planning on doing some exploring after we drop our luggage at the King Street Amtrak Station for the evening train.

1) Columbia Tower/Skyview Observatory, and maybe Smith Tower as well

2) Pike Place market, with lunch/dinner there.

Any recommendations for a restaurant in Pike Place that is reasonable and hearty? Hubby is very picky, but would love halibut and chips. Sandwiches, Chinese, sushi is out. A view would be great. Lowell's looks good. Any input?

I think we should be able to walk to Columbia Tower and then over to Pike Place Market easily. If we decide we don't want to walk back to the train station, is there easy public transit or taxis available?

My husband is concerned about the possibility of protests in Seattle as he saw one reported yesterday. We want to stay as far away as possible from something like that. Is there somewhere we can look and see if there is something planned for our travel day so we can avoid it?

We are taking the train to Vancouver, but it gets in very late.

Do they have a taxi stand/taxis waiting, or should I plan to call a taxi company to get us to our hotel? Would you recommend one taxi company over another? How easy is it to find the taxi stand at the train station?

Any other advice/info you have is always appreciated. You all have given so much great info that will make our trip just wonderful. Thank you all so much.

http://www.wififreespot.com/alk.php

When I did my research, it seems that public libraries are your best bet. But the above link has some info.

Thank you Essiesmom. That's the one I usually look at, all the time.

Thank you Marylin. I will keep watching those live cams. Awesome.

oh noooooo. There are live cams? really? Are there any more for the different Alaska ports or Vancouver? wow.

working for me too.

http://www.kroooz-cams.com/portcams/us/juneau1.php

Unfortunately I am obsessed with looking at these....

So a related question:

we have pre-paid all of our DSC/gratuities/whatever you want to call it, and have about $140 OBC that was purchased for our cruise. This is refundable, obviously.

We will be sailing b2b from Vancouver to Seward and back for two weeks.

Will they:

1) accept a low cash deposit, and how low?

2) accept no deposit and then not allow us to charge once we get close to the max on the OBC? and then we can present a card or cash to cover anything else we want?

3) put a lower hold on our credit card?

Thanks.

looks much better today on the Canada Place webcam, thankfully.