martincath

In that case I'd be looking into the earliest possible departure you can get yourself on that doesn't impact his medical care. Getting to Alaska between now and early July maximizes daylight, giving as much time every day as possible to just stare off the balcony at the scenery. August is still going to have long days and probably reasonable weather statistically - this year's long-term forecasts generally indicate warm & dry across the PNW. Wildfire smoke could be a factor at any point until even into October whether you're in Seattle or AK, so unless you can wait until next spring there's nothing to be done on that front except cross fingers! September definitely starts to suffer more from weather, college kids going back home, stores and tours cutting hours and starting to close, and October wasn't even part of cruise season until very recently, it's definitely a sub-optimal choice. If October was chosen because of low pricing - you'll get even cheaper deals on last-minute cruises as well as having much better potential scenery etc. for DH. This year does seem to be getting back to almost-full ships again, so the lines won't be as desperate to get anyone with a wallet who may spend onboard into cabins at any price but every year since I moved here if you are flexible you can find fares within a few days or weeks that hit rock-bottom. Every time I've actually booked a last-minute fare I have been given an Accessible room too - they're usually never made available for general purchase until close to departure, so unless all such rooms are sold out on a given cruise they are excellent candidates for short-notice bookings. If you have the relevant passports/other WHTI docs to allow a Vancouver departure, you'll have two ports within less than two hours drive that you can check for bargains from and the odds of getting one will increase even more. I'd honestly prioritize date over everything else unless DH has already indicated a specific desire to see a specific place! If you need DDs help with DH at home and would on the cruise too, her work flexibility etc. may make a short-notice cruise impossible of course - but if just you & DH would be able to cruise without her, then frankly the sooner the better even if DD can't accompany you at short-notice. I've done a lot of palliative care volunteering over the years, primarily on the bereavement/family support side, and literal 'bucket list' things are always challenging when there are other family members, maybe with kids of their own to care for too, but one of the most effective tools I found to help those feelings of guilt from the primary caregivers about trying to balance what's best for the patient against the rest of their loved ones is to adopt the (pardon my French!) 'Sh*t flows outward' principle. Draw three concentric circles, with DH alone in the middle one. Next circle is you and any other primary caregivers. Last circle is the folks who sometimes help DH, or who help you rather than him fairly often. Outside the circles go the folks who care but are not able to help directly or regularly. In the plainest English I can manage - DH gets to vent to anyone; you and other Circle 2 folks can reciprocally vent to each other, or to Circle 3 and Outsiders; Circle 3 vents among themselves or to the outsiders. Nobody complains at anyone in a smaller circle as they have more of their own sh*t to worry about. So if you could take Cruise X on July 1st, but that would annoy family who expect you to go round for a BBQ on July 4th because 'tradition' for example - tough noogies, they're outside your circle and DHs, your needs trump their wants, no guilt! If these last couple of paras offend in any way, if I'm overstepping, apologies - but in my experience having someone in a relevant position simply give you permission to be just a bit bl**dy selfish makes for a potentially huge mental improvement to care-givers.

You're not going to get a 'binding answer' from anyone at the cruise line, end of story - their contracts make it absolutely clear, although of course in the small print(!), that YOU are responsible for all matters around complying with Immigration policies of all countries visited so don't waste your time waiting hours on hold for varying degrees of incompetent answers or emails which just quote their rules and policies... Drive/bus/train across the Canadian border, or enter by sea, and you are correct - Minors <16 only need a birth cert. No plane will take them for several years now - friends learned that the hard way when the rules changed and their 'take new baby to see granny' trip got derailed expensively at the airport! - but land and sea borders you're still good per WHTI rules. If the 'no passport' issue is because you're hoping for a cheap 'last minute' cruise THIS season rather than an issue with parental approval - ignore the next paragraph 😉 Each cruiseline has their own preferred format docs for minors being brought by folks other than their parents/guardians, in case that's a factor, covering permission to take the kids abroad and to make medical decisions for them if needed. If the reason for the kid not being able to get a passport is one spouse won't sign off on it, then this trip will likely be a non-starter anyway unless the other spouse is awarded full custody in the interim... someone who objects to a passport for their kid doesn't seem likely to allow them to leave the country without them either!

If 'October this year' isn't a mistyping, I would first of all reconsider the date - it clashes with both your husband and daughters likely activities! Significantly more chance of rain/wind/cold rendering sitting on a balcony thoroughly unpleasant, distant scenic views blocked by clouds and rain. etc. etc. Lots of activities, stores, and tour companies will already be closed too. I'd look into May next year - statistically the driest month in SE Alaska and IMO the best viewing of landscapes (mountains still have lots of snow). It gives you a lot more time too - perhaps engaging your hubbie in the planning would help keep his mood up too? And while you did say you want an RT out of Seattle, Vancouver really isn't much extra hassle from Mount Vernon, maybe an extra 20miles driving depending exactly where you're going - and next May would be sufficient time to arrange passports (cards would work fine for driving and cruising) or EDLs if the reason for the RT cruise is no current passport. This would make for a significant qualitative improvement over Seattle for DH if he wants to see beautiful scenery - instead of a whole day just floating around far offshore at both ends of your 7 day trip you'd be traveling through narrow, scenic-on-both-sides Inside Passage provided you avoid the Princess Royal Class ships. I can also point you to some marvelous local amputee/para-/quadriplegic services locally that would enable him to sail on small boats (probably skiing too if you come in May!), if that sort of thing would be of interest? Vancouver is among the most disabled-accessible cities in the world too - no significant hills downtown, every transit bus is RORO, visitors can even use our local paratransit services for the cost of simply filing a form in advance to get door-to-door service anywhere, and even if whatever mobility device he used cannot manage gravel/dirt trails we have many parks and gardens with proper sidewalk/road quality pathways covering big chunks of them.

Yup, although invented may be a bit extreme, like with just about every recipe that doesn't require a brand-new ingredient or bit of machinery there's obviously been more of an evolution. The most plausible historic background for the rich, date-heavy pud itself is the coast around Whitehaven (one of the biggest sugar and date importing ports back in the day, and with many notorious little nooks and crannies that made offloading some goods before official arrival and tax inspection dead easy, seems to be the root of why Cumbria has been so pudding-focused for the last two or three centuries...) and Coulson's partner confirmed a Canadian influence - although not a recipe, that claim appeared out of nowhere some years later in Lancashire! - on the toffee sauce via Canuck WWII aircrew bringing over maple syrup and pouring it on puds where locals would add cream or custard... Personally whenever I make STP these days I just heat maple syrup, bourbon and cream rather than making a toffee sauce, in a terribly bastardized but gosh-durn delish Ameri-Can-umbrian concoction!

Cha Time & Cactus Club are certainly close and sensible first and last things to visit, but the spray park in Stanley is a significant hike further - a full two miles going the less scenic short route along Cordova and via Malkin Bowl, but if you stick to the Seawall the whole way it's over 60% longer; even cutting through by the Totem Poles pushes the distance to approx. 3 miles... with what sounds like younger kids, that could easily be over an hour each way if walked! Cabbing from near the pier will work easily to get TO the splash park, and for almost as cheap as transit to get dropped right next to it on the park 'ring road' instead of having an extra ~500 metres to walk from the bus loop - but trying to get a cabuber to come get you afterward may be challenging due to the one-way system so I'd definitely plan to use the bus on the way back (19, runs from the Bus Loop which is a very short walk from the splash park, and even closer to the pretty nice adventure playground!) It's a 10 minute ride - get off at Burrard, the stop is after the junction, so it's actually easiest to walk up Hornby three blocks (despite Google having issues with it, pedestrians can continue all the way down to Canada Place it's just cars that are blocked at Hastings) and even if you just missed a bus they run every 15mins so you'll be at the pier within about 30mins worst case. Since kids under 13 are free, the adult bus fare of CAD$3.15pp is all you'd likely have to pay (if you have a 13+ child, they do qualify for Concession fares BUT that might be problematic with exact change needed; any Tappable credit card or smartphone can be used to board a bus, but those always charge the regular adult ticket price - this is however frankly worth the extra buck compared to finding a ticket vending machine and buying a Concession ticket for later use on the bus). Personally I'd push the arrival time to at least 2pm - 'boarding time' on any document is meaningless at Canada Place as CBP have such tight and total control over the process, but the lines are hardly going to spend the money and effort on IT systems to print different terminology and time-frames just for Vancouver/Montreal departures... if they were actually willing to invest in seasonal IT improvements they'd instead prioritise their booking systems to reject PVSA-incompatible cruise combos!

Mediterranean Inn is ideal for big groups - edit, just checked the website as I had a sneaking suspicion they had upgraded and indeed they now say ALL rooms have AC, so ignore my prior point about some rooms being even cheaper without AC... The roof deck is a great hangout, it's got typical outdoor furniture so you could move things around to sit together in the evening, watch the sun set over the water. Queen Anne has a lot of restos, it's an easy walk to the needle/Chihuly (Science Center is good too if some of the group are kids or just like science centers!), MoPop entertains a wide age range, and while the hotel certainly isn't walking with suitcases distance to Pier 91 it's one of the closer options, no downtown core traffic to contend with, so Uber/taxis should be about $15 per vehicle.

Yup - the best STP, and the most legitimate claim to be the original source of it IMO, is definitely Cumbria; never had a 'sponge with some dates' version anywhere around the Lakes or even random Carlisle cafes. Any chance you're familiar with Lucy's On A Plate in Ambleside? If they still have a 'Pudding Wall of (Sh/F)ame' these days my photo may still be on it after a particularly memorable meal back in the day, long before diabetes came a-calling, when our party of four ordered (and finished) all twelve puds on the menu after licking our dinner plates clean! We had always planned to return for the monthly Pudding Club (one appy followed by six desserts), but Canada insisted we move here not long after that dinner. Black pud though, while most of my fellow Scots point to Stornoway as the best, I'm more a fan of Bury's style with the cubes of fat. But I've yet to meet any blood pudding, regardless of texture and added flavourings, that isn't worth the eating!!!

Sorry, living downtown the only hotel we ever stayed in was almost 20 years ago on a visit long before moving (the YWCA, hence me still recommending it now to all and sundry if its available because it only seems to have gotten better with age!); and given the odd location this hotel is about the least likely one to find reviews of on a cruise site, far from the pier but not actually very convenient for the airport. Assuming that you checked Tripadvisor, Expedia, Hotels dot com etc. you probably found very few reviews as the hotel only changed names a couple of years ago - you should find a greater volume of not-actually-too-old reviews if you check under the previous name too, it used to be the Coast Vancouver Airport Hotel until some time during the Pandemic. I have no idea what, if any, upgrades were done when BW took over other than changing the signage but skimming the most recent reviews as Coast there's a lot of 1* because of customer service issues like not issuing refunds for Covid-impacted travel - you'll have to do more of a deep dive reading longer reviews to see if they refer to more tangible issues like sound-proofing, AC etc. that might still be problematic now.

No probs - that's why they pay me the big bucks! 😉

@caymancouple while this version is much more active, I replied to your Port of Call thread - rather than re-type all your various options, here's a shortcut... I didn't know from that question whether this was a port stop or a Disembarkation - so I didn't address YOUR problem (what to do with the bags while DH is on his call!). If it's OK for you to listen in, you could just join him - but if he needs to run off by himself, you could check out the FlyOverCanada ride right at the pier. They'll hold bags while you ride, the whole thing lasts about an hour from queue to preride video to ride itself, and if he is OK to use an 'open' connection he could be right above you on top of CP or just a block along the Seawall. Depending whether you have a post-cruise hotel stay or a flight home, and if his call is going to be a very long one, I might be able to offer some more suggestions... so a full breakdown of what else you need to do that day would enable a more complete answer.

The Whales of Lake Erie 😉

Black Pudding! Or if you only mean sweet puds, then Sticky Toffee (NB: only the proper, dates-as-biggest-ingredient-by-weight version, although there's nothing wrong with a 'sponge plus sauce/jam/custard' whatsoever 9 times out of ten in the US/Canada the product is far too light to be a real STP... but you can find the good stuff pretty easily, a Texan bakery sells them internationally - if you see their seasonal two-pack in Costco around the end of the year, grab some! They freeze well too.) A warm portion of STP, a dollop of crème fraîche, and a glass of Alvear Solera 1927 Pedro Ximenez would be my proverbial 'last meal' dessert; a seared scallop on top of a fried disc of black pudding with a glass of Neige 'ice cider' would be one of the savoury courses!

If you claim to be a foodie but have no opinion of something with as many common iterations as a burger, then you're more of a food snob Bruce! 😉 And ketchup - jeez, I know people who have shouting matches about whether Hunts or Heinz is the best American major-brand ketchup (both suck equally IMO), others who refuse to use anything other than the pronunciation 'catsup' when talking about it, and yet others who will never say ketchup without saying the relevant primary ingredient first as it was originally a generic term for a style of condiment, made with e.g. mushrooms long before anyone thought to use tomatoes. I do think the term food(ie/y) has been and is definitely used pejoratively, neutrally and positively depending who's talking - the recent movie The Menu is a fantastic example of taking the attitude of some 'real pros' being dismissive of 'mere foodies' to the extreme! Like Trekkie/Trekker, there will be waves of terminology, attempts at inclusivity that back-fire into attempted gate-keeping, but at the end of the day I think it boils down to whether you invest more time and effort into learning about and enjoying food, of whatever kind, than the minimum needed to prepare it and eat it. If you give a proverbial cra*p about any kind of food, to the extent you're happy to debate about it with someone else, you're a foodie IMO. Maybe a niche foodie if you only care about burgers and ketchup - but no more niche than if you only care about Michelin restos!

Even if it's a full disembarkation on a busy day, rather than a port stop with perhaps just your ship, it will be trivially easy for your hubby to get off the ship and find some internet. The only issue I see is if the Zoom call is something that requires 'secrecy' from random Vancouverites - while I doubt matters of national security would be involved, corporate info perhaps? Basically, if DH would be willing to discuss the same topics on a cellphone call, he'll be fine without spending a penny - but if he'd want to be inside a locked room where nobody can overhear he'll have to spend some money! There is free internet at Canada Place itself, although the port authority are cheapskates so the signal may struggle to maintain a video call - especially if there are lots of folks all getting off ships around the same time, booking Ubers, calling home etc. etc. The free city-provided network is better - and much more widespread, even including decent coverage throughout many of our parks. This broadcasts everywhere as an open connection named #VanWiFi - I know that many people managed live video chats during the Pandemic, when witnessed tests by official observers were needed to board, and a lot of them were done on the city and Canada Place networks in a short space of time for all the folks who didn't do their research and schedule them in hotels, before leaving home etc. So personally I would take a wander either to the top deck of Canada Place or along the Seawall (weather dependent, not much shelter on CP but there's a huge covered swathe of Seawall and sidewalk a block away at the Convention Centre West building). Check for signal strength, and unless you get unlucky there should be somewhere with at least a bench to sit on! Don't mind spending a small sum, like buying a coffee? Every cafe that doesn't have completely open internet will give you the WiFi code if you make a purchase. Personally I'd never take a call inside a cafe, but I've certainly seen more than a few 'Starbucks Laptop Campers' ignoring social mores and obviously having meetings in a room full of other customers! Fortunately, there are outside tables (and again, Seawall under the convention centre offers you a couple of options without the worry of being rained on). Lastly, if this is a 'nobody should overhear me!' situation then you're in luck - as well as the obvious 'book a hotel room' option (there are some day rooms around, generally swankier hotels though, so you might actually pay less by booking a cheap hotel for the night than paying for a few hours in a fancy room) we are a city with a metric buttload of 'book some office space' options, and many are easily walked to from the pier - Gastown is, believe it or not, a bit of a tech hub! There are ad hoc AirBnB type services like Peerspace - taking advantage of the fact that many office buildings still have only a third of their staff back in person on any given day to use 'real offices' by the hour - as well as dedicated 'shared office space' with desks, pods, rooms etc. through the likes of WeWork (who have three buildings downtown within ~10mins walk, with actual room space as cheap as $15/hour/seat the room holds, e.g. this one). In short - this is not going to be a problem in the slightest, so you and hubbie can relax! Worst case he really needs to book somewhere for a super-secret call, you can do that in advance (and possibly claim back the expense from work!) Edit - rereading your post, I noticed that this is a meeting your DH is supposed to be running - so I'd lean toward advance booking of a dedicated office space, especially if you really meant that you would cancel the cruise rather than have him miss this call! You can contact them in advance whether it's a WeWork or Peerspace office to find out details of the available tech, internet speed, etc. etc. - if it's a port stop or a self-disembarkation he could be in a downtown office by 8am with a full hour to prep, ensure his devices are hooked up and working etc. My wife has gone straight to work or a breakfast meeting every time we've disembarked in Vancouver, in all cases she's been sat there before 8am ready to go! Second Edit - juuuuuust in case of a silly mistake derailing things, have you already accounted for Time Zones when you say the meeting starts at 9am? We're one or two hours behind Texas depending which part you're in!

Anna's Hummingbird I think - our official city bird! Good, or lucky, photo given how rapidly they zip around! Prospect Point is actually in Stanley Park - it's biiiiiiiiiiiig! And those other cities aren't over a river - that's the Pacific (Burrard Inlet to be specific). North Van is roughly on the east (right) side of the bridge, West Van to the west (left) of it. Same folks who built the bridge - the Guinness Family - bought a huge chunk of what is now West Van for pennies first, then built the bridge which increased the value of their land massively compared to when just the small ferry was operating, then charged a toll to pay back the cost of the bridge (so all the folks buying land from them to build homes also paid them back for the reason they paid so dang much for their lots in the first place), then sold the bridge to the province 'for only the cost of construction' once they had already been paid back by the tolls and thus neatly avoided the starting-to-seriously-increase cost of maintaining an aging bridge! The Guinnesses were always a**holes - but smart ones 😉

Unfortunately you got screwed by a weaselcabbie - firstly, there is no fixed rate going TO the airport. By law, it applies leaving YVR only - EVERY other trip, if the meter does not get turned on, free ride for you! Why would drivers offer this? When traffic is light and they put their foot down, they know the actual metered fare runs as low as $30-32, so many 'enterprising' cabbies offer the fixed rate - and keep all the cash themselves because officially it did not happen! Secondly, not only is it illegal to charge for moving a mobility device, all cabbies are trained how to safely move them in and out, attach them securely etc. - and they are specifically forbidden to even turn the meter on while doing so, let alone charge anything extra! Our equivalent of ADA ensures that nobody with a mobility device is charged a penny more than someone able-bodied - when the rules are followed at least! Bag fees are also Not A Thing here - there are rules that allow fee-based moving of packages separately, but an extra fee for baggage brought by a passenger is explicitly forbidden. If by any chance you took a photo or wrote down the cabbie's ID and license plate you should lodge a complaint and get a refund! As to the mixing pax from lines - that is 100% on the US government. If there were no Preclearance here, each berth of the pier could be set up it's own lines for security, check-in etc.! But since every person has to be filtered through the one CBP area, it's simply not practical to have separate Security or Check-in rooms because everyone must be merged together to be pre-cleared. Even on the crappiest days though, it's still faster than it would have been if instead you had to be cleared at your first US port! CBP staffing levels in Vancouver may seem inadequate - but have a think about how many CBP agents could be set up to work in Skagway? Ketchikan? Icy Strait Point? By forcing cruise ships to preclear in Vancouver, none of these tiny ports need to be staffed up to handle multiple 3000+pax vessels! The only remotely viable alternative would be making every ship use Juneau as their first US stop - seat of government, biggest population, etc. etc. - but then the lines would all complain as they would lose a lot of flexibility in routing, and of course pax would also whine because now every ship leaving Vancouver has to visit Juneau first so the port will be JAMMED with pax, p*ssed off at having waited hours to be processed before they can get to Mendenhall etc.... we've seen San Francisco take over three hours to process the pax load on a single Grand class Princess ship, ~2600 pax... and Juneau currently has 4+ ships in port simultaneously many days, even with total freedom of which ports to put in which order for the lines as things stand. Doing things the way they are saves your government a significant amount of expensive CBP staff, office space etc. in all the possible ports a ship might visit first - but by all means complain to your elected officials to see if you can persuade them to staff up Vancouver with more agents and kiosks. The more folks that can move through that bottleneck per minute, the smoother everyone's embarkation becomes!

GOES was the system used to process, and the previous generic group name, for what is now called Trusted Traveler Programs (NEXUS, Global Entry etc.) Back to OP @new2cruise - there is no possible time you can show up to be able to board by 11am! Even 11:30am needs a bit of luck, and either very few ships or high status/Suite to get a jump on the initial cattle call 'holding room' check-in. If you want onboard as early as possible, 10am is a good time to show up - but you'll have a wait of indeterminate time until the ship(s) are confirmed Zeroed Out and CBP are ready to start preclearing the embarking pax. If you're near the start of the lines, they should move quickly - but then like reported above already, odds are very low the ship is ready! So there's another lurking lounge. This 90+ minute waiting, even if you are the first folks at the pier, is why I prefer to board late instead! There's so much good stuff to do in Vancouver, even for us locals, that the 'cost' of missing out on a seated dining room lunch and instead having to hit the buffet or buy lunch ashore is well worth the big chunk of time saved - aim for two hours before sailway, to ensure you comply with final manifest deadline, and you should romp through all queues and have a total curb to cabin time of 20mins!

And here's the problem inherent to your question @kutchyone Cheryl - one person's Must See is another's Meh. Even whale-watching (which is great) does not have to be done to enjoy Juneau! Every other thing listed by SCRR wouldn't even make my top three options in any of those ports - I'd prioritise the Totem Heritage Center in Ketchikan, the Russian Bishops House in Sitka, Alaska State Museum in Juneau (but I can access significantly cheaper whale-watching in BC, WA and Oregon - if you can't fill your boots with whales at home though, I would absolutely recommend Juneau as a good port for doing it in AK), and Swan's Brewpub in Victoria (but if you have a long enough stop and have not already seen it, you'd have to really hate gardens NOT to prioritise Butchart as your big hit here...) So - now you've got two very different lists already! The question is - which one of us shares most in common with your taste in activities? Maybe neither of us are a good match to you & your sister... We don't know anything about you unless you tell us - other than your lack of desire to do physically demanding activities, we know nothing of your tastes and preferences.

The only way you can ever fairly compare is by researching the available flights and hotels yourself, then checking whether the cruiseline can beat the prices. If it's actually cheaper, then it's worth consideration even if you are generally more of an 'in control' person, only you can assess whether the savings are enough to feel worth giving up your control; if it's more expensive, but you are someone who would rather have your hand held, the opposite - how much extra is the hand-holding worth to you? Unless you insist on Hotel X/Airline Y and the line doesn't want to book one of them at all, you can always do a comparison shop! If your cruise package doesn't offer all the possible hotels and flights, and the ones most of interest to you are not available, only you can decide what compromising on these things is worth to you... But do make sure you use Apples to Apples: you may get 'free' transfers with a flight/hotel/cruise package, so you need to check on the taxi/transit/rideshare etc. pricing and ease of use; you may get a 'free' breakfast at a hotel booked independently but not via the cruise (or vice versa), different room categories might be listed; and of course all the cruise pricing is generally Per Person so it's simplest if you always use the actual number of pax in your party for your potential flight, hotel, and transfer costings to get the total independent rate and compare it with the total cruise package price.

I think you may be out of luck - the Feds cover marine, rail, air and Any Form Whatsoever Accessibility complaints about transportation, but not buses (unless they were discriminating against a wheelchair user or similar!) Quebec does of course have it's own ministry of transport, and the English pages confirm that there are licensing and safety issues that they handle for public transit buses, private buses, and even out-of-province buses like Greyhound, but a quick search for Bus and Coach on the Ministry website is only pulling French language legislation results - living in Montreal I'm sure your French is more practised then mine and you may be able to find something relevant by searching or contacting them... but I have a vague recollection from when Greyhound Canada ceased to operate a few years back that part of the issue was the piecemeal regulation of road-based transportation at the Provincial level - like the US we are basically far too car-dependent a country for long-distance bus/coach travel to be an important enough matter, other than ensuring all the vehicles are basically safe and the drivers licensed, for it ever to make any difference come election day! I think this kind of situation is where the local-ish media reporters on whatever Montreal's remaining TV/newspaper groups might be your easiest win, as bad press may encourage settling a modest compensation amount of a few hundred bucks...

Glad to help, fellow Portlandians! Everett's not bad - key thing is it's north of Seattle, although until they finally get that road-widening project complete the first northbound I5 stretch to Marysville remains a drag almost any time of day! I'd check Waze or similar to see if taking the 529 up to Marysville is faster as you're setting out. Now I'm embarrassed - even though I looked at the timetable for K'dam days I never bothered to look at which day of the week... Saturdays way less of an issue with commuters inbound, and tunnel often stays 2 in, 2 out unless there's some big event on during the day (there are night-time fireworks that day, but since it's not a long weekend your fellow Americans coming up for vacations should still be much less than normal weekday commuter volume approaching town). Optimal crossing varies - we rarely deviate from I5 proper, but we have NEXUS. We check the signs though, and personally I can only only recall a handful of occasions in over ten years when deviating as far as Lynden, let alone Sumas, are worthwhile if you're headed downtown rather than to the eastern 'burbs. They add more drive time than the time saved crossing even without NEXUS on all but the super-busy times - even Pacific Crossing, where trucks & buses generally go, adds 10+mins drive time to downtown Van and is rarely more than 10mins faster than Peace Arch for cars statistically, while Lynden and Sumas are both on the order of 30mins extra drive time. Since I assume you will have data within WA State, have your partner/one of the kids keep an eye on not-quite-live data updates from CBSA as you get to the places where you have to make a choice, as well as checking the highway overhead info signs - unless Peace Arch/Pacif X-ing delays are closing in on an hour deviating to Lynden is almost certainly both extra mileage and time. With kids to factor in things get trickier - do you think they'd handle an early awakening well? Sitting around on plastic chairs for an hour? Standing in queues that just stop randomly for no reason? You hopefully know your kids a lot better than I do(!) so it's on you to figure out what options would minimize disruption to/from them!!! In general though, Late or Early both have benefits - anywhere in the middle is just varying degrees of Suck. While the total pax load of Grand & Oc Vic is likely way less than just Majestic, having to have three sets of Check-in desks rather than two means another unknown factor in the 'who will embark first?' sweepstakes... I'd say that if your kids are on the younger end, or just 'full of beans' not keen on lots of sitting types, then splitting things up as much as possible with 'fun stuff for them' as the in-between boarding day treat might be the way to go (i.e. drive up earlyish, drop bags on arrival, then go for some of our awesome ice cream, let them run about in a park, that sort of thing - if you don't mind bringing a wet bag onboard, the splash park on Granville Island could be a real Happy Kid Making thing; if weather sucks then the roof level adventure playground inside the Kids Market is another great 'burn some energy so you annoy me less later child!' option; and of course the shops of the kids market provide a lot of fun, and also educational, toys for bribery!); and while The Old Spaghetti Factory may be of Portlandian origins, the Gastown outpost is the oldest remaining resto (I think it opened just one year after the original PDX one, but unlike that has been in the same building ever since), priced in CAD making it even cheaper (for still mediocre, but enormous portions of) food - and I don't think any other OSF can claim to have a haunted streetcar available for sitting in! If it's older kids who can self-regulate, maybe there's something in Hollywood North that could entice - check out filming locations of fave shows? Seems like several of our recent local productions are aimed at teen audiences, like the whole 'Archieverse' batch of shows, and while the Arrowverse may be effectively over now it always entertained me that The Flash used real Portland maps for Central City but filmed here, two real places combined into one fake one! If the TV/movie sites idea has traction, this is where I'd say that crossing at Lynden/Sumas becomes sensible again - loads of filming sites out east of town: Riverview Hospital might be the single most filmed building in the region out in Coquitlam for example, it's been in dang near every tv show filmed here that uses location shoots!

Probably not a significant difference in any of them... Taxi Van outbound TO the airport impossible to say exact price as metered so traffic becomes a factor - on average the fare should be around the same $38 as the fixed fare for Inbound traffic, but could be $33 or $43 without any weaseling from the cabbie. Uber may have Surge or not based on volume of demand - 3+ ship day, or a big'un like Majestic/Royal Princess, strong possibility of Surge! If not though the rideshares are all usually about 10% less than cabs on an airport run, but that's for the default Regular Size Car - the extra cost of the bigger vehicles for XL/Plus I'm not familiar with personally, never needed to use them, but again barring Surge I would think they are likely within the ballpark metered cab price range.

Unknown issues: your exact sail date will make a difference... K'dam shares port with either Majestic or Grand Princess, and sometimes also Ocean Victory... since the 2 Princess ships have a significantly different pax load, almost every time will differ as to how many other pax you have to deal with! Your driving route can also have an impact - if you're 3 hours away down I5, over-nighting somewhere in the Seattle area then the time you leave there makes a potentially huge difference if you have to drive with or against an commuter traffic! If you're somewhere further east, like Nehalem, that's also a 3 hour drive on paper you don't have those Seattle area volume worries. So - visiting family, i.e. no option where in WA you are overnighting? Or just splitting the trip from PDX to minimize same day drive, with your choice of where to stay? If the latter - be near the border, Ye Olde bits of downtown Bellingham are really nice, and your drive will drop to <2 hours. But in general... 1) You will sit around about an hour before boarding starts; depending which ships are allowed to start their pax first and what if any priority you have with HAL, you could be right at the start of the lines when they do start moving or still have hundreds of pax ahead of you... curb to cabin time, anything from 90-120mins is likely 2) Second-worst option - noon arrivals means Amtrak may see hundreds of extra cruise pax, on top of the constant flow from airport arrivals and hotels. No initial wait but constant slowdowns and stoppages as CBP get overloaded and prevent anyone entering their area which backs up Security and so on 3) Risky from the perspective of your drive - any border issue, a flat tire, another vehicle crashing can easily turn a 3 hours drive from Seattle into a 5 hour... 4) Impossible - you MUST be at the pier for check-in 2 hours beforehand so for a 4:30 planned sailaway, hard cap is 2:30pm or you risk the manifest being finalized and No Cruise For You! Other Option would be my suggestion, sort of a combo of 1) and 4) - get here ASAP, even if that means getting on the road by 6am to minimise commuter impact around Seattle and give plenty of padding for re-routing around incidents or choosing one of the border crossings further east instead of the main I5 corridor. if all goes well and you cross the border early enough to hit Vancouver commuter traffic, optionally pull over somewhere to chill, grab a coffee, triple-check you didn't leave anything back in the hotel like passports in the safe...(!) Local commuter traffic inbound from the border gets much lighter after 9am, the Tunnel returns to 2 lanes each way approx 9:30am - marking 'normal' flow again. Before that you will benefit from 3 lanes inbound if you stick to 99, but it can still be really slow until close to 9am. Once downtown, drop bags at the pier as soon as you can (9:30am is usually safe although officially bag drop begins no earlier than 10am) and go enjoy time in town... but be back by no later than 2:30pm!!!!

Customs declaration form beforehand - might be in the cabin on embarkation, might be handed out during the cruise, but they'll confirm a deadline for dropping off your completed forms (usually just at the main customer service desk, but your line may have their own procedures). This info, along with the IDs of all onboard from the manifest, gets transmitted to CBSA just after the ship leaves the last US port before Victoria, so usually the deadline for declaration forms is no later than the night before that port stop. Assuming nobody in your party declares anything expensive you intend to leave in Canada and nobody has a criminal record, you probably won't hear anything else and you can walk off the ship when it docks, possibly without even seeing any CBSA officials standing around. Folks who do need interviewed for either a Customs (My Stuff Is Problematic) or Immigration (I Am Problematic) reason will most likely find their names called over the tannoy to report to X location onboard just after docking - CBSA will send an agent or several aboard to chat with these folks before they can disembark. Depending how those interviews go you may be welcomed to Canada and can join your fellow pax in disembarking, told to stay onboard if you've been naughty in the past so are not welcome to visit Canada (and your ship card flagged to sound alarms when scanned at the gangplank if you try to sneak off), asked to pay some Duty if you are planning to give away/sell stuff to Canadians (probably politely escorted off to the pier office for that), or worst-case if you have an open warrant for a crime perhaps cuffed up and jailed while extradition is arranged to wherever it is that wants you! Note that US authorities share access to their criminal databases with us and vice versa - plenty of Americans find out the hard way every year that we treat DUIs a heckuvalot more seriously than our cousins south of the border do! If you ever cruised with a Victoria stop in the past, and wondered what the heck the delay between docking and the first pax being allowed off was, it probably means at least one of your fellow pax was a criminal (by local standards) and CBSA wanted the chance to deal with them without any risk of them sneaking off using someone else's card... nobody allowed off means no chance of anyone sneaking ashore! If the same name(s) get repeatedly called on the tannoy during that delay, then that someone likely knows they've been naughty but foolishly thinks that just staying aboard means Canada won't care... nope! If we know you've been naughty, at the very least we want to shame you to your face for it - which is good, because in many cases of relatively minor offences from long ago your interview might see you 'Deemed Rehabilitated' and now you'll be able to cross the border in future without having to pay the money and wait a long time for a 'pardon' for those past indiscretions!

You don't HAVE to, but if you're bringing a bunch of really expensive stuff and want to avoid even the super-tiny chance of being dinged for duty payments you CAN declare that you have such things and intend to take them back out of Canada again (which you can claim back afterward - for foreigners, simply taking them back out of the country again is proof that they were not given away or sold within Canada; for Residents we need proof of prior ownership within Canada to avoid import duties so it's much more likely we would be hassled than a tourist). The kiosk options though are for 'normal' travel as a visitor - for 'temporary importation declarations' you'd need to speak to CBSA directly, and frankly if you do start listing your watches, rings, laptops, cameras, designer handbags etc. they will probably just cut you off and ask whether you intend to give them away or sell them, then tell you to b*gger off when you say "no" because the paperwork is a bear! Serial numbers, dates and prices of purchase, where it was made and bought - you're supposed to supply the info, but they need to verify it so it comes down to a cost/benefit analysis of "Does this make us income from duty that is worth the time and hassle of the forms?" and since by definition a temporary import never makes money because at best they gain Duty but have to refund it again... I've yet to meet any CBSA person who can be bothered! Relevant-but-lengthy personal examples follow - you certainly don't need to read them but they may put your mind further at rest about how low-risk CBSA deem foreigners flying to to take a cruise then go home again are in terms of Customs issues... Re: border rules, declarations, etc. we've declared permanent and temporary importation of loads of stuff on multiple occasions - having immigrated here, and owning properties both sides of the border, sometimes things we bought for our Portland pad get brought up to Vancouver or vice versa for temporary stays as well as permanent relocation. On top of all the standard customs declaration issues we have NEXUS which means if we ever fail to declare anything we could lose that incredibly-valuable time-saving status, so my already-keen Pedant Sense kicks into the highest possible gear in such situations... the first time we brought stuff over the border post-NEXUS I researched thoroughly, found the correct forms, filled them out completely (down to country of manufacture as well as purchase of every item so that NAFTA rules were correctly accounted for too!) and the border agent just about pooped their pants. He stared at the forms a few seconds, asked me what the heck this was all about, I said "Your website indicated this was the right way to cross all the i's and dot the t's about bringing our stuff across the border to be fully compliant with all the rules" and he just looked at my "Total Duty Payable" entry ($0; everything over the $800 limit was NAFTA-exempt) and waved us on as I watched him tear the form up in my rear-view!!! Since then, we have given only verbal declarations that have become simplified to the point of now just saying "Nothing we do not intend to bring back over the border with us on our return" when asked "Anything to declare?" (unless we are actually importing something permanently of course!) and then waiting to see if we are asked any other questions - I still make sure I can easily supply the needed info if asked, but "Only answer what you are asked without volunteering anything extra" is the golden rule of all interactions at borders. Re: your 'Mister Two Laptops' story, I would guess that he was snarky to the CBSA person who decided on some petty revenge... every corporate-issued laptop I've ever seen has some kind of identifying tag so the company can keep track of their stuff. My wife has traveled with her work laptop and a personal one for over 20 years to many countries and has been asked "why two?" many times - simply pointing to the label with <Company>ItemID/barcode and saying "I'm on call as needed for work" has never failed to be accepted anywhere - although US CBP almost always follow up with "Are any of your clients American?" to ensure we don't also need some sort of working visa on the immigration front!