Alaska on the Star 8-11-07 review posted

[boss_lady]

My review has been posted. Under members review you will find it or you may use this: http://www.cruisecritic.com/memberre...?Entry1D=31800

Thank you to all who had offered or given advice or information before our cruise. It all was a big help.

Looking forward to hearing your comments.

Bosslady:)

[electricron]

My review has been posted. Under members review you will find it or you may use this: http://www.cruisecritic.com/memberre...?Entry1D=31800

Thank you to all who had offered or given advice or information before our cruise. It all was a big help.

Looking forward to hearing your comments.

Bosslady:)

 

Thanks for the review. :)

[suzequ]

My review has been posted. Under members review you will find it or you may use this: http://www.cruisecritic.com/memberre...?Entry1D=31800

Thank you to all who had offered or given advice or information before our cruise. It all was a big help.

Looking forward to hearing your comments.

Bosslady:)

 

Bosslady -- Thank you for the review. DH, DD and SIL did this cruise in JUne and also had a fabulous time. Can't wait to go back.:D

[mistybaby]

We were on this sailing as well, and for the most part agree. Out of nearly twenty cruises, this was among the top three. A couple of things I'd point out (first as to NCL):

 

1. My understanding is that we got closer to Sawyer than anyone had all summer. Bravo to the Captain and Mother Nature. For a cynical NY'er, this was quite a site (as was the glacier I landed on via helicopter in Skagway).

 

2. Crowd control on re-embarkation. NCL has got to organize use of the elevators, especially as the deadline for reboarding approaches. I can't begin to tell you how many people (who were more than able bodied) pushed ahead of the elderly, infirm, or those with children in strollers, simply to take the elevator up one or two levels. Worse were those who walked up one flight, to then "hijack" the elevator from that level.

 

Next as to the ports (which were for the most part dynamite):

 

3. Skagway, the few places for lunch were pretty crowded considering all the ships in port. Can't expect the town to really fix it, and its really inconvenient to re-board just for lunch. Sorry to complain without a solution, but just an observation.

 

4. Prince Rupert - the one miserable weather day of our trip. I realize why we stop here, but unless you have a compelling reason, no sense in getting off the ship.

 

But, as I said, overall a terrific trip, and well worth the cross-country flight.

[just4now]

I was on the Star the week prior to this and agree with everything you say. I was on the catamaran tour of the twin Sawyer glaciers, and we got super close, but the ship was able to make it quite far in towards the glacier and there were lots of icebergs to be watched on the way in.

 

Things did get a bit clogged up with people reboarding now and again, but they do have 2 gangplanks available and it usually worked out that everyone tended to make their way to one leaving the other practically deserted. The only real bottleneck I saw was when the last White Pass train group got back late and the all had to reboard at once and pretty quickly.

 

I had read several reviews here about this itinerary mentioning that there's nothing much to do in Prince Rupert, and what makes it really difficult is that the ship is only in port 5-10pm. I pre-booked a kayaking excursion that took up the whole stay and I absolutely recommend this. We had great weather that day, we were able to go in t-shirts.

 

For disembark, we used the "Bags" program and left the ship when we were ready, strolling off around 9:30 avoiding the crazy rush. It was great not to have to tote luggage.

 

We all had a great time, especially my 17 year old son who'd pledged he'd have nothing to do with the teen group, and who promptly disappeared with said teen group for most of the week :p !

 

I'd be hard-pressed to find anything I didn't enjoy about the entire trip but I could have done without the CONSTANT loud music by the pool (and you can't get from here to there without passing through that area) and the annoying Bingo announcements with that baby xylophone.

 

Future Star cruisers: Do not miss the Dixieland Jazz show in the Red Lion!

[Chipster2]

Thanks for posting your review. Alaska is still high on the don't wanna miss cruises.

[boss_lady]

We were on this sailing as well, and for the most part agree. Out of nearly twenty cruises, this was among the top three. A couple of things I'd point out (first as to NCL):

 

1. My understanding is that we got closer to Sawyer than anyone had all summer. Bravo to the Captain and Mother Nature. For a cynical NY'er, this was quite a site (as was the glacier I landed on via helicopter in Skagway).

 

2. Crowd control on re-embarkation. NCL has got to organize use of the elevators, especially as the deadline for reboarding approaches. I can't begin to tell you how many people (who were more than able bodied) pushed ahead of the elderly, infirm, or those with children in strollers, simply to take the elevator up one or two levels. Worse were those who walked up one flight, to then "hijack" the elevator from that level.

 

Next as to the ports (which were for the most part dynamite):

 

3. Skagway, the few places for lunch were pretty crowded considering all the ships in port. Can't expect the town to really fix it, and its really inconvenient to re-board just for lunch. Sorry to complain without a solution, but just an observation.

 

4. Prince Rupert - the one miserable weather day of our trip. I realize why we stop here, but unless you have a compelling reason, no sense in getting off the ship.

 

But, as I said, overall a terrific trip, and well worth the cross-country flight.

 

Glad to hear you had a great time like we did. Wished we had known you were sailing with us, you could have come to our meet & greet. Maybe another cruise. I didn't realize that we had gotten the closest to the glacier so far this year. It sure was amazing to see ice like that. It was beautiful. We want to go back but next time we will drive up and ferry back. Have a friend who is doing this next summer. Will decide after their trip.

We enjoyed all the ports. Didn't get off in Prince Rupert either. Needed time to relax. Thank you on your comments of the cruise.

Bosslady:)