Norwegian Encore Alaska Cruise Review: Day 4 – Embarkationfeatured
(Ed note: This is a cruise we took in 2022 so keep that in mind for any references to COVID protocols! Better late than never, right?)
I think the pandemic gave me a new appreciation for cruises.
Don’t get me wrong — I’ve always had a very healthy appreciation for this mode of travel in particular — but after the uncertainty around cruising and all the effort to get back to a point where cruising is almost back to the way it was — I just appreciate it even more. This cruise would be our fourth in the last year (and the fourth since the restart), and for each one, I’ve just been so filled with gratitude that I can freely get on a ship again and sail to just about anywhere I could want to.
I have such a healthy appreciation for cruises that I didn’t even gripe when Stephanie woke me up before 6:00 AM. We knew we’d have to get an early start: our check in time was 10 – 11 and it was going to take us at least two and a half hours to drive from Portland to Seattle, during which time we’d also need to refuel the car, drop it off at the car rental facility and get a ride to the pier. So an early start it was, a start that began before the sun was even up. Luckily, I’m a pro at preempting early wake ups with some extra pre-bed prep: I laid out my outfit, re-packed my carry ons, locked up my luggage and put the ship tags on. I was ready to go before my head even hit the pillow.
We grabbed a quick breakfast and an extra cup of coffee to go before we checked out of the hotel. I have to give a plug to the Inn at Northrop Station — it might be the only hotel in Portland proper that offers free breakfast and free parking and the location was fantastic.
The ride to Seattle was smooth and quick — just around two and a half hours. Stephanie made an unfortunate wrong turn that took us an extra 20 minutes to navigate around but we still made it back with plenty of time to get to the ship. One thing to note, though — gas prices were absurdly high in Seattle (more than a dollar/gallon higher than Portland and nearly two dollars/gallon higher than it is at home). We filled up at a Costco gas station, which was nearly a dollar lower than their nearby competitors.
After we checked the car back in with the rental car agency, we dug our jackets out of our suitcases and summoned an Uber. A taxi would have been around $35/40, but we would have had to shuttle back to the airport to catch one, and we had a lot of luggage we’d have to get in a small trunk. A Norwegian transfer would have been around $25 a person, but also would have required us to shuttle back to the terminal with all of our luggage. Uber estimates earlier in the week priced out around $75 for an Uber XL, but when Stephanie went in the app, she found the prices much lower and we were able to get an Uber XL to pick us up at the car rental facility for around $52.
The ride to Norwegian’s home at Pier 66 in downtown Seattle took just over 20 minutes. Steps away from the drop off point was the luggage drop and since our bags were already tagged, we dropped them there and made our way to the front to begin check in.
We arrived a little later than our scheduled check in time, so it was bustling inside the terminal by the time we arrived. We checked in first with an agent in front who checked our passports and the code on our documents. Next, we were sent to another document check, where they checked our ArriveCAN code, our vaccine cards and our test results (all required due to our four hour stop in Victoria). No fewer than three people stopped us and asked us if we had filled out our ArriveCAN form in the app between the first and second check in points, so I guess it’s that important. Next, we went through security scans and finally made our way into the queue to get our cards. That line was the longest, but they began boarding as we were making our way through the queue and by the time we finished getting our boarding photo taken and our keys were in our hands, they were just about to start general boarding and the agent told us to just walk onboard.
Our arrival at the pier was a minute or two before 11:00 AM. We were walking onboard the ship by 11:30 AM. As long as the lines were, everything was efficient and we just walked on right through, simultaneously lost in this ship that we stepped off of 11 months ago and feeling like we’d never left. We beelined for The Local to get a table since we knew it would fill up quickly, and we found it already busy with folks ready to get their cruises started (probably because it offers the nearest bar to where you step onboard!). The menus had changed a bit since our last visit, but we noshed on appetizers, polished off our beverage package with a round of sodas (because anything harder that earlier in the day with the early wake up we had would have put us under) and let the deja vu pour over us.
After lunch, we checked in at our muster drill to get it knocked out of the way. Instead of lining up and queuing outside, we checked in at our muster station for a short presentation on how to put on a life jacket and what to do if the horn sounds (turns out, you have to put on warm clothes and closed toe shoes, so hopefully the emergency that forces the horn to sound can wait on a trip back to your room to consider your wardrobe!). And then, once we got our cards scanned, we were set free to re-explore the ship. We wandered up and down and all around the public areas trying to jog our memories of the things we discovered the year before. The atrium was just as grand, the waterfront was just as scenic and the menu at the mojito bar was just as intriguing.
We ultimately settled in at the Observation Lounge and commented to each other how quiet it was, knowing that by the time we got to Glacier Bay, this lounge would be packed to the brim and people would be saving observation loungers before the sun came up. We FaceTime’d Mom to show her around and lingered over some iced teas when the announcement came that rooms were ready (earlier than expected — 12:30!).
Stephanie loved the location of our room last year, so when she booked this trip, she tried to get us as close as possible. There’s a section of the ship that’s under an overhang from the go kart track, providing some extra coverage from any potential rain (a must on an itinerary like this at this time of year!). We had to flip to the other starboard side of the ship, though, which meant the room configuration changed from sofa by the closet to sofa by the window. We didn’t love this arrangement, but we were on a cruise instead of sitting home working so we really couldn’t complain!
Our luggage was delivered not long after we settled into our cabin. Stephanie took a nap before she started unpacking. I went for a walk on The Waterfront and then up to the Garden Cafe for some mango water and some chocolate bark they had put out for lunch. The Garden Cafe had an expansive array of offerings for lunch, but Carnival still takes the cake on casual eats for us, for the sheer number of made to order options they have in their Lido Marketplace. The offerings on the Norwegian Encore were many, but there wasn’t a made to order taqueria, or a made to order deli, or a made to order pizzeria or burger shop. The offerings are fine for what they are and I think there are other area (like the tea time offerings in the Observation Lounge) where Norwegian excels vs Carnival — but on casual eats, there are more on Norwegian that aren’t done quite as well as Carnival does them.
When I got back to the room, Stephanie was ready to go out so we headed downstairs for a few more laps around The Waterfront before we headed back to the room for sailaway. Seattle offers an incredibly scenic sailaway, but our sailaway was made a bit more memorable in the form of a person on the dock verbally sparring with some folks sitting on their balconies, ending in a full strip tease that was definitely NSFW. A new core memory unlocked for our Alaska trips with that one.
When we sailed last year, Seattle was wet and dreary when we sailed out. This year, we had sunshine and a brilliant view of the Space Needle fading into the background as we sailed North out of Elliott Bay. We snapped a million pictures, we took a bunch of videos and we crossed our fingers the weather in our first port (Juneau) was a little drier than it was last year.
Once the landscape faded further off into the distance and the ocean air was cool enough to force our hands into our pockets, we headed back inside to unpack (Stephanie) and watch Cruella (me — turns out, I hate unpacking just as much as I hate packing). Stephanie checked the dining times for the main dining rooms and most of them were booked until the late evening, so we snagged the last 7:15 PM reservation we could find and got cozy until it was time to leave for dinner.
We’d noticed that the app was a little glitchy, and just as we were about to leave for our 7:15 dinner reservation, we noticed that in the app, it was now listed as an 8:45 dinner reservation. We decided to go down to the Savor dining room (one of the three MDR’s on the Encore — they all serve the same menu, though!) where the hostess confirmed that the system had booked us at 8:45 PM, but that she could seat us immediately. The dining room wasn’t particularly busy, which also begged the question if the app was glitching or if they were purposefully keeping the dining rooms at 50% capacity. I didn’t have the answer but either way, service and our meal were pleasant and that honey creme brûlée continues to wow every time I order it!
After dinner, we changed into our cozy clothes and wandered around the ship a bit more. We had coffee up in the Garden Cafe (where, I’m sorry to report, there is no one chanting Washy Washy Healthy Healthy to urge you to wash your hands when you enter) before we headed down to the District Brewhouse, which became one of our favorite night time spots during our last cruise.
I was kind of proud of us for even going out on the first night (in the dozens of cruises we’ve taken, I can count on one hand the number of times we’ve actually made it out on the first night!), but we ordered a round of beer (Stephanie) and cider (me) and sang our hearts out to the hits of the 80s.
Once our voices were sufficiently fried, we headed back to the room with every intention of unpacking. At some point, I fell asleep while we watched Ghostbusters and we booted the unpacking thing to the next day, the only full sea day on our itinerary. If nothing else, it would give us something to do while we sailed on up towards our first port of call in Juneau!
