Welcome to our coastal cruise! My husband Carl and I hadn’t cruised since before Covid. Things have changed, a few for the better. Many for the worse. For the good or bad, here we go!
We chose to take the flyaway from Van Nuys to LAX. Because we had an international flight to Vancouver, we were told to be at the airport three hours early. Our flight left at six. Since we had to build in travel time and the fact the flyaway only runs once an hour early in the morning, we didn’t bother going to bed.
There were signs in the flyaway terminal explaining we pay on the bus, a departure from our travel a year ago. Not a single employee was in the terminal. To pass the time, we chatted with a nurse who was on her way to visit family. The ticket machine was on the bus steps. We should have downloaded an app, purchased and activated tickets on our phone. Since we didn’t do that, the bus driver said no problem. All we had to do was use a tap credit card. Well, although we have one of those, we didn’t bring it. Disbelieving our credit card wouldn’t tap, the bus driver took my card, intent to make it work. I so enjoy being treated like an idiot who doesn’t understand my own credit card. Thankfully, the nurse from the waiting room came to our rescue. We paid her cash, she used her tap card to buy our tickets. Whew. First disaster avoided.
We got to the airport a little more than three hours early only to find nothing open. We perched on the edge of some luggage equipment and waited until 3:45 for someone to show up. Next challenge. We needed to learn to use a kiosk to check in and print our luggage tags which we attached ourselves. Our tickets did not include our TSA information. We had to either trudge through the longer line with everyone else or go back to the counter and have our boarding passes redone. We chose to trudge.
Because there was a light bulb out on the display in the cockpit of our plane, we waited for maintenance to come and fix it before we could take off. And, there’s nothing quite like being shoved like a sardine into seats for three hours.
Vancouver Airport was almost empty and well-organized although the first thing most passengers crave at the end of a flight is a restroom. Those were located quite far away. We had to figure out yet another machine where we became our own immigration officer, scanning our passports and answering a couple of electronic questions.
A little fall color at the airport.
The bus ride to the port was long. There aren’t actual highways in Vancouver so we rode along streets with signals all the way. Finally, we sighted our ship but our journey’s end was not actually in sight. Vancouver cruise ships have found a way to save money. All the ships load and leave at the same time, which means they share the terminal and port employees. Bad news for travelers: three ships leaving at the same time meant the line to go through immigration and board made Disneyland lines appear minuscule. Two tired passengers were relieved to finally open the door to our stateroom.
Sea planes land and take off every few minutes in Vancouver.
The emergency drill has improved. We only needed to watch a video on the phone and check in at our muster station. Easy and short.
One thing hasn’t changed—the daily cruise paper.
We didn’t have lotion or tissue. Our stateroom attendant Kenang quickly remedied those problems. Tissues were hidden in a drawer in the desk. He provided lotion since I asked.
It finally felt like a vacation when we sat on our balcony and watched as the ship left the port.
We passed under the Lion’s Gate Bridge, built in 1938.
Our first evening show was a bit of singing and dancing and a great comedian, Billy Galan. His jokes come quick. You have to pay attention. He’ll be back.