NCL Star Mexico Cruise Blog Day 1: Embarkation and Leaving Los Angeles

We arrived at the Los Angeles Cruise Terminal at around 10:30 AM. We checked in our baggage at the curb and proceeded to the building for check-in. We were assigned group 4, and were a bit annoyed that there weren't enough chairs for us to sit in the waiting area. This only lasted about 5 minutes as group 3 was called away to register. After about 15 minutes our group was called to go register/check-in. Afterwards we sat back down and waited to be boarded. An announcement was made that boarding forthe Norwegian Star was going to be at noon. After some more waiting we finally were able to board the ship.

We were each given our choice of champagne or orange-ade as we entered the ship. We then proceeded to the Market Cafe at deck 12 to have lunch. There was a large selection of salad, pizza, pastas, as well as a slicing station as well. At 1:30 we went to our ocean-view cabins on Deck 5. They were small as expected but neat and clean. The squarish-porthole was larger than I had envisioned, and provided a nice view of the dock. The shower and the bathroom each had their own sliding door which is nice. The TV stand, however, cannot be rotated so that you can view it from the toilet (which was the case with our cabin on the Norwegian Sun).

We then proceeded to the Internet cafe to buy our Internet usage minutes. The embarkation speicals were 20 free minutes if you buy 250 minutes for $100 (+ $3.95 connection charge) or 15 free minutes if you bought 100 minutes for $55. We noticed on our NCL Latitudes letter that we can get 30 free minutes if you bought 250, so go for that deal instead if you've been on a NCL cruise before. If you don't mention that deal the Internet manager may well not give you that extra 10 minutes. There was a raffle for prizes at the Barong Spa so we headed over there. Unfortunately we didn't win anything!

For dinner we headed to the Aqua restaurant. The leg of lamb was good, as was the Mahi Mahi. The creme brule was tasty as well and not too sweet. Afterward we went to the Stardust theatre to watch the opening night show, m.c.'ed by Paul, our cruise director. He has a heavy accent and had a hard time pumping up the crowd. The show wasn't very impressive overall especially considering we missed the first 10 minutes and only saw the tail-end of the performance of a muscial dance troupe. The rest of the show consisted of Paul making jokes, interacting with the crowd, and several solo musical acts.

Afterwards we were encouraged to go the the party at the Spinnaker lounge so we obliged. There was a raffle to win various prizes such as t-shirts, bingo cards, and even a free shore excursion. We didn't win anything there either! After the 70's dance music started blaring and we danced for about half an hour before calling it an evening.

NCL Star Mexico Cruise Blog Day 1: Embarkation and Leaving Los Angeles - December 13, 2008 | Log-in or register a new user account | 0 Reviews/Comments

Reviews and Comments are opinion statements made by the author.
They do not necessarily represent the opinions of the site editor.