Getting on NCL Star

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Geo: 22.33, 114.18

Monday, January 16, 2017

Today is Embarking Day - the day we get on NCL ship. I woke up especially early. Guess I was excited. I have an app where I can "track" the NCL Star, so I checked to see where and when the ship would be arriving. I noticed the STAR was just about an hour from docking. I had thought it would sailing right in front of the hotel, however it was sailing from the right. So, exactly at 5:45am and according to my app, it appeared to the right of us. Cool.

DALLAS COWBOYS At the same time, as I was watching the Star slowly move up to the dock, Glenn was listening /watching the Dallas Cowboy vs Green Bay Packers on ESPN app. The TV in the hotel room was not broadcasting the game. So, like every 3-4 minutes Glenn would refresh the app and then he would tell me how they were doing. The first 1/2 of the game, the Cowboys did terrible. Since I had gotten up especially early, decided that it was a good time to take a nap. I woke up during the 4th Quarter in the last 4 minutes. The Cowboys tied it up. Then the Cowboys went ahead. However, in the last minute, the Packers kicked a field goal and won. Heartbreak.

We went down for breakfast. In the hall way, we met a couple from England. She had a "boot" on her leg, and was using a cane. Bless her heart. We also found out that they were on the NCL cruise ship. Then we found out that they had booked the hotel reservations on-line and had only booked 1 breakfast - that really set of "off", so they decided to forget eating breakfast at the hotel and go grab something at McDonalds. The next thing we knew, they were returning, she sitting in her wheel chair, cussing the world out. She was definitely in a bad mood. Moreen was her name.

Glenn took our MTR octopus card down to the MTR station and got a refund on the money we didn't spend for transportation. After a quick Skype call to Dad, Glenn and I did the finish packing of our luggage. We got a taxi to the port. The cost was around 20.00 USD Not too bad. Sure beats taking the MTR, cause the closest station was about 1 mile away from the drop off. As we drove, we noticed that there was an IKEA store. I immediately thought about Karen, because she has been posting on FB about her trip to the IKEA store - don't know if it was a good or bad experience.

We had to wait about 1 hour until they called our name to board. They checked to see if we had purchased an Australia visa - so I showed them my receipt that I had done on line. And then we had to sign up for a Vietnam Visa. The staff then took our passport. We walked on board about 5 minutes til 2pm. We immediately walked down to the Versailles Restaurant - the main restaurant at the rear of the boat. Our room wouldn't be ready until our luggage arrive.

Glenn ate salmon and I had chicken. We had a window seat. Nice to finally be on board. We got to our room and started to unpack. At 4:30pm, we made our way to the Stardust Theatre for our security drill. After the drill, we noticed 2 of the 5 ladies we had met in Stanley. Claire and GiGi. We walked down to reintroduce ourselves. Then we learned that Brian (very tall guy) and his wife arrived from Dubai. As we were in the elevator together, Brian started making fun of Tex - aka Glenn. Glenn made another pun and everyone in the elevator laughed.

We walked around the outside to look at the beautiful Hong Kong Harbor. I think it was one of the prettiest ones I have ever seen. The captain announced that there was a medical emergency and they we would be leaving slightly later. We pulled away from the dock at 6:30pm. The skyline was beautiful. The sun had already set and the building were lit up. There were several buildings that had laser lights on them.

As we were going downstairs to eat dinner, we asked to join the couple in line behind us. Gloria and Al, couple about our age, from San Antonio. We learned that they have cruised many many times. They have been married over 40 years, have 2 kids and 2 grandkids. Quite interesting couple. About 1 year ago, there was a cruise ship (Royal Caribbean) that was sailing from NJ down to Florida and ran into some strong winds, waves, etc - they were on that ship. We talked about that experience. Al travels and does speaking engagements. We did excuse our self early so we could make the 8:45 show.

The show was ok. There was a special violinist and singing. I told Glenn that I would not go hear her again. The rest of the show was good. Glenn excused himself early as he wasn't feeling well. I returned back to our cabin and got ready for bed. Glenn soon arrived in our cabin. 11023. Not as big of a room when we cruised through South America (that one had a couch).

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