The Norwegian Pearl
In the spring of 2015, Marc and I sailed with Norwegian Cruise Line for the very first time. We sailed with them on our fourth trip to the Caribbean. We specifically chose this particular sailing because it had more stops than the usual 7 day cruise to the Western Caribbean. We liked their freestyle cruising so much that we decided to travel with them again on our fifth cruise, this time to the Panama Canal. It was the NCL Dawn we boarded last year. This year, it was the NCL Pearl for us. I must say, little did we realize that the two ships looked so much alike in layout and décor. In fact, these two ships even shared the same names for their theaters, restaurants, and lounges.
The Norwegian Pearl
Boarding the ship took a while. The cruise line had all passengers board by assigned numbers and Marc and I were in placed in group 10. That mean, many more passengers arrived before us and they were able to board first.
Unlike in previous sailings, it is now law that cruise passengers attend the safety drill before the ship actually sailed and left port. Thus, at 3 pm on the day of boarding, Marc and I went to the Summer Palace restaurant on the ship's deck 6 to attend the mandatory fire and safety drill. It meant, given our cabin's location on board, this venue was our assigned station in the event of an emergency and evacuation.
A view of the drill in progress
As soon as the drill ended, it was time to explore the ship. This was a view of the port terminal from one of the ship's decks. The tube connecting the terminal to the ship had already been taken away.
Another partial view of the terminal