I will answer your questions in the order you posed them!

No luggage labels required at the airport...electronically printed at check-in. The cruise labels should be applied just before boarding, so they do not get ripped by airline!

It would be wise to have a copy of both the easyjet booking, and the on-line e-document. Also, don't forget passport!!

We always board late morning, in time for lunch, no matter what the "tickets" say! You will be allowed on, no fears there.

No, you will require passport also!!

Thank you so much for your prompt and informative reply, you've put my mind at rest. Thanks also for reminder about the passport

OK with NCL out of BCN,

This will be the Jade or the Gem (if this year).

NCL work with edocs, but if you book through the UK looks like they still send them.

It is important that you fill in the on-line registrations.
The Edocs have luggage tags you can print, apply them at the terminal building(or hotel) all the porters carry SHIP tags they will put your cabin No, on the tags for you if you don't have any.

If you have not already create a NCL user account
https://www.ncl.com/nclweb/secure/bookedGuestLanding.html
or
https://seaweb.it.ncl.com/sw/ConsumerIndex.do

This will work on both UK and US sites handy for tracking things later.

If you don'r want to do this account you can do your pre reg/check in here
https://checkin.ncl.com/?locale=en-GB

OK thats the paper work done, if you forget either the Air or cruise paperwork you will still get on as long as you have your pasports. but it can cause some minor issues so best to try and remember.

NCL try to start boarding between some time after 11:00am but it can get delayed a bit, so far at 10:30am onwards we have never seen a queue, so little point in turning up much before 11:00.

Depending on cabin/vip status you will join one of 3 queues, it does not matter if no queues unless in a suite then it is important to let the staff know so you get the VIP and coincierge checkin.

Check in is a bit like the airport give them passports and you get a card back this is your cruise card and also acts as your onboard spend card, it is best to use a credit card for this so have one handy they will need it to set up the account(nationwide,Abbey zero or the post office are the best) make sure you ask for the charges to be applied in $ and NOT converted by NCL to £, even if you want to use cach to pay the onboard account use the CC to register and pay cash once on board.

If you arrive early there may be a wait, they will let any suite/VIP/latitude on first then every one else but it should still be fairly quiet if before 12:00 so won't take long.

The cabins are unlikely to be ready, so we either drop our bags off in the cabin(in the closet and let the steward know) or go staight to lunch( after grabing another glass off bubbly at boarding).

IF you want to eat in a speciality that night think about booking it now(check the show time), we always go to Cagnies first night.

My recomendation is to use the restaurant for lunch rather than the buffet, much better way to start the trip. You should have a freestle daily, get one each, over lunch is the time to examine it carefully for what is going on around the ship, there will be a guided tour at some point. you get one of these daily a marker pen can come in handy to highlight things.

Once you have had lunch the cabins may be ready, next is to go and visit all the speciality restaurants they have samples to try, then on to the spa for the spa tour, or take the ships tour.

IF it is a nice day we stop by the great outdoors at the back of the ship for a drink.

We then go a bag check and if they have arrived at the cabin unpack and get ready for the boat drill or go for another drink.

As a first timer it will be worth going to the welcome aboard show this will give you a fair bit of information.

A few other tips,
Check the Freestyle daily for the 1/2 price speciality restaurants.

Sea days the Sushi will be open for lunch so that is a good time, they also do a sushi saki tasting special.

Check the dinner menu every day and if you don't fancy it look at one of the other places.
try to avoid eating in the main room around 7:00-7:30(varies a bit) that will be the busy time and there may be waits.
On our teip in Jan there was no problem booking same day even very late.

The indian food on the buffet is very good.

If you breakfast in the buffet use the italian for seating the buffet will be madness

Fancy coffee machines are in the buffet area as is ice cream no charge.

Look out for the Bavarian lunch if they do it(great outdoors)

The Bistro Brunch is supposed to be very good(we have never done it)

Look out for the Murder mystery dinner they may have one but limited numbers, normaly a note in the freestyle 2,3rd day for sigh up in the library.

No cash needed on board but worth taking some $1,€1,£1 for room service tips if you use it

If you have any issues make them known the policy is to try to fix things.
If you see or get good service they have SYLE cards you can use to let the management know.

Any other question on NCL let us know on this thread.

One last thing sign up for the Cruisecritic roll call for your cruise and go to the Meet and Greet .
I can give you an exact link if you give me ship and date. but it will be under here somewhere
http://boards.cruisecritic.com/forumdisplay.php?f=110
need to register though.

If you are going this Friday on the Jade then it is a friend of mine doing the organization.

I've just lost my post!

Thank you for your reply Windjammer, esp for the online check in link to ncl although I had to ring them in the end as it wasn't recognising me as a guest. A nice rep sorted it out over the phone for me - at least I hope it's sorted!

Lots of super information for me to peruse, would you mind if I print it?

I've been reading this board for 18 mnths - 2 years now and thoroughly enjoy the posts. It was nice to receive replies from Hamrag and Windjammer as I've read and enjoyed many of your cruise posts.

I've got marker pens, an extension plug, walkie talkies and a night light so as you can see I've been paying attention.

We're going on the Gem in May and my butterflies have now got butterflies .

Hi, I just thought I'd post to say that I'm back.

We were on the 3 - 10 May trip and it was incredible. Much much better than I had even hoped for. I went with my teenage daughter who hadn't read anything about the Gem beforehand and she loved it. It was ideal for us, the staff were brilliant, lovely mix of passengers mainly of europeans and americans. The weather was fantastic. I can't think of a single negative. I've been back a fortnight and I'm still on a high.

Thanks for the helpful info - I did print it out and take it with me.