schmoopie17

Will be following along with everyone on their shore excursions. We will have an Iceland stop for two days next year but have no idea what to see or do. I guess we can anticipate seeing lots of ice...hence the name.

On this point I need to disagree. My feeling is that desserts are the one area where NCL consistently excels. I almost never get dessert when we go out for dinner on land, but I always get dessert after every meal on an NCL cruise. As for entertainment, I'm shocked that nobody has mentioned "Choir of Man". Probably the best NCL production show...until they replace it with some inane game show (but hopefully not before September when we're on the Escape again).

WOW...looks like a huge "crowd" for Deal or no Deal. That was about the same size "crowd" we had for Wheel of Fortune on the Jade. Hoping NCL observes the "crowds" and decides to pull the plug on the game show fiasco.

All of this Chocolate Cowboy talk has caused me to dig deep into the photo archives for this picture of the Schmoopies with the famous one behind the bar on the Prima last year.

Agree. For cruisers who do the stairmaster in the gym...if you have a stop in Cannes, (or the other French place I can't pronounce)...skip the stairmaster and take the excursion to Eze. More than enough stairs in that place.

All of this swearing is going on because he knows you can't stick a bar of soap in his mouth. Smart man.

Surely/Shirley you can't be serious. Le Bistro is consistently one of our favorite NCL dining venues. Been four times...had Filet four times. Delighted four times. As I've so astutely pointed out in previous posts, if you want a great steak, go to Le Bistro. After all, Filet Mignon is French. Just be sure to get it without that goose liver crapola on top.

So, I'm confused. Do we blame NCL or the port staff for making people wait so long hanging upside down? I'm leaning toward port staff...but so many things are upside down in the world today, I'm not sure who to blame in this instance.

We always check our bags, but on our upcoming September cruise (r/t Rome) we're doing carry-on only. We will have a tight departure time out of FCO going home, so we don't want to have a later debark time and then have to wait to get our bags in the pick-up area after debarking the ship. Also don't want to drag two giant suitcases, plus other stuff, down four flights of stairs, (elevators will be packed to the gills) since we're doing self-debark to get to our private transport to FCO as soon as possible. Also don't want to have to waste time checking bags at FCO...rumor has it it can add a significant amount of time at FCO. Plus, checked bags = fees. So, in this instance, carry-on is the way to go. Although Mrs. Schmoopie is already fretting about not having enough room for all of her "stuff". Plus, we have bulkhead seats reserved both ways, which limits our onboard storage options. But I assume we'll somehow manage.

Can't tell from the picture...did you have the ashtray in front of the toilet? How about the sign that says "No smoking in bed"?

The Jade has two Main Dining Rooms...Alizar and Grand Pacific. We only ate in Alizar once in 14 nights...just didn't "do it" for us. We thought it had a "different" vibe...not horrible, just different. Not as elegant (or as "Grand") as Grand Pacific. On the bright side, you can wear shorts in there. Grand Pacific we ate in three or four times and I believe I needed to wear long pants (in my case, jeans). But don't quote me on that (although, this is CC, so someone will probably end up quoting me 😁)... Oh, one more thing. Baseball caps are not allowed in Jasmine, the Asian restaurant where we ate at least four times.

This is for cruise buffs only...

Bummer. Maybe on your next ship(s).

Nowadays when you go into a website they ask if you'll accept their cookies. I'll accept these...

Also the Local/O'Sheahan's...depending on the ship.